who is elon musk biography timeline

South African entrepreneur Elon Musk is known for founding Tesla Motors and SpaceX, which launched a landmark commercial spacecraft in 2012.

Who Is Elon Musk?

Elon Musk is a South African-born American entrepreneur and businessman who founded X.com in 1999 (which later became PayPal), SpaceX in 2002 and Tesla Motors in 2003. Musk became a multimillionaire in his late 20s when he sold his start-up company, Zip2, to a division of Compaq Computers.

Musk made headlines in May 2012, when SpaceX launched a rocket that would send the first commercial vehicle to the International Space Station. He bolstered his portfolio with the purchase of SolarCity in 2016 and cemented his standing as a leader of industry by taking on an advisory role in the early days of President Donald Trump 's administration.

In January 2021, Musk reportedly surpassed Jeff Bezos as the wealthiest man in the world.

Musk was born on June 28, 1971, in Pretoria, South Africa. As a child, Musk was so lost in his daydreams about inventions that his parents and doctors ordered a test to check his hearing.

At about the time of his parents’ divorce, when he was 10, Musk developed an interest in computers. He taught himself how to program, and when he was 12 he sold his first software: a game he created called Blastar.

In grade school, Musk was short, introverted and bookish. He was bullied until he was 15 and went through a growth spurt and learned how to defend himself with karate and wrestling.

Musk’s mother, Maye Musk , is a Canadian model and the oldest woman to star in a Covergirl campaign. When Musk was growing up, she worked five jobs at one point to support her family.

Musk’s father, Errol Musk, is a wealthy South African engineer.

Musk spent his early childhood with his brother Kimbal and sister Tosca in South Africa. His parents divorced when he was 10.

At age 17, in 1989, Musk moved to Canada to attend Queen’s University and avoid mandatory service in the South African military. Musk obtained his Canadian citizenship that year, in part because he felt it would be easier to obtain American citizenship via that path.

In 1992, Musk left Canada to study business and physics at the University of Pennsylvania. He graduated with an undergraduate degree in economics and stayed for a second bachelor’s degree in physics.

After leaving Penn, Musk headed to Stanford University in California to pursue a PhD in energy physics. However, his move was timed perfectly with the Internet boom, and he dropped out of Stanford after just two days to become a part of it, launching his first company, Zip2 Corporation in 1995. Musk became a U.S. citizen in 2002.

Zip2 Corporation

Musk launched his first company, Zip2 Corporation, in 1995 with his brother, Kimbal Musk. An online city guide, Zip2 was soon providing content for the new websites of both The New York Times and the Chicago Tribune . In 1999, a division of Compaq Computer Corporation bought Zip2 for $307 million in cash and $34 million in stock options.

In 1999, Elon and Kimbal Musk used the money from their sale of Zip2 to found X.com, an online financial services/payments company. An X.com acquisition the following year led to the creation of PayPal as it is known today.

In October 2002, Musk earned his first billion when PayPal was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion in stock. Before the sale, Musk owned 11 percent of PayPal stock.

Musk founded his third company, Space Exploration Technologies Corporation, or SpaceX, in 2002 with the intention of building spacecraft for commercial space travel. By 2008, SpaceX was well established, and NASA awarded the company the contract to handle cargo transport for the International Space Station—with plans for astronaut transport in the future—in a move to replace NASA’s own space shuttle missions.

Falcon 9 Rockets

On May 22, 2012, Musk and SpaceX made history when the company launched its Falcon 9 rocket into space with an unmanned capsule. The vehicle was sent to the International Space Station with 1,000 pounds of supplies for the astronauts stationed there, marking the first time a private company had sent a spacecraft to the International Space Station. Of the launch, Musk was quoted as saying, "I feel very lucky. ... For us, it's like winning the Super Bowl."

In December 2013, a Falcon 9 successfully carried a satellite to geosynchronous transfer orbit, a distance at which the satellite would lock into an orbital path that matched the Earth's rotation. In February 2015, SpaceX launched another Falcon 9 fitted with the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) satellite, aiming to observe the extreme emissions from the sun that affect power grids and communications systems on Earth.

In March 2017, SpaceX saw the successful test flight and landing of a Falcon 9 rocket made from reusable parts, a development that opened the door for more affordable space travel.

A setback came in November 2017, when an explosion occurred during a test of the company's new Block 5 Merlin engine. SpaceX reported that no one was hurt, and that the issue would not hamper its planned rollout of a future generation of Falcon 9 rockets.

The company enjoyed another milestone moment in February 2018 with the successful test launch of the powerful Falcon Heavy rocket. Armed with additional Falcon 9 boosters, the Falcon Heavy was designed to carry immense payloads into orbit and potentially serve as a vessel for deep space missions. For the test launch, the Falcon Heavy was given a payload of Musk's cherry-red Tesla Roadster, equipped with cameras to "provide some epic views" for the vehicle's planned orbit around the sun.

In July 2018, Space X enjoyed the successful landing of a new Block 5 Falcon rocket, which touched down on a drone ship less than 9 minutes after liftoff.

BFR Mission to Mars

In September 2017, Musk presented an updated design plan for his BFR (an acronym for either "Big F---ing Rocket" or "Big Falcon Rocket"), a 31-engine behemoth topped by a spaceship capable of carrying at least 100 people. He revealed that SpaceX was aiming to launch the first cargo missions to Mars with the vehicle in 2022, as part of his overarching goal of colonizing the Red Planet.

In March 2018, the entrepreneur told an audience at the annual South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, that he hoped to have the BFR ready for short flights early the following year, while delivering a knowing nod at his previous problems with meeting deadlines.

The following month, it was announced that SpaceX would construct a facility at the Port of Los Angeles to build and house the BFR. The port property presented an ideal location for SpaceX, as its mammoth rocket will only be movable by barge or ship when completed.

Starlink Internet Satellites

In late March 2018, SpaceX received permission from the U.S. government to launch a fleet of satellites into low orbit for the purpose of providing Internet service. The satellite network, named Starlink, would ideally make broadband service more accessible in rural areas, while also boosting competition in heavily populated markets that are typically dominated by one or two providers.

SpaceX launched the first batch of 60 satellites in May 2019, and followed with another payload of 60 satellites that November. While this represented significant progress for the Starlink venture, the appearance of these bright orbiters in the night sky, with the potential of thousands more to come, worried astronomers who felt that a proliferation of satellites would increase the difficulty of studying distant objects in space.

Tesla Motors

Musk is the co-founder, CEO and product architect at Tesla Motors, a company formed in 2003 that is dedicated to producing affordable, mass-market electric cars as well as battery products and solar roofs. Musk oversees all product development, engineering and design of the company's products.

Five years after its formation, in March 2008, Tesla unveiled the Roadster, a sports car capable of accelerating from 0 to 60 mph in 3.7 seconds, as well as traveling nearly 250 miles between charges of its lithium ion battery.

With a stake in the company taken by Daimler and a strategic partnership with Toyota, Tesla Motors launched its initial public offering in June 2010, raising $226 million.

In August 2008, Tesla announced plans for its Model S, the company's first electric sedan that was reportedly meant to take on the BMW 5 series. In 2012, the Model S finally entered production at a starting price of $58,570. Capable of covering 265 miles between charges, it was honored as the 2013 Car of the Year by Motor Trend magazine .

In April 2017, Tesla announced that it surpassed General Motors to become the most valuable U.S. car maker. The news was an obvious boon to Tesla, which was looking to ramp up production and release its Model 3 sedan later that year.

In September 2019, using what Musk described as a "Plaid powertrain," a Model S set a speed record for four-door sedan at Laguna Seca Raceway in Monterey County, California.

The Model 3 was officially launched in early 2019 following extensive production delays. The car was initially priced at $35,000, a much more accessible price point than the $69,500 and up for its Model S and X electric sedans.

After initially aiming to produce 5,000 new Model 3 cars per week by December 2017, Musk pushed that goal back to March 2018, and then to June with the start of the new year. The announced delay didn't surprise industry experts, who were well aware of the company's production problems, though some questioned how long investors would remain patient with the process. It also didn't prevent Musk from garnering a radical new compensation package as CEO, in which he would be paid after reaching milestones of growing valuation based on $50 billion increments.

By April 2018, with Tesla expected to fall short of first-quarter production forecasts, news surfaced that Musk had pushed aside the head of engineering to personally oversee efforts in that division. In a Twitter exchange with a reporter, Musk said it was important to "divide and conquer" to meet production goals and was "back to sleeping at factory."

After signaling that the company would reorganize its management structure, Musk in June announced that Tesla was laying off 9 percent of its workforce, though its production department would remain intact. In an email to employees, Musk explained his decision to eliminate some "duplication of roles" to cut costs, admitting it was time to take serious steps toward turning a profit.

The restructuring appeared to pay dividends, as it was announced that Tesla had met its goal of producing 5,000 Model 3 cars per week by the end of June 2018, while churning out another 2,000 Model S sedans and Model X SUVs. "We did it!" Musk wrote in a celebratory email to the company. "What an incredible job by an amazing team."

The following February, Musk announced that the company was finally rolling out its standard Model 3. Musk also said that Tesla was shifting to all-online sales, and offering customers the chance to return their cars within seven days or 1,000 miles for a full refund.

In November 2017, Musk made another splash with the unveiling of the new Tesla Semi and Roadster at the company's design studio. The semi-truck, which was expected to enter into production in 2019 before being delayed, boasts 500 miles of range as well as a battery and motors built to last 1 million miles.

Model Y and Roadster

In March 2019, Musk unveiled Tesla’s long-awaited Model Y. The compact crossover, which began arriving for customers in March 2020, has a driving range of 300 miles and a 0 to 60 mph time of 3.5 seconds.

The Roadster, also set to be released in 2020, will become the fastest production car ever made, with a 0 to 60 time of 1.9 seconds.

In August 2016, in Musk’s continuing effort to promote and advance sustainable energy and products for a wider consumer base, a $2.6 billion dollar deal was solidified to combine his electric car and solar energy companies. His Tesla Motors Inc. announced an all-stock deal purchase of SolarCity Corp., a company Musk had helped his cousins start in 2006. He is a majority shareholder in each entity.

“Solar and storage are at their best when they're combined. As one company, Tesla (storage) and SolarCity (solar) can create fully integrated residential, commercial and grid-scale products that improve the way that energy is generated, stored and consumed,” read a statement on Tesla’s website about the deal.

The Boring Company

In January 2017, Musk launched The Boring Company, a company devoted to boring and building tunnels in order to reduce street traffic. He began with a test dig on the SpaceX property in Los Angeles.

In late October of that year, Musk posted the first photo of his company's progress to his Instagram page. He said the 500-foot tunnel, which would generally run parallel to Interstate 405, would reach a length of two miles in approximately four months.

In May 2019 the company, now known as TBC, landed a $48.7 million contract from the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority to build an underground Loop system to shuttle people around the Las Vegas Convention Center.

In October 2022, Musk officially bought Twitter and became the social media company's CEO after months of back and forth.

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Musk’s Tweet and SEC Investigation

On August 7, 2018, Musk dropped a bombshell via a tweet: "Am considering taking Tesla private at $420. Funding secured." The announcement opened the door for legal action against the company and its founder, as the SEC began inquiring about whether Musk had indeed secured the funding as claimed. Several investors filed lawsuits on the grounds that Musk was looking to manipulate stock prices and ambush short sellers with his tweet.

Musk’s tweet initially sent Tesla stock spiking, before it closed the day up 11 percent. The CEO followed up with a letter on the company blog, calling the move to go private "the best path forward." He promised to retain his stake in the company, and added that he would create a special fund to help all current investors remain on board.

Six days later, Musk sought to clarify his position with a statement in which he pointed to discussions with the managing director of the Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth fund as the source of his "funding secured" declaration. He later tweeted that he was working on a proposal to take Tesla private with Goldman Sachs and Silver Lake as financial advisers.

The saga took a bizarre turn that day when rapper Azealia Banks wrote on Instagram that, as a guest at Musk's home at the time, she learned that he was under the influence of LSD when he fired off his headline-grabbing tweet. Banks said she overheard Musk making phone calls to drum up the funding he promised was already in place.

The news quickly turned serious again when it was reported that Tesla's outside directors had retained two law firms to deal with the SEC inquiry and the CEO's plans to take the company private.

On August 24, one day after meeting with the board, Musk announced that he had reversed course and would not be taking the company private. Among his reasons, he cited the preference of most directors to keep Tesla public, as well as the difficulty of retaining some of the large shareholders who were prohibited from investing in a private company. Others suggested that Musk was also influenced by the poor optics of an electric car company being funded by Saudi Arabia, a country heavily involved in the oil industry.

On September 29, 2018, it was announced that Musk would pay a $20 million fine and step down as chairman of Tesla's board for three years as part of an agreement with the SEC.

Inventions and Innovations

In August 2013, Musk released a concept for a new form of transportation called the "Hyperloop," an invention that would foster commuting between major cities while severely cutting travel time. Ideally resistant to weather and powered by renewable energy, the Hyperloop would propel riders in pods through a network of low-pressure tubes at speeds reaching more than 700 mph. Musk noted that the Hyperloop could take from seven to 10 years to be built and ready for use.

Although he introduced the Hyperloop with claims that it would be safer than a plane or train, with an estimated cost of $6 billion — approximately one-tenth of the cost for the rail system planned by the state of California — Musk's concept has drawn skepticism. Nevertheless, the entrepreneur has sought to encourage the development of this idea.

After he announced a competition for teams to submit their designs for a Hyperloop pod prototype, the first Hyperloop Pod Competition was held at the SpaceX facility in January 2017. A speed record of 284 mph was set by a German student engineering team at competition No. 3 in 2018, with the same team pushing the record to 287 mph the next year.

AI and Neuralink

Musk has pursued an interest in artificial intelligence, becoming co-chair of the nonprofit OpenAI. The research company launched in late 2015 with the stated mission of advancing digital intelligence to benefit humanity.

In 2017, it was also reported that Musk was backing a venture called Neuralink, which intends to create devices to be implanted in the human brain and help people merge with software. He expanded on the company's progress during a July 2019 discussion, revealing that its devices will consist of a microscopic chip that connects via Bluetooth to a smartphone.

High-Speed Train

In late November 2017, after Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel asked for proposals to build and operate a high-speed rail line that would transport passengers from O'Hare Airport to downtown Chicago in 20 minutes or less, Musk tweeted that he was all-in on the competition with The Boring Company. He said that the concept of the Chicago loop would be different from his Hyperloop, its relatively short route not requiring the need for drawing a vacuum to eliminate air friction.

In summer 2018 Musk announced he would cover the estimated $1 billion needed to dig the 17-mile tunnel from the airport to downtown Chicago. However, in late 2019 he tweeted that TBC would focus on completing the commercial tunnel in Las Vegas before turning to other projects, suggesting that plans for Chicago would remain in limbo for the immediate future.

Flamethrower

Musk also reportedly found a market for The Boring Company's flamethrowers. After announcing they were going on sale for $500 apiece in late January 2018, he claimed to have sold 10,000 of them within a day.

Relationship with Donald Trump

In December 2016, Musk was named to President Trump’s Strategy and Policy Forum; the following January, he joined Trump's Manufacturing Jobs Initiative. Following Trump’s election, Musk found himself on common ground with the new president and his advisers as the president announced plans to pursue massive infrastructure developments.

While sometimes at odds with the president's controversial measures, such as a proposed ban on immigrants from Muslim-majority countries, Musk defended his involvement with the new administration. "My goals," he tweeted in early 2017, "are to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy and to help make humanity a multi-planet civilization, a consequence of which will be the creating of hundreds of thousands of jobs and a more inspiring future for all."

On June 1, following Trump's announcement that he was withdrawing the U.S. from the Paris climate accord, Musk stepped down from his advisory roles.

Personal Life

Wives and children.

Musk has been married twice. He wed Justine Wilson in 2000, and the couple had six children together. In 2002, their first son died at 10 weeks old from sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS). Musk and Wilson had five additional sons together: twins Griffin and Xavier (born in 2004) and triplets Kai, Saxon and Damian (born in 2006).

After a contentious divorce from Wilson, Musk met actress Talulah Riley. The couple married in 2010. They split in 2012 but married each other again in 2013. Their relationship ultimately ended in divorce in 2016.

Girlfriends

Musk reportedly began dating actress Amber Heard in 2016 after finalizing his divorce with Riley and Heard finalized her divorce from Johnny Depp . Their busy schedules caused the couple to break up in August 2017; they got back together in January 2018 and split again one month later.

In May 2018, Musk began dating musician Grimes (born Claire Boucher). That month, Grimes announced that she had changed her name to “ c ,” the symbol for the speed of light, reportedly on the encouragement of Musk. Fans criticized the feminist performer for dating a billionaire whose company has been described as a “predator zone” among accusations of sexual harassment.

The couple discussed their love for one another in a March 2019 feature in the Wall Street Journal Magazine , with Grimes saying “Look, I love him, he’s great...I mean, he’s a super-interesting goddamn person.” Musk, for his part, told the Journal, “I love c’s wild fae artistic creativity and hyper-intense work ethic.”

Grimes gave birth to their son on May 4, 2020, with Musk announcing that they had named the boy "X Æ A-12." Later in the month, after it was reported that the State of California wouldn't accept a name with a number, the couple said they were changing their son's name to "X Æ A-Xii."

Musk and Grimes welcomed their second child, a daughter named Exa Dark Sideræl Musk, in December 2021. The child was delivered via a surrogate.

Nonprofit Work

The boundless potential of space exploration and the preservation of the future of the human race have become the cornerstones of Musk's abiding interests, and toward these, he has founded the Musk Foundation, which is dedicated to space exploration and the discovery of renewable and clean energy sources.

In October 2019 Musk pledged to donate $1 million to the #TeamTrees campaign, which aims to plant 20 million trees around the world by 2020. He even changed his Twitter name to Treelon for the occasion.

QUICK FACTS

• Name: Elon Musk
• Birth Year: 1971
• Birth date: June 28, 1971
• Birth City: Pretoria
• Birth Country: South Africa
• Gender: Male
• Best Known For: South African entrepreneur Elon Musk is known for founding Tesla Motors and SpaceX, which launched a landmark commercial spacecraft in 2012.
• Space Exploration
• Internet/Computing
• Astrological Sign: Cancer
• University of Pennsylania
• Queen's University, Ontario
• Stanford University
• Nacionalities
• South African
• Interesting Facts
• Elon Musk left Stanford after two days to take advantage of the Internet boom.
• In April 2017, Musk's Tesla Motors surpassed General Motors to become the most valuable U.S. car maker.

We strive for accuracy and fairness.If you see something that doesn't look right, contact us !

CITATION INFORMATION

• Article Title: Elon Musk Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
• Url: https://www.biography.com/business-leaders/elon-musk
• Access Date:
• Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
• Last Updated: October 31, 2022
• Original Published Date: April 2, 2014
• I'm very pro-environment, but let's figure out how to do it better and not jump through a dozen hoops to achieve what is obvious in the first place.
• Failure is an option here. If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough.

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A Complete Timeline of Elon Musk’s Business Endeavors

W ith Elon Musk close to claiming a new role as owner of Twitter after a winning bid to purchase it for $44 billion this week , the billionaire entrepreneur can add the social media app to a long list of business ventures he has led, invested in, and supported over his lengthy career . Here’s a timeline of Musk’s most notable business endeavors—both successful and not—over the past three decades.

Along with his brother, Musk founded Zip2, an online business directory, as an online alternative to the standard paper yellow pages. (Google would not launch until 1998.) He sold it for over $300 million in 1999 to Compaq Computer Corporation. Musk was ousted as CEO in 1996, however, when the board of directors decided to install a more experienced leader in his stead.

1999: X.com

Musk invested some of his windfall from the Zip2 sale into his next venture: X.com, an online bank, launched with three other co-founders. X.com’s business model was innovative for its time, in that it incentivized sign-ups and eased the process of transferring funds digitally, with no need for mail or traditional banking infrastructure. In an interview with CBS MarketWatch at the time of the launch, Musk explained his business: “There are no minimum balances. You can open an account and receive a $20 promotional offer in your checking account. You can move $8 to your S&P fund, $3 each to your money market and bond fund, and be left with $6 in your checking.”

He went on to expand more philosophically on the new company: “In my view, the Internet had gone through a couple of stages and was ready for another stage,” he said. “The first stage was where people could trust the Internet for information. This was perhaps ’95 or ’96. The second was to trust the Internet for purchases and begin to use credit cards online to buy books, toys, pet food and that kind of thing. I think we’re at the third stage now where people are ready to use the Internet as their main financial repository.”

2000: PayPal

X.com merged with software company Confinity just one year later, forming PayPal , a secure online payments platform with a foundation in payments conducted for PalmPilots. PayPal would go on to be one of his most successful companies; Musk and his partners, including Confinity co-founder Peter Thiel , sold it to eBay in 2002 for a $1.5 billion stock deal. However, it was a rough start. PayPal was named at one point as one of the “worst business ideas” of 1999, and Musk himself was again removed from his role as CEO while on honeymoon in 2000 , replaced by the board with Thiel.

After going public on the NASDAQ stock exchange in 2002, eBay snapped up PayPal. They would hold onto PayPal until 2015, spinning it off into a separate entity.

2002: SpaceX

Musk next set his sights on a lofty goal: space exploration, and the future colonization Mars. In the past 20 years, SpaceX has dealt with a series of rocket launch failures and Starship explosions. But it has also become a heavy-hitter in the space industry with a number of records to its name, including being the first private company to send a craft to the International Space Station and send astronauts to orbit. It is known for its reusable rockets.

SpaceX is also behind the development of Starlink , a constellation of satellites intended to offer commercial internet service around the globe.

2002: The Musk Foundation

Founded as a 501(c)3 non-profit organization, the Musk Foundation is one of Musk’s least-talked-about endeavors. Its stated goals including supporting renewable energy and pediatric research and education, and the developing of “safe artificial intelligence to benefit humanity.” Between 2002 and 2018 it handed out around $25 million , about half of that to OpenAI, a company owned by Musk himself. (Since 2012, Musk has also been a signatory of The Giving Pledge, in which many of the world’s richest people have committed to giving away the majority of their wealth at some point.)

2004: Tesla

These days, Musk is perhaps best known for his leadership at Tesla , the electric car company named after famed inventor Nikola Tesla. Valued at over $1 trillion at one point in 2021, Tesla was founded in 2003 by two other men; Musk entered a Series A funding round with an investment of $6.5 million, and eventually took an increasingly active role in the company. He has been CEO since 2008. The Model 3 is the most popular electric car in production today, with over one million units sold globally.

Tesla has come in for its fair share of controversy , however, from dealing with long production and fulfillment delays to safety issues with its vehicles and employee complaints about working conditions and management practices.

2006: SolarCity

Founded by his cousins in 2006, SolarCity received Musk’s patronage from the offset; he was their primary financial backer. A solar energy company that became the leading residential solar installer in the U.S. by the mid-2010s, SolarCity installed solar energy systems that were leased to residential users. Musk, via Tesla, acquired SolarCity in 2016 for $2.6 billion in stock and incorporated it into its operations as Tesla Energy.

2015: OpenAI

Musk co-founded OpenAI as a non-profit in 2015, with a for-profit artificial intelligence research lab component; it was started with a $1 billion collective pledge from its founders. Musk has been open about his interest in developing “friendly” AI that supports humanity, but he ended up resigning from the board in 2018 due to conflicts with Tesla’s AI projects.

2016: Neuralink

Another research endeavor, Musk co-founded Neuralink in 2016 with the goal of working on “brain-machine interfaces,” or BMIs, that can be implanted directly into the body. Neuroscientists have been skeptical of Neuralink’s research and claims. While they currently conduct experiments on animals, they moved plans to begin working on human subjects to 2022.

2016: The Boring Company

Founded with the intention of helping dispel city traffic via underground tunnels as a subsidiary of SpaceX, the Boring Company is one of Musk’s side projects. Its aim: build tunnels. They first experimented by tunneling under the SpaceX factory in California. The Boring Company became an independent entity in 2018, and in 2021 completed a tunnel project in Las Vegas to shuttle visitors beneath the Las Vegas Convention Center. It is currently working on further tunnel projects in Las Vegas for underground transport. Other projects are primarily speculative.

Musk once spoke boldly about an ambitious “Hyperloop” system, creating tunnels across the country to revolutionize and speed up underground mass transport between cities. However, Hyperloop mentions have been scrubbed from the Boring Company’s website.

2022: Twitter

After buying up enough stock to make him a majority shareholder by April 1, Musk made the move to purchase Twitter for $44 billion at the end of April. His plans include making Twitter “better than ever” by “enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans.”

🚀💫♥️ Yesss!!! ♥️💫🚀 pic.twitter.com/0T9HzUHuh6 — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 25, 2022

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Elon Musk Biography: Timeline of Events

Elon Musk is the greatest visionary entrepreneur of modern time. He co-found companies that changed the world – from PayPal and Tesla Motors to SpaceX and SolarCity. At the age of 32, when he sold PayPal for $180 million, he could just retire and invest in rising startups. Instead of doing that, he co-found innovative companies that make significant advances in the electric car, solar energy and spaceflight industries. Check this biography timeline of Elon Musk – from his early life to major key events that made him the most audacious entrepreneur of our time. See also the Biography of Howard Hughes .

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When was Elon Musk born?

Where did elon musk go to school, what did elon musk accomplish.

Elon Musk (born June 28, 1971, Pretoria , South Africa) South African -born American entrepreneur who cofounded the electronic-payment firm PayPal and formed SpaceX , maker of launch vehicles and spacecraft . He was also one of the first significant investors in, as well as chief executive officer of, the electric car manufacturer Tesla. In addition, Musk acquired Twitter (later X) in 2022.

Musk was born to a South African father and a Canadian mother. He displayed an early talent for computers and entrepreneurship. At age 12 he created a video game and sold it to a computer magazine. In 1988, after obtaining a Canadian passport, Musk left South Africa because he was unwilling to support apartheid through compulsory military service and because he sought the greater economic opportunities available in the United States .

Musk attended 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. He enrolled in graduate school in physics at Stanford University in California , but he left after only two days because he felt that the Internet had much more potential to change society than work in physics. In 1995 he founded Zip2 , a company that provided maps and business directories to online newspapers. In 1999 Zip2 was bought by the computer manufacturer Compaq for $307 million, and Musk then founded an online financial services company, X.com, which later became PayPal, which specialized in transferring money online. The online auction eBay bought PayPal in 2002 for $1.5 billion.

Musk was long convinced that for life to survive, humanity has to become a multiplanet species. However, he was dissatisfied with the great expense of rocket launchers. In 2002 he founded Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) to make more affordable rockets. Its first two rockets were the Falcon 1 (first launched in 2006) and the larger Falcon 9 (first launched in 2010), which were designed to cost much less than competing rockets. A third rocket, the Falcon Heavy (first launched in 2018), was designed to carry 117,000 pounds (53,000 kg) to orbit, nearly twice as much as its largest competitor, the Boeing Company’s Delta IV Heavy, for one-third the cost. SpaceX has announced the successor to the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy: the Super Heavy–Starship system. The Super Heavy 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 designed for providing fast transportation between cities on Earth and building bases on the Moon and Mars. SpaceX also developed the Dragon spacecraft, which carries supplies to the International Space Station (ISS). Dragon can carry as many as seven astronauts, and it had a crewed flight carrying astronauts Doug Hurley and Robert Behnken to the ISS in 2020. The first test flights of the Super Heavy–Starship system launched in 2020. In addition to being CEO of SpaceX, Musk was also chief designer in building the Falcon rockets, Dragon, and Starship. SpaceX is contracted to build the lander for the astronauts returning to the Moon by 2025 as part of NASA ’s Artemis space program.

Musk had long been interested in the possibilities of electric cars, and in 2004 he became one of the major funders of Tesla Motors (later renamed Tesla), an electric car company founded by entrepreneurs Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning . In 2006 Tesla introduced its first car, the Roadster , which could travel 245 miles (394 km) on a single charge. Unlike most previous electric vehicles, which Musk thought were stodgy and uninteresting, it was a sports car that could go from 0 to 60 miles (97 km) per hour in less than four seconds. In 2010 the company’s initial public offering raised about $226 million. Two years later Tesla introduced the Model S sedan, which was acclaimed by automotive critics for its performance and design. The company won further praise for its Model X luxury SUV, which went on the market in 2015. The Model 3, a less-expensive vehicle, went into production in 2017 and became the best-selling electric car of all time.

Dissatisfied with the projected cost ($68 billion) of a high-speed rail system in California, Musk in 2013 proposed an alternate faster system, the Hyperloop , a pneumatic tube in which a pod carrying 28 passengers would travel the 350 miles (560 km) between Los Angeles and San Francisco in 35 minutes at a top speed of 760 miles (1,220 km) per hour, nearly the speed of sound . Musk claimed that the Hyperloop would cost only $6 billion and that, with the pods departing every two minutes on average, the system could accommodate the six million people who travel that route every year. However, he stated, between running SpaceX and Tesla, he could not devote time to the Hyperloop’s development.

X (formerly Twitter )

Musk joined the social media service Twitter in 2009, and, as @elonmusk, he became one of the most popular accounts on the site, with more than 85 million followers as of 2022. He expressed reservations about Tesla’s being publicly traded, and in August 2018 he made a series of tweets about taking the company private at a value of $420 per share, noting that he had “secured funding.” (The value of $420 was seen as a joking reference to April 20, a day celebrated by devotees of cannabis .) The following month the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sued Musk for securities fraud, alleging that the tweets were “false and misleading.” Shortly thereafter Tesla’s board rejected the SEC’s proposed settlement, reportedly because Musk had threatened to resign. However, the news sent Tesla stock plummeting, and a harsher deal was ultimately accepted. Its terms included Musk’s stepping down as chairman for three years, though he was allowed to continue as CEO; his tweets were to be preapproved by Tesla lawyers, and fines of $20 million for both Tesla and Musk were levied.

Musk was critical of Twitter’s commitment to principles of free speech , in light of the company’s content-moderation policies. Early in April 2022, Twitter’s filings with the SEC disclosed that Musk had bought more than 9 percent of the company. Shortly thereafter Twitter announced that Musk would join the company’s board, but Musk decided against that and made a bid for the entire company, at a value of $54.20 a share, for $44 billion. Twitter’s board accepted the deal, which would make him sole owner of the company. Musk stated that his plans for the company included “enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans.” In July 2022 Musk announced that he was withdrawing his bid, stating that Twitter had not provided sufficient information about bot accounts and claiming that the company was in “material breach of multiple provisions” of the purchase agreement. Bret Taylor, the chair of Twitter’s board of directors, responded by saying that the company was “committed to closing the transaction on the price and terms agreed upon with Mr. Musk.” Twitter sued Musk to force him to buy the company. In September 2022 Twitter’s shareholders voted to accept Musk’s offer. Facing a legal battle, Musk ultimately proceeded with the deal, and it was completed in October.

Among Musk’s first acts as Twitter’s owner were to lay off about half the company and to allow users to purchase for $8 a month the blue check-mark verification, which had previously been bestowed by Twitter upon notable figures. In addition, he disbanded Twitter’s content-moderation body and reinstated many banned accounts, most notably that of former U.S. president Donald Trump , which had been suspended after the U.S. Capitol attack on January 6, 2021 . Advertising revenue fell sharply as many companies withdrew their ads from the platform. Musk changed the name of the company from Twitter to X in July 2023. (Tweets became posts with the change.)

• Collectibles

Elon Musk: The Complete Biography of an Extraordinary Innovator

• by history tools
• March 26, 2024

Elon Musk is one of the most famous entrepreneurs and business leaders of the 21st century. As the co-founder of PayPal, CEO of Tesla Motors and SpaceX, and driving force behind many other companies, Musk has had an outsized influence on technology, space exploration, and solving some of humanity‘s biggest challenges.

Let‘s take a closer look at Musk’s remarkable life story, complex persona, monumental successes and occasional setbacks, and what makes him such a polarizing character.

Childhood and Early Life in South Africa

Musk was born on June 28, 1971 in Pretoria, one of South Africa’s wealthiest and most segregated cities during apartheid. His mother Maye was a famous dietitian and model who grew up in Canada, while his father Errol was a wealthy white South African electromechanical engineer.

As a child, Musk was an avid reader and self-taught computer programmer. At age 12 he created and sold a video game called Blastar to a computer magazine for $500. But his relationship with his father was difficult – his parents divorced when he was 9 years old. Musk chose to live mostly with his father, which he would later regret considering they became estranged.

Discovering His Calling

After spending two years in the South African military, Musk moved to Canada at age 19. He studied at Queen‘s University in Ontario for two years, avoiding mandatory service in the South African military, before transferring to the University of Pennsylvania.

At Penn, Musk pursued a Bachelor’s degree in Physics as well as a Bachelor’s degree in Economics. Most notably, he rekindled an early passion by taking extra classes at the Stanford School of Engineering. It was a harbinger of innovations to come.

Founding Zip2 and PayPal

In 1995 Musk dropped out of Stanford’s PhD program to found his first startup Zip2 Corporation with his brother Kimbal. Zip2 provided online city guides to newspapers like the New York Times and Chicago Tribune.

Compaq bought Zip2 in 1999 for $307 million, earning Musk $22 million. He soon co-founded X.com, one of the first online banks providing services like checking accounts and money transfers.

X.com merged with its rival Confinity in 2000 to become PayPal, with Musk serving as the new CEO. Despite internal struggles at the new company, PayPal went on to revolutionize online payments. In 2002 eBay acquired PayPal for $1.5 billion in stock, of which Musk received $175 million.

“If something‘s important enough you should try, even if the probable outcome is failure.”

Making History with SpaceX

Flush with cash from the PayPal sale, Musk founded Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) in 2002 with an audacious long-term goal: make humanity multi-planetary by establishing a human colony on Mars.

SpaceX develops rockets, spacecraft and satellites aimed at revolutionizing space transportation to eventually make it affordable for private citizens to travel into orbit and to other planets. It almost went bankrupt in 2008, but Musk kept it afloat with personal funds.

In 2012 SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft became the first commercial spaceship to deliver cargo to the International Space Station. And in 2020 SpaceX sent astronauts to the ISS for the first time, effectively resurrecting American manned spaceflight.

Tesla Accelerates Ahead with Musk at the Helm

Also in 2004 Musk made the series A investment round in Tesla Motors and joined Tesla’s board of directors as chairman. Founded by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning in 2003, Tesla aimed to prove electric cars could be better than gasoline-powered cars.

The original Roadster sports car impressed critics, but by 2007 Tesla was also on the verge of bankruptcy. Musk invested heavily in Tesla and took over leadership of the company, serving as CEO and product architect.

Under his guidance, Tesla went public in 2010 to raise funds and the Model S sedan was named Motor Trend‘s 2013 Car of the Year. By 2023 Tesla had become the world‘s most valuable automaker, dominating the rapidly growing EV market.

Expanding His Entrepreneurial Portfolio

In addition to SpaceX and Tesla, Musk has founded or co-founded a number of new companies over the last two decades. These include:

• The Boring Company (2016) – Develops tunnels aimed at eliminating street traffic to reduce transportation time
• Neuralink (2016) – Develops implantable brain-machine interfaces to connect human brains with computers
• OpenAI (2015) – Non-profit AI research company working to ensure artificial general intelligence benefits humanity
• Starlink (2019) – SpaceX project to provide global satellite Internet access coverage

Not all of these companies have proven successful so far. But Musk continues to think big while attracting top talent to bring innovative new technologies to reality.

Taking Over Twitter for $44 Billion

In January 2022, Musk started acquiring shares of social media company Twitter. By March he had accumulated a 9.2% stake to become Twitter‘s largest shareholder. This set in motion a tumultuous year that eventually led to his purchase of Twitter for $44 billion on October 27, 2022.

Shortly after acquiring Twitter, Musk laid off roughly half the company‘s 7,500 employees and radically changed the platform‘s operations. Many users have quit the platform over concerns about misinformation as Musk grants "amnesty" to suspended accounts. The long-term implications of his takeover remain uncertain.

“Failure is an option here. If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough.”

Marriages, Relationships and Family

In 2000, Musk married Canadian author Justine Wilson. Their first son died unexpectedly from SIDS at 10 weeks old. They share custody of 5 sons – a set of twins and a set of triplets – born through IVF. Musk and Wilson separated in 2008.

From 2010 to 2012, Musk was married to English actress Talulah Riley. After divorcing, they remarried in 2013 before finalizing their divorce again in 2016. Musk also had an on-and-off relationship with musician Grimes which began in 2018. They had 2 children – a son born in 2020 and daughter born in 2021 via surrogate.

In 2022 it was revealed that Musk secretly had twins in 2021 with Shivon Zilis, a top executive at his company Neuralink. He now has 10 children from 3 relationships. But his 18-year-old transgender daughter has disowned him, changing her name in opposition to Musk‘s "public transphobia."

Losing and Regaining Title of World‘s Richest Person

Thanks mostly to his shares in Tesla Motors, Musk experienced an astronomical rise in his personal net worth. He became the richest person in the world for the first time in January 2021 when he surpassed Jeff Bezos.

But his net worth dropped in 2022 and early 2023 as Tesla‘s share price declined. On January 6, 2023 Musk lost the title of world‘s richest person to Bernard Arnault, CEO of LVMH.

What‘s more, with an estimated $183 billion loss between November 2021 and January 2023, Musk holds the record for the largest loss of personal fortune in history according to Guinness World Records. Despite these setbacks, Musk’s supporters are betting he’ll reclaim the top spot someday.

What Makes Musk Such a Polarizing Figure

Musk has earned both ardent fans and vocal critics. So what makes him such a polarizing public figure?

Reasons supporters are drawn to Musk include:

• Daring vision for future innovations
• Willingness to take risks
• Commitment to tackling climate change with sustainable energy
• Power to make things happen that others consider impossible
• Relatable sense of humor on social media

However some people are strongly critical of Musk for:

• Poor treatment of employees by demanding unrealistic hours and goals
• Controversial public stances on issues like pandemic lockdowns
• Spreading misinformation and making questionable promises on Twitter
• Brash communication style and vindictiveness towards naysayers
• Concerns about concentration of power held by billionaires

But there‘s no questioning the outsized impact Musk already made on multiple industries. Even his detractors admit they‘re curious to see what he’ll achieve next.

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Rated 4.5 of 5 | Office Timeline 5482 reviews

Elon Musk timeline

Explore Elon Musk’s extraordinary story as a wild innovator. Walk through the key milestones of his life with our free downloadable timeline.

Office Timeline

May 24, 2024

18 min read

Imagine a world where cars drive themselves, rockets land themselves, and humans are a multi-planetary species. Sounds like science fiction, right? For Elon Musk, it’s just another day at the office.

Elon Musk’s work has kept people’s imaginations captive through his breathtaking ideas and projects that push the boundaries of what seems possible. Whether it’s his efforts to make electric vehicles mainstream with Tesla  , or his audacious plans to colonize Mars through SpaceX  ’s spacecraft, Musk’s bold thinking and willingness to take on gigantic technological challenges have turned him into one of the most well-known people on this planet. 

Yet, the “tech rock star” is also one of the most controversial figures among the genius minds of our time. His bold statements, unconventional behavior, and sometimes erratic tweets have been known to spark hot debates. Despite controversy surrounding his public persona, Musk’s daring projects continue to transform our world. There’s no denying that Musk’s influence is felt far beyond the spheres of science and technology.

Let’s decipher milestone by milestone the fascinating story of Elon Musk, the man who’s turning wild dreams into reality faster than you can say “NEW.” Buckle up and get ready for a ride that’s out of this world!

Elon Musk’s timeline: key milestones

• June 28, 1971 : Elon Reeve Musk is born
• 1983 : Creates Blastar
• 1989 : Moves to Canada
• 1992 : Goes to Penn, Stanford
• 1995 : Founds Zip2 Corporation
• 1999 : Sells Zip2
• 2000 : Marries Justine Wilson
• 2000 : X.com merges with Confinity to form PayPal
• 2002 : Becomes a U.S. citizen 
• 2002 : First child is born, passes away
• 2002 : Sells PayPal, Founds SpaceX
• 2002 : The Musk Foundation
• 2004 : Xavier and Griffin Musk are born
• 2004 : Investment in Tesla Motors
• 2006 : Damian, Saxon, and Kai Musk are born
• 2006 : SolarCity is founded
• 2008 : Divorces first wife, Justine Musk
• 2008 : Falcon 1 reaches orbit
• 2008 : Roadster is launched
• 2010 : Marries actress Talulah Riley
• 2010 : SpaceX demonstrates reusable rockets
• 2012 : Divorces second wife, Talulah Riley
• 2012 : ISS docking
• 2013 : Remarries Talulah Riley
• 2013 : Plans for Hyperloop and battery production with Tesla
• 2015 : Co-founds OpenAI
• 2016 : Founds Neuralink and The Boring Company
• 2016 : Divorces Talulah Riley
• 2018 : Launches Falcon Heavy
• 2018 : Starts dating Grimes
• 2020 : X Æ A-12 Musk is born
• 2020 : Tesla became the world’s most valuable carmaker
• 2020 : 1st manned mission - Crew Dragon
• 2021 : Strider and Azure Musk are born
• 2021 : Exa Dark Sideræl Musk is born
• 2021 : First all-private civilian crew (Inspiration4)
• 2022 : Acquires Twitter and renames it X
• 2023 : Starship’s test flight trial (failed)
• 2023 : Techno Musk is born

2024: Elon Musk’s 12th child is born

• 2024 : 3rd Starship test flight success
• 2024 : Ranks third in Bloomberg Billionaires Index

The detailed milestones of Elon Musk’s timeline

Elon Musk’s name has become synonymous with bold creativity. Born in Pretoria, South Africa in 1971, Musk’s journey has been nothing short of amazing. From co-founding PayPal to revolutionizing electric vehicles and space exploration, his life story reads like a gripping novel.

Let’s discover the key moments of his life, tracing Elon’s path from humble beginnings to becoming one of the wealthiest people worldwide.

June 28, 1971: Elon Reeve Musk is born

Elon Reeve Musk was born on June 28 in Pretoria, South Africa. His father, Errol Musk, an electromechanical engineer and property developer, co-owned an emerald mine in South Africa, while his mother, Maye Musk, was a Canadian model. Elon has a younger brother, Kimbal James, and a younger sister, Tosca.

Despite being born into wealth, Elon had a difficult childhood. After his parents’ divorce when he was nine, he initially wanted to live with his mother and siblings but chose to stay with his father out of sympathy. Later he regretted his decision and became estranged from his father, describing his childhood as “miserable.” In an interview , Elon Musk described his father as “evil” and a “terrible human being.”

1983: Creates Blastar

At the age of 12, Musk programmed and sold a space-themed video game called Blastar for $500, showing early interest and talent in computing and technology. You can play the game online and see what Blastar is about.

1989: Moves to Canada

Seeking better opportunities, Musk emigrated to Canada, using his mother’s citizenship to simplify the process. He moved to Canada to avoid mandatory service in the South African military and to enroll at Queen’s University (aged 17). The same year, he obtained his Canadian citizenship.

1992: Goes to Penn, Stanford

In 1992, Musk left Canada to study business and physics at the University of Pennsylvania, where he earned a degree in economics and pursued a second bachelor’s in physics. After Penn, he enrolled at Stanford for a PhD in energy physics, but the timing coincided with the Internet boom, so he dropped out after two days to join the expanding tech industry.

1995: Founds Zip2 Corporation

In 1995, Musk co-founded Zip2 Corporation with his brother, Kimbal Musk. Zip2 was an online city guide, providing business directories and maps for newspapers. The company developed software that allowed newspapers to offer additional commercial services to their readers, such as online guides and directory listings with maps. This innovation helped businesses reach a broader audience through the internet. Elon secured contracts with major newspapers like The New York Times and the Chicago Tribune, which strengthened the company’s profile and credibility.

1999: Sells Zip2

In 1999, Musk sold Zip2 to Compaq for nearly $300 million and co-founded X.com. This was Musk’s first significant financial success. Elon received $22 million from the sale, which he used to fund his subsequent ventures, including X.com, an online payment company that would later become PayPal.

2000: Marries Justine Wilson

In January 2000, Elon Musk married his first wife Justine Wilson, whom he met while attending Queen’s University in Canada. The couple had 6 kids before divorcing in 2008 after 8 years of marriage.

2000: X.com merges with Confinity to form PayPal

In 2000, Elon Musk’s online banking company X.com merged with the money transfer firm Confinity to create PayPal. The merger combined X.com’s online banking technology with Confinity’s money transfer capabilities to form an online payment platform. PayPal’s grew rapidly and was adopted as a facilitator of e-commerce transactions.

2002: Becomes a U.S. citizen 

In 2002, Elon Musk became a U.S. citizen, so he could pursue business opportunities in America.

2002: First child, Nevada, is born. Tragically passed away 10 weeks later

The same year, Elon Musk’s first child was born: a son named Nevada Alexander Musk. Tragically, Nevada passed away from sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) at just 10 weeks old. This devastating loss led Musk and his then-wife Justine to pursue IVF treatments, resulting in the births of twins and triplets in subsequent years.

2002: Sells PayPal, founds SpaceX

eBay bought PayPal for $1.5 billion in eBay stock on October 3, 2002. This was shortly after PayPal first sold shares to the public. Over 70% of eBay auctions took PayPal payments at that time, around 1 out of every 4 successful eBay auctions using PayPal.

After being ousted as the CEO of PayPal, Musk became interested in space exploration.  Believing that making human life possible on Mars was imperative for the future of humanity, Musk was concerned that NASA lacked plans for a human mission to Mars. He then attended space conferences, funded private space projects, and even considered growing a plant on Mars as a publicity stunt. 

However, after failed attempts to obtain a missile for a Mars mission, he decided to build his own rocket. In the same year, using the funds from the PayPal sale, Musk founded SpaceX with the goal of reducing space transportation costs and enabling the colonization of Mars.

2002: The Musk Foundation

In 2002, Elon Musk founded the Musk Foundation as a nonprofit organization. Its stated goals were aimed to support renewable energy, pediatric research, education, and safe artificial intelligence. From 2002 to 2018, it donated about $25 million, with almost half going to OpenAI, a company owned by Musk. According to a Daily Mail article , “the world’s second-richest man has escaped billions in tax by gifting Tesla stock to the Musk Foundation”.

2004: Xavier and Griffin Musk are born

On April 15, 2004, Elon Musk and his then-wife, Justine Musk, welcomed twin sons into their family, Xavier and Griffin.

2004: Investment in Tesla Motors 

Tesla Motors was founded in 2003 by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning, with the goal of producing electric vehicles. Elon Musk began his involvement in the electric vehicle industry by making a significant financial investment and joining the company’s board of directors as chairman.

Under Musk’s leadership, Tesla has expanded into solar energy, battery production, and self-driving tech, while he uses his public influence to advocate for Tesla’s sustainability mission. As an engineer with physics and computer science expertise, Musk directly shapes Tesla’s engineering decisions on electric vehicles, batteries, and self-driving AI, fostering a culture of rapid iteration and technological boundary-pushing.

2006: Damian, Saxon, and Kai Musk are born

On January 1, triplets Damian, Saxon, and Kai Musk were born to Elon and Justine Musk.

2006: SolarCity is founded

In 2006, Elon Musk co-founded SolarCity with his cousins Peter and Lyndon Rive, a company that provided solar energy services. The aim was to make solar energy affordable and widespread, aligning with Musk’s vision for sustainable energy. In late 2015, SolarCity stopped offering solar panel sales and installation services in Nevada after the state’s Public Utilities Commission made changes that increased monthly charges for rooftop solar customers and reduced the compensation they received for selling excess solar energy back to the grid through net metering.

2008: Divorces first wife, Justine 

In an essay that Justine wrote for Marie Claire , she recounted how their marriage got sour and how Elon said to her at one time: ‘If you were my employee,’ he said just as often, ‘I would fire you.’”

2008: Falcon 1 reaches orbit

On 28 September 2008, the small-lift launch vehicle Falcon 1 was successfully launched, becoming the first privately developed liquid-fuel rocket to reach orbit around the Earth.

2008: Roadster is launched

In 2008, Tesla launched its first production electric car, the Roadster, demonstrating the potential of EVs. The same year, Elon Musk became CEO and product architect, taking a hands-on role in steering the company’s vision to mass-produce EVs.

2010: Marries actress Talulah Riley

In 2010, Elon Musk married British actress Talulah Riley. Their relationship was quite public, and they tied the knot twice, first in 2010 and then again in 2013 after a brief separation. The couple eventually divorced in 2016.

2010: SpaceX demonstrates reusable rockets

In 2010, SpaceX made history by launching and safely bringing back its Falcon 9 rocket. This was a huge leap in space travel, showing that rockets could be reused. Going to space can be cheaper.

2012: Divorces second wife, Talulah Riley

Elon Musk and actress Talulah Riley divorce for the first time.

2012: ISS docking

In 2012, SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft docked with the International Space Station (ISS), showing SpaceX’s capability to transport cargo and crew to and from the ISS.

2013: Remarries Talulah Riley

Their relationship had its ups and downs, but they decided to give it another shot.

2013: Plans for Hyperloop and battery production with Tesla

Musk unveils plans for the Hyperloop high-speed transportation system and Tesla announces plans to build a Gigafactory for battery production.

2015: Co-founds OpenAI

In 2015, Elon Musk co-founded OpenAI, an organization focused on advancing artificial intelligence research. Their mission is to develop safe and beneficial AI for everyone. This initiative was based on Musk’s concerns about AI safety and the potential risks associated with AGI. The main aim is to make sure that the development of advanced AI (AGI) doesn’t turn into a frantic race where safety gets overlooked and to encourage responsible practices in the AI community.

2016: Founds Neuralink and The Boring Company

In 2016, Elon Musk founded Neuralink, a company focused on creating implantable brain–computer interfaces (BCIs) to enhance human capabilities. Neuralink aims to connect our brains directly to computers, allowing wireless control and benefiting individuals with unmet medical needs.

The same year, Musk founded The Boring Company, which aims to revolutionize urban transportation by creating efficient tunnel networks. Tunnels provide weatherproof, invisible, expandable, safe, and fast transportation options.

2016: Divorces Talulah Riley

In March 2016, British actress Talulah Riley filed for divorce from billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk for the second time. The couple had previously married in 2010, divorced in 2012, and then remarried in 2013.

2018: Launches Falcon Heavy

On February 6, 2018, SpaceX successfully launched the first Falcon Heavy rocket, the most powerful operational rocket. This milestone showed SpaceX’s ability to carry large payloads into space.

2018: Starts dating Grimes

Elon Musk and Canadian musician Claire Boucher, known by her stage name of Grimes, started dating in 2018. They made their debut as a couple at the Met Gala in May 2018. Despite coming from contrasting worlds (Musk, the tech entrepreneur, and Grimes, the avant-garde artist), they found a shared wavelength during their time together (2018 to 2021).

2020: X Æ A-12 Musk is born

X Æ A-12 Musk, born on May 4, 2020, is the first son of the Musk-Grimes couple. His unconventional name initially caused quite a stir; it was originally spelled as “X Æ A-12,” but the last part was later changed to Roman numerals, making it “X Æ A-Xii.” Musk said the name is pronounced “X Ash A Twelve.” In an interview for Vanity Fair , Grimes pronounced the name “X A.I. Archangel,”, or “X” or “Little X” for short.

What the name means, as tweeted by Grimes :

• “X, the unknown variable” [commonly used in mathematical equations. It represents enigmatic and limitless possibilities.]
• “Æ, my elven spelling of Ai (love &or Artificial Intelligence)”
• “A-12 = precursor to SR-17 (our favorite aircraft).  No weapons, no defenses, just speed.  Great in battle, but non-violent”
• “(A=Archangel, my favorite song)”
• “(X metal rat)”

2020: Tesla became the world’s most valuable carmaker

In July 2020, Tesla overtook Japan’s Toyota to become the world’s most valuable carmaker. Its stock reached a record high of $1,134, giving Tesla a market value of approximately $209.47 billion, which was about $4 billion more than Toyota’s market value. Tesla’s stock surged due to its leadership in the electric vehicle market, strategic model launches, strong financial performance, advancements in battery technology, inclusion in the S&P 500, Elon Musk’s influence, and market sentiment.

In 2024, Mercedes-Benz has reclaimed its position as the world’s most valuable automobile brand, with a brand value that increased by 1% to reach $59.4 billion.

2020: 1st manned mission - Crew Dragon

On November 15, 2020, SpaceX’s Crew Dragon successfully completed its inaugural manned mission to the International Space Station (ISS). This historic event marked the first time a private company sent astronauts to space, marking a new era of space exploration.

2021: Strider and Azure Musk are born

In November 2021, twins Strider (boy) and Azure (girl) were born to Elon Musk and Shivon Zilis via IVF. Zilis is the Director of Operations and Special Projects at Neuralink, reporting directly to Elon Musk. She initially met Musk through her involvement with OpenAI, where she served as a board member until 2023.

2021: Exa Dark Sideræl Musk is born

Exa Dark Sideræl Musk, born in December 2021, is the second child of the Musk-Grimes couple. Her unique and cosmic-inspired name combines scientific, cosmic, and literary elements. 

While her parents affectionately refer to her as “Y”, the unusual , complex name “Exa Dark Sideræl” was explained by her mother in an interview for Vanity Fair :

• Exa refers to the supercomputing term exaFLOPS, which represents the ability to perform 1 quintillion floating-point operations per second. It’s a nod to cutting-edge computational power.
• Dark is the “the unknown. People fear it but truly it’s the absence of photons. Dark matter is the beautiful mystery of our universe,” Grimes explained.
• Sideræl  is pronounced as “sigh-deer-ee-el,” and relates to star time and deep space time, not our relative Earth time. The name also pays tribute to Galadriel, a character from The Lord of the Rings.

2021: First all-private civilian crew (Inspiration4)

On September 15, 2021, the Inspiration4 mission launched the first all-private civilian crew into orbit aboard a SpaceX Dragon capsule. Funded by entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, the mission aimed to raise awareness and funds for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. The mission showed that space travel can be possible for regular people, not just professional astronauts.

2022: Acquires Twitter and renames it X

In 2022, Musk became Twitter’s majority shareholder by April 1 and later acquired the platform for $44 billion at the end of April. His goals included promoting free speech, introducing new features, making algorithms open source for increased trust, eliminating “bot” accounts, and verifying all users. Musk officially became the owner and CEO of Twitter in October 2022.

2023: Starship’s test flight trial (failed)

SpaceX’s first fully integrated Starship was launched on April 20, 2023, from SpaceX’s Starbase facility at Boca Chica Beach in South Texas. The Starship, standing at an impressive 394 feet (120 meters), powered by 33 first-stage Raptor engines, was the biggest and most powerful rocket ever built. Although the flight ended in an intentional explosion, after multiple issues, reaching an altitude of about 24 miles (39 kilometers) was a significant achievement.

2023: Techno Mechanicus (Tau) Musk is born

In September 2023, a review of Isaacson’s biography of Elon Musk in the New York Times disclosed that Musk and Grimes had welcomed a third child named Techno Mechanicus (nicknamed Tau) . Grimes talks about Techno in a post on X : “I wish I could show u how cute little Techno is, but my priority rn is keeping my babies out of the public eye.”

Techno is the 11th child officially acknowledged to be fathered by Elon Musk so far. Looks like Elon’s really going for his own fleet to start a colony on Mars!

In June 2024, Musk announced the birth of his 12th child . It is his third with Shivon Zilis, Neuralink Corp.'s director of special projects. The baby's name, sex and birth date have not been revealed yet.

2024: 3rd Starship test flight success

During SpaceX’s third test flight of the Starship rocket on March 14, 2024, the megarocket reached orbital speed , with both the Starship spacecraft and Super Heavy rocket booster performing better than in previous tests. Although radio contact was lost towards the end, SpaceX celebrated the achievement, and Elon Musk expressed his excitement on X about Starship’s potential to take humanity to Mars.

2024: Ranks third in Bloomberg Billionaires Index

As of May 19, 2024, per Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Elon Musk ranks as the third wealthiest person in the world, following Bernard Arnault and Jeff Bezos.

Closing thoughts

As Elon Musk’s life story unfolds, we see a mix of brilliance and eccentricity, a reflection of his unconventional approach and ambitious vision. From rockets that defy gravity to cryptic tweets that defy reason, he stays on the edge of genius and absurdity. Love him or hate him, one thing’s certain: he remains one of the most influential, yet polarizing figures of our time.

What next? Hard to tell. For sure, right now he’s strapping himself into the next formidable quest, destination unknown.

About the timeline

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You can download the timeline for free as an editable PowerPoint slide and add other milestones that you feel would be needed. To update the timeline and further customize it, download for free the 14-day trial of Office Timeline, which offers you access to advanced functionalities for a stunning outcome.

Frequently asked questions about Elon Musk

How did Musk make all his money? What’s next for Elon Musk? We want to know everything there is to know about the genius mind behind SpaceX rockets, Tesla electric cars, and the quest for a multi-planetary future! So many questions, so little time.

What is Elon Musk’s real name?

Elon Musk’s complete name is Elon Reeve Musk .

How many companies does Elon Musk own?

As of now (2024), Musk owns or has significant involvement in these companies:

• SpaceX : Founded in 2002, SpaceX aims to innovate space exploration by crafting and launching advanced rockets. With 246 launches and 207 successful landings, it’s the only private company to return a spacecraft from low-Earth orbit and transport humans to and from the International Space Station.
• Tesla, Inc. : Founded in 2003, the company secured $7.5 million in Series A funding, with $6.5 million of that amount contributed by Elon Musk in 2004, (equivalent to $12 million and $10 million respectively in 2023). Although not solely owned by Musk, he plays a key role as CEO, product architect, and former chairman. Tesla is a leader in electric vehicles and clean energy solutions.
• The Boring Company (TBC) : Founded in 2016, this American construction company focuses on intra-city transit systems using tunnels to address traffic challenges. Inspired by Los Angeles traffic challenges and the limitations of its transportation network, Musk initiated the project, forming The Boring Company as a subsidiary of SpaceX. The company aims to make establishing a tunnel network financially viable.
• Neuralink : Musk co-founded this company in 2016 to advance neurotechnology and artificial intelligence research.
• X Corp. (formerly Twitter): In 2022, Musk acquired Twitter, now rebranded as X, for $44 billion. His goals include promoting free speech, eliminating “bot” accounts, and making the algorithm open-source.
• xAI : Launched in July 2023, xAI is an artificial intelligence (AI) company focusing on cutting-edge AI research. Musk assembled a team of experts, including former employees from leading AI firms like OpenAI and DeepMind. It aims to advance AI, address safety concerns, and gain deeper insights into reality.

Historically, Elon Musk has founded or co-founded ten companies, some of which are now defunct: xAI, X.com (PayPal), Tesla, SpaceX, The Boring Company, Neuralink, OpenAI, SolarCity, Thud and Zip2 Corporation.

What ethnicity is Elon Musk?

Elon Musk’s ethnicity is a blend of Canadian and South African heritage. He was born in Pretoria, South Africa, on June 28, 1971, to a Canadian mother (Maye Musk, née Haldeman) and a South African father (Errol Musk).  If we look further, Elon’s paternal roots are English and Dutch, and his maternal origins trace back to South Africa, Canada and Switzerland.

He lived most of his childhood with his father in various places in South Africa after his parents’ divorce in 1981. Later, he moved to Canada and then to the United States.

What education does Elon Musk have?

Elon Musk attended Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, before transferring to the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. There, he earned bachelor’s degrees in both physics and economics in 1997.

What is Elon Musk’s IQ? How smart is Elon Musk?

Elon Musk’s IQ falls within the Highly Gifted range, estimated to be around 155 to 160. To put this in context, Albert Einstein’s IQ was believed to be around 160. (Einstein never took an IQ test, but we can rely on expert estimates .)

Just to clarify, IQ tests provide insight into a person’s cognitive abilities.

Who is the CEO of Tesla?

Elon Musk is the co-founder and CEO of Tesla, a company that produces electric vehicles, battery products, and solar energy products. Since Tesla was founded in 2003, Musk has led all aspects of product design, engineering, and global manufacturing for the company’s electric vehicles. Under his leadership, Tesla has become a global leader in electric vehicles. As referred to by Tesla , “Elon is Technoking of Tesla” and has served as Chief Executive Officer since October 2008 and as a member of the Board since April 2004.

How did Elon Musk get rich?

In 1995, together with his brother, Elon Musk  co-founded Zip2 Corporation, his first company, an online business directory service, which he sold to Compaq in 1999 for approximately $300 million. Obviously, this move made him very wealthy. Musk’s significant increase in wealth is primarily due to his ownership stake in the electric car maker Tesla, along with his investments in ventures like SpaceX and The Boring Company.

Does Musk own PayPal?

Elon Musk co-founded PayPal, which originated from his online banking venture, X.com. In 2000, X.com merged with Confinity, a startup founded by Max Levchin and Peter Thiel, leading to the creation of PayPal. However, Musk no longer owns any PayPal stock, revealing in 2018 that the only stock he holds is in Tesla.

How many children does Musk have?

Elon Musk has fathered 12 children; he now has 11 after his first son tragically passed away just a few weeks after birth due to sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).

Musk and his first wife, Justine Wilson, had six children, he also had three kids with his former girlfriend Grimes, and three more with Neuralink executive Shivon Zilis.

Who are Elon Musk's 12 children?

Musk and Justine Wilson’s children are:

• Son born in 2002: Nevada Alexander, passed away at the age of 10 weeks (sudden infant death syndrome - SIDS)
• Twins born in 2004: Griffin (boy) and Vivian (formerly Xavier, born as a male, changed gender identity and name in 2022)
• Triplets born in   2006: Kai, Saxon, and Damian (all boys)

Musk and Grimes’s children are:

• Son born in 2020: X Æ A-Xii (pronounced “X Ash A Twelve”, nickname: X or Little X)
• Daughter born in 2021: Exa Dark Sideræl Musk (nickname: Y)  
• Son born in 2023: Techno Mechanicus Musk (nickname: Tau)

Musk and Shivon Zilis’s children are:

• Twins born in 2021: Strider (boy) and Azure (girl)
• Youngest child (gender not specified) born in 2024: name hasn't been released to the public yet

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Tesla CEO Elon Musk: His career, life, and companies he started

• Elon Musk is the CEO of Tesla. He's also cofounder other major companies, including SpaceX.
• He was born in South Africa and founded his first startup in the '90s.
• Musk is a polarizing figure who has incited lawsuits and SEC investigations. 

Elon Musk was born on June 28, 1971, in Pretoria, South Africa.

His mother, Maye Musk , is a professional dietitian and model, appearing on boxes of Special K cereal and the cover of TIME magazine. Last year, at the age of 74, she was on the cover of Sport Illustrated's swimsuit edition.

Maye and Musk's father, Errol, were married for nearly a decade before they divorced. Maye said in her book that she'd wanted to end the marriage earlier, but the Divorce Act, which legalized the termination of a marriage in South Africa, was not enacted until 1979. Musk's parents divorced the same year the law was passed.

After their parents divorced, 9-year-old Musk and his younger brother Kimbal  decided to live with their father. It wasn't until after the move was made that his notoriously troubled relationship with his dad began to emerge. "It was not a good idea," Musk said of the move in an interview with Rolling Stone.

Musk's school days weren't easy — he was once hospitalized after being beaten by bullies. The bullies threw Musk down a set of stairs and beat him until he blacked out, as detailed in Ashlee Vance's book "Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future." Musk's father told Business Insider the incident took place after Musk made some insensitive comments to a classmate.

The Tesla CEO has said he didn't always feel he was on the same wavelength as his classmates.

"Social clues were not intuitive," Musk said during a TED conference last year. In 2021, the billionaire said during his performance on " Saturday Night Live " that he has Asperger's syndrome.

Musk has said he spent a lot of his childhood reading and coding late into the night — and it paid off. At 17, he took a university-level aptitude test on his computer programming skills. Examiners made him retake the test because they had never seen such a high score, his mother said in a tweet. 

After graduating from high school, Musk moved to Canada with his mother, Maye; his sister, Tosca, and his brother, Kimbal, and spent two years studying at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, according to the school.

He later finished his studies at the University of Pennsylvania, earning degrees in physics and economics.

While studying at the  University of Pennsylvania , Musk and a classmate rented out a 10-bedroom frat house and turned it into a nightclub. The move, which Musk undertook with Adeo Ressi, was one of his first entrepreneurial experiments, Vogue reported.

After graduation, Musk traveled to Stanford University to study for his Ph.D. — but he barely started the program before leaving it. He deferred his admission after only two days in California, deciding to test his luck in the dot-com boom that was just getting underway. He never returned to finish his studies at Stanford.

Musk's college girlfriend Jennifer Gwynne would later auction a set of photos of Musk from his time studying at the University of Pennsylvania.

Late 1990s - 2000: Early career

With brother Kimbal, Musk launched Zip2. A cluster of Silicon Valley investors helped to fund the company, which provided city travel guides to newspapers like The New York Times and Chicago Tribune, per the Rolling Stone interview with Musk.

While Zip2 got off the ground, Musk lived in the office and showered at a local YMCA, he said in a Stanford University video. The hard work paid off when Compaq bought Zip2 in a deal worth $341 million in cash and stock, earning Musk $22 million.

Musk next started  X.com , an online banking company. He launched the company in 1999 using $10 million of the money he got from the Zip2 sale, Investopedia reported. About a year later, X.com merged with Confinity, a financial startup cofounded by Peter Thiel, to form PayPal.

Musk was named the CEO of the newly minted PayPal — but it wouldn't last long. While Musk was en route to Australia for a much-needed vacation, PayPal's board fired him and made Thiel the new CEO. "That's the problem with vacations," Musk told Fortune years later about his ill-fated trip in late 2000.

2002-2004: Elon Musk starts SpaceX and invests in Tesla

But things worked out for Musk — he made another windfall when eBay bought PayPal in late 2002. As PayPal's single biggest shareholder, he netted $165 million of the $1.5 billion price eBay paid, Money.com reported.

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Even before the PayPal sale, Musk was dreaming up his next move, including a wild plan to send mice or plants to Mars. In early 2002, Musk founded the company that would be known as Space Exploration Technologies , or SpaceX, with $100 million of the money received from the PayPal sale. Musk's goal was to make spaceflight cheaper by a factor of 10.

One early SpaceX vehicle was named after the song "Puff the Magic Dragon." The name of the spacecraft, the Dragon, was Musk's jab at skeptics who told him SpaceX launches would never be able to put vehicles into space, Musk later shared on Twitter.

SpaceX's long-term goal is to make colonizing Mars affordable. Musk has said that SpaceX stock won't be available an initial public offering until what Musk calls the "Mars Colonial Transporter" is flying regularly.

Musk had also been keeping plenty busy here on Earth, particularly with Tesla Motors. In 2004, Musk made the first of what would be $70 million of total Tesla investments, an electric car company. Tesla's founders were veteran startup executives Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning.

Musk has said he took an active product role at the carmaker, helping develop its first car, the Tesla Roadster , the Roadster.

The Roadster was built on the chassis of a Lotus Elise — a tiny British sports car that Tesla remade into an electric car with a lithium-ion battery. The all-electric Roadster debuted in 2006 when Musk was serving as Tesla's chairman. 

2008: Elon Musk becomes Tesla CEO

In 2007, Musk staged a boardroom coup at Tesla, first ousting Eberhard from his CEO seat and then from the company's board and executive suites entirely.

In 2008, with the financial crisis seriously limiting his options, a Tesla bankruptcy was personally halted by Musk. He invested $40 million in Tesla and loaned the company $40 million more. Not coincidentally, he was named CEO the same year.

But between SpaceX, Tesla, and SolarCity, Musk nearly went broke. He described 2008 as "the worst year of my life" in an interview with 60 Minutes. Tesla kept losing money, and SpaceX was having trouble launching its Falcon 1 rocket. By 2009, Musk was living off personal loans just to survive.

Right around Christmas 2008, Musk got two pieces of good news: SpaceX had landed a $1.5 billion contract with NASA to deliver supplies into space, and Tesla finally found more outside investors.

Musk's career was starting to get noticed in other circles, too, most notably in Hollywood. Robert Downey Jr.'s portrayal of Tony Stark in the "Iron Man" movies is at least partially based on Musk, director Jon Favreau said on the "Recode Decode" podcast. Musk even had a cameo in " Iron Man 2 ."

2015: OpenAI

In late 2015, Musk also cofounded OpenAI , a nonprofit dedicated to researching artificial intelligence and ensuring it doesn't destroy humanity.

He later announced that he would step down from the board to avoid any potential conflicts of interest with Tesla , which has made strides into artificial intelligence for its self-driving car technology.

The billionaire has since spoken out against the company on multiple occasions and is even attempting to launch his own competitor, which he jokingly dubbed " Truth GPT " after the success of OpenAI's ChatGPT.

By the end of 2015, 24 SpaceX launches had been made on assignments like resupplying the International Space Station, setting some records along the way. 

That year, Tesla also released its first version of Autopilot , a driver-assist feature for its EVs. Musk later went on to release an enhanced version of Autopilot called Full Self-Driving beta several years later.

He has since said that Tesla FSD is the difference between being "worth a lot of money or worth basically zero." However, Autopilot has generated its fair share of lawsuits, as well as investigations from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration over the years.

2016: SolarCity and The Boring Company

In late 2016, Tesla bought SolarCity in a $2.6 billion deal. That same year some Tesla shareholders filed a lawsuit accusing Musk of putting pressure on Tesla's board members to buy SolarCity and bail it out. Musk later won the lawsuit in 2022.

In 2016, he also started The Boring Company , which has a mission to dig a network of tunnels under and around cities for high-speed, no-traffic driving.

Boring's first tunnel network for commercial use, located in Las Vegas, opened in April 2021.

2017: Neuralink

Musk founded another company: Neuralink , in 2017, which is trying to build devices that can be implanted inside the human brain. The billionaire has described the device as a "Fitbit in your skull" and has said it will allow people to perform tasks using only their minds. The company has experimented with putting the device in pigs and monkeys and won approval from the US Food and Drug Administration to begin human trials in 2023.

In 2017, Musk also joined President Trump's business advisory council — a move that caused a huge public backlash. He initially defended the move but then quit after Trump pulled the US out of the Paris Agreement on climate change. Musk said he tried to convince Trump not to withdraw.

2018: Tesla Roadster in space

The Falcon Heavy, the successor to the Falcon 9 and the most powerful rocket SpaceX has built to date, completed a successful maiden launch in February 2018. The Falcon Heavy carried a unique payload: a dummy dubbed "Starman," and Musk's personal cherry red Tesla Roadster, which were launched toward Martian orbit.

"We really wanted to get the public here to wonder, to get excited about the possibility of something new happening in space — of the space frontier getting pushed forward," Musk told an audience at the 2018 South by Southwest conference. "The goal of this was to inspire you and make you believe again, just as people believed in the Apollo era, that anything is possible."

SEC subpoenas Tesla

Musk ran into some trouble in 2018 when he sent a tweet declaring he was considering taking  Tesla private at $420 per share and had already secured funding. Just a few days later, the SEC sent Tesla subpoenas about the company's plans to go private and Musk's comments.

By September, the SEC had formally filed a lawsuit against Musk, accusing him of making "false and misleading statements." Musk settled with the SEC, which resulted in both him and Tesla paying a $20 million fine and Musk stepping down as chairman of Tesla's board. Additionally, Tesla was required to appoint a committee to oversee Musk's communications.

One month later, Musk won a victory in court when a jury ruled he was not guilty of defaming the British diver Vernon Unsworth . Unsworth had filed a defamation lawsuit in 2018 after Musk called him a "pedo guy" on Twitter.

2021: Musk becomes richest person in the world

Musk's net worth has soared in recent years. The Tesla CEO became the richest man in the world in 2021 when his fortune surpassed $200 billion, passing Amazon founder Jeff Bezos' net worth.

Musk said he commemorated the occasion by sending Bezos, his longtime rival, a silver medal. Musk's status as the richest man in the world was eclipsed by LVMH owner Bernard Arnault in 2023. Since, he has remained near the top of the list of wealthiest people in the world.

He also won Time's Person of the Year award in 2021.

2022: The 'Technoking' sets his sights on Twitter 

In 2022, Musk started buying up shares of Twitter and later turned down an offer to join the board in favor of buying Twitter outright for $44 billion.

Musk, who has become one of the most-followed accounts on the social media site, attempted to backtrack on his offer to buy Twitter in July.  Twitter sued Musk promptly, in order to force him to go through with the purchase. 

After months of back and forth leading up to a trial in the Delaware Court of Chancery, Musk agreed to buy the company in October. The same day he took over Twitter, he ousted several key executives including then-Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal. Musk took over as "Chief Twit" and proceeded to cut the Twitter workforce in half in the chaotic months following the Musk acquisition .

He later brought in a new CEO for Twitter in May 2023 after the billionaire said Twitter was no longer "in the fast lane to bankruptcy."

The platform was also rebranded "X" in July 2023.

The billionaire has also expressed interest in launching his own AI venture. In April 2023, Musk confirmed reports that he's planning to create an AI startup to build a ChatGPT rival .

Katie Canales, Matt Weinberger, and Mary Meisenzahl contributed to an earlier version of this story. 

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