Video released by spacecraft maker Space, X commemorating its Dragon capsule, which on May 25, 2012, ended up being the 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 entrepreneur who cofounded the electronic-payment company Pay, Pal and formed Area, X, maker of launch cars and spacecraft. He was also one of the first significant investors in, as well as president of, the electric vehicle maker Tesla. Leading Questions, Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971. Elon Musk cofounded the electronic payment firm Pay, Buddy and founded the spacecraft company Space, X.
Elon Musk founded Space, X, a company that makes rockets and spacecraft. He became the primary executive officer and Look at more info a major funder of Tesla, that makes electric cars. Musk was born to a South African father and a Canadian mom. He showed an early talent for computer systems and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he developed a computer game and offered it to a computer publication. In 1988, after getting a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa because he was reluctant to support apartheid through obligatory military service and due to the fact that he looked for the greater financial chances offered in the United States. Musk participated in Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, and in 1992 he moved to the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, where he received bachelor's degrees in physics and economics in 1997.
In 1995 he founded Zip2, a company that provided maps and business directory sites to online papers. In 1999 Zip2 was bought by the computer system manufacturer Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then established an online financial services business, X.com, which later became Pay, Buddy, which focused on transferring cash online. The online auction e, Bay bought Pay, Buddy in 2002 for $1. 5 billion. Musk was long convinced that for life to survive, mankind needs to end up being a multiplanet types. However, he was disappointed with the great cost of rocket launchers. In 2002 he established Space Expedition Technologies (Space, X) to make more cost effective rockets.
A 3rd rocket, the Falcon Heavy (first released in 2018), was developed to carry 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, nearly twice as much as its largest rival, the Boeing Company's Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the expense. Space, X has revealed the successor to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy: the Super Heavy, Starship system. The Super Heavy first phase would can lifting 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) to low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft created for providing fast transport in between cities on Earth and building bases on the Moon and Mars.
Dragon can bring as numerous as 7 astronauts, and it had a crewed flight bring astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to the ISS in 2020. Musk looked for to lower the expenditure of spaceflight by establishing a totally multiple-use rocket that might take off and return to the pad it launched from. Learn more here Beginning in 2012, Space, X's Insect rocket made numerous short flights to test such innovation. In addition to being CEO of Area, X, Musk was also chief designer in constructing the Falcon rockets, Dragon, and Insect. Get a Britannica Premium membership and gain access to special content. Subscribe Now Musk had actually long been interested in the possibilities of electrical cars, and in 2004 he turned into one of the major funders of Tesla Motors (later on renamed Tesla), an electrical vehicle business established by entrepreneurs Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.