BEGINNings / SCHOOL

• 28 June 1971: Born in Pretoria, South Africa

• 1983: Writes and designs a video game called Blastar; sells for $500

• 1989-1991: Attends college at Queen's University (Ontario) but transfers to University of Pennsylvania; completes BS in Economics and a BA with a major in Physics

• 1995: Begins graduate program at Stanford; drops out after two days to found Zip2

Spacex

• Founded in 2002

• Musk is currently CEO and CTO

• Develops and manufactures space launch vehicles

• Create a "true spacefaring civilization"

• Reduce cost of spaceflight

SOlarCity

• Musk provided initial concept and early funds

• Co-founded in 2006 by his cousins Lyndon and Peter Rive

• Second largest provider of solar power systems in the US

Tesla Motors

• Incorporated in 2003 by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning

• First product was the Roadster

• Roadster based on Lotus Elise but featured all-electric drivetrain

• Musk took over as CEO and product architect in 2008

How did he do it?

• Creative thinker & very innovative

• "Brains of an engineer, guts of an entrepreneur"

• "How can I make this better?" mentality

• Described as a real-life Iron Man/Tony Stark