Video released by spacecraft maker Area, X commemorating its Dragon pill, which on May 25, 2012, ended up being the very first business spacecraft to dock with the International Spaceport Station. Area, X (A Britannica Publishing Partner), (born June 28, 1971, Pretoria, South Africa), South African-born American business owner who cofounded the electronic-payment company Pay, Buddy and formed Space, X, maker of launch lorries and spacecraft. He was also among the very first significant financiers in, as well as ceo of, the electric car maker Tesla. Leading Questions, Elon Musk was born upon June 28, 1971. Elon Musk cofounded the electronic payment firm Pay, Buddy and founded the spacecraft business Area, X.
Elon Musk founded Area, X, a company that makes rockets and spacecraft. He ended up being the chief executive officer and a significant funder of Tesla, that makes electric cars and trucks. Musk was born to a South African father and a Canadian mother. He displayed an early skill for computer systems and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he developed a computer game and sold it to a computer system publication. In 1988, after acquiring a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa because he hesitated to support apartheid through mandatory military service and since he looked for the higher financial chances offered in the United States. Musk attended Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, and in 1992 he transferred to the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, where he got bachelor's degrees in physics and economics in 1997.
In 1995 he established Zip2, a company that supplied maps and business directory sites to online newspapers. In 1999 Zip2 was bought by the computer manufacturer Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then established an online financial services business, X.com, which later on ended up being Pay, Buddy, which concentrated on transferring money online. The online auction e, Bay bought Pay, Friend in 2002 for $1. 5 billion. Musk was long convinced that for life to survive, humankind needs to become a multiplanet types. However, he was disappointed with the excellent expense of rocket launchers. In 2002 he established Area Expedition Technologies (Space, X) to make more inexpensive rockets.
A third rocket, the Falcon Heavy (initially introduced in 2018), was created to bring 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, nearly twice as much as its largest competitor, the Boeing Business's Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the cost. Area, X has revealed the follower to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy: the Super Heavy, Starship system. The Super Heavy very first stage would can lifting 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) to low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft developed for offering quick transportation in between cities in the world and constructing bases on the Moon and Mars.
Dragon can carry as numerous as 7 astronauts, and it had a crewed flight carrying astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to the ISS in 2020. Musk sought to reduce the cost of spaceflight by establishing a completely multiple-use rocket that might take off and go back to the pad it launched from. Beginning in 2012, Space, X's Grasshopper rocket made numerous brief flights to test such technology. In addition to being CEO of Area, X, Musk was likewise chief designer in building the Falcon rockets, Dragon, and Grasshopper. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to unique material. Subscribe Now Musk had actually long had an interest in the possibilities of electrical automobiles, and in 2004 he turned into one of the major funders of Tesla Motors (later renamed Tesla), an electric vehicle business established by entrepreneurs Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.