Video released by spacecraft maker Space, X celebrating its Dragon capsule, which on May 25, 2012, became the first industrial spacecraft to dock with the International Space Station. Space, X (A Britannica Publishing Partner), (born June 28, 1971, Pretoria, South Africa), South African-born American entrepreneur who cofounded the electronic-payment firm Pay, Buddy and formed Area, X, maker of launch cars and spacecraft. He was also among the first considerable investors in, as well as chief executive officer of, the electrical automobile manufacturer Tesla. Leading Questions, Elon Musk was born upon June 28, 1971. Elon Musk cofounded the electronic payment firm Pay, Friend and founded the spacecraft company Area, X.
Elon Musk established Space, X, a company that makes rockets and spacecraft. He became the ceo and a major funder of Tesla, which makes electrical cars and trucks. Musk was born to a South African daddy and a Canadian mom. He displayed an early skill for computers and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he developed a computer game and offered it to a computer magazine. In 1988, after getting a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa since he was reluctant to support apartheid through required military service and due to the fact that he looked for the greater economic chances offered in the United States. Musk went to 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 established Zip2, a business that offered maps and service directories to online newspapers. In 1999 Zip2 was purchased by the computer system manufacturer Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then founded an online monetary services business, X.com, which later on ended up being Pay, Friend, which concentrated on moving cash online. The online auction e, Bay purchased Pay, Pal in 2002 for $1. 5 billion. Musk was long persuaded that for life to make it through, humankind has to become a multiplanet species. However, he was dissatisfied with the excellent expense of rocket launchers. In 2002 he founded Space Expedition Technologies (Space, X) to make more budget friendly rockets.
A third rocket, the Falcon Heavy (first launched in 2018), was created to carry 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, nearly two times as much as its largest competitor, the Boeing Company's Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the expense. Space, X has actually announced the successor to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy: the Super Heavy, Starship system. The Super Heavy first phase would can raising 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) to low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft developed for offering fast transport between cities in the world and constructing bases on the Moon and Mars.
Dragon can bring as many as seven astronauts, and it had a crewed flight carrying astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to the ISS in 2020. Musk looked for to reduce the cost of spaceflight by establishing a completely multiple-use rocket that could lift off and go back to the pad it released from. Beginning in 2012, Space, X's Insect rocket made a number of short flights to test such innovation. In addition to being CEO of Area, X, Musk was likewise primary 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 electric vehicles, and in 2004 he turned into one of the significant funders of Tesla Motors (later relabelled Tesla), an electrical automobile business established by business owners Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.