Video launched by spacecraft maker Space, X celebrating its Dragon capsule, which on May 25, 2012, became the very first commercial spacecraft to dock with the International Area Station. Space, 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, Pal and formed Area, X, maker of launch lorries and spacecraft. He was also among the first substantial financiers in, along with ceo of, the electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla. Top 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 founded Area, X, a company that makes rockets and spacecraft. He became the primary executive officer and a major funder of Tesla, which makes electrical cars and trucks. Musk was born to a South African father and a Canadian mom. He showed an early talent for computers and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he developed a video game and sold it to a computer magazine. In 1988, after acquiring a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa since he hesitated to support apartheid through obligatory military service and because he looked for the higher economic chances readily available in the United States. Musk went to Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, and in 1992 he transferred 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 service directories to online papers. In 1999 Zip2 was bought by the computer system maker Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then established an online financial services business, X.com, which later ended up being Pay, Friend, which specialized in transferring money online. The online auction e, Bay bought Pay, Buddy in 2002 for $1. 5 billion. Musk was long convinced that for life to endure, mankind has to become a multiplanet types. However, he was disappointed with the great expenditure of rocket launchers. In 2002 he established Area Exploration Technologies (Space, X) to make more budget-friendly rockets.
A third rocket, the Falcon Heavy (initially introduced in 2018), was created to carry 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, almost two times as much as its biggest competitor, the Boeing Company's Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the expense. Area, X has actually revealed the follower to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy: the Super Heavy, Starship system. The Super Heavy very first phase would be capable of lifting 100,000 kg (220,000 pounds) to low Earth orbit. The payload would be the Starship, a spacecraft designed for supplying fast transport between cities in the world and developing bases on the Moon and Mars.
Dragon can bring as lots of as seven astronauts, and it had a crewed flight bring astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to the ISS in 2020. Musk looked for to minimize the expense of spaceflight by developing a totally multiple-use rocket that might take off and go back to the pad it introduced from. Starting in 2012, Space, X's Insect rocket made a number of short flights to test such innovation. In addition to being CEO of Space, X, Musk was also chief designer in developing the Falcon rockets, Dragon, and Grasshopper. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to unique material. Subscribe Now Musk had actually long been interested in the possibilities of electric cars and trucks, and in 2004 he turned into one of the significant funders of Tesla Motors (later on relabelled Tesla), an electric automobile business founded by business owners Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.