Video released by spacecraft maker Space, X commemorating its Dragon capsule, which on May 25, 2012, became 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 cars and spacecraft. He was likewise among the first significant financiers in, in addition to ceo of, the electrical vehicle manufacturer Tesla. Leading Questions, Elon Musk was born upon June 28, 1971. Elon Musk cofounded the electronic payment firm Pay, Buddy and founded the spacecraft company Area, X.
Elon Musk established Space, X, a business that makes rockets and spacecraft. He became the chief executive officer and a significant funder of Tesla, that makes electric vehicles. Musk was born to a South African father and a Canadian mom. He displayed an early talent for computer systems and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he created a computer game and sold it to a computer publication. In 1988, after getting a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa since he was reluctant to support apartheid through compulsory military service and because he looked for the greater economic opportunities offered in the United States. Musk attended Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, and in 1992 he moved 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 offered maps and organization directories to online papers. In 1999 Zip2 was purchased by the computer system manufacturer Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then founded an online monetary services company, X.com, which later on ended up being Pay, Buddy, which focused on moving money online. The online auction e, Bay bought Pay, Buddy in 2002 for $1. 5 billion. Musk was long persuaded that for life to endure, humankind needs to end up being a multiplanet types. However, he was dissatisfied with the fantastic expense of rocket launchers. In 2002 he founded Area Exploration Technologies (Space, X) to make more economical rockets.
A 3rd rocket, the Falcon Heavy (first released in 2018), was created to bring 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, almost twice as much as its largest competitor, the Boeing Business's Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the expense. Space, X has announced the follower to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy: the Super Heavy, Starship system. The Super Heavy very first stage would be capable of lifting 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) to low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft created for supplying fast transportation in between cities in the world and developing bases on the Moon and Mars.
Dragon can carry as numerous 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 expenditure of spaceflight by developing a completely multiple-use rocket that might lift off and go back to the pad it released from. Starting in 2012, Space, X's Insect rocket made several brief flights to evaluate such technology. In addition to being CEO of Space, X, Musk was also primary designer in developing the Falcon rockets, Dragon, and Grasshopper. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to special content. Subscribe Now Musk had long had an interest in the possibilities of electric cars, and in 2004 he turned into one of the major funders of Tesla Motors (later relabelled Tesla), an electrical vehicle business founded by entrepreneurs Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.