The identify Elon Musk is probably some of the recognisable within the modern-day.
The richest man on the earth is understood for being the proprietor of assorted corporations together with electrical automobile maker Tesla and Area X, his takeover of social media firm Twitter – which he renamed X – and, till most lately, his work inside the US authorities.
After almost 130 days as head of the Division of Authorities Effectivity – often called DOGE for brief – Musk introduced he’s leaving his position inside Donald Trump’s administration.
His work inside the division and his shut relationship with Mr Trump led to Musk being within the headlines greater than ever, however there may be a lot to the billionaire businessman that’s hardly ever reported.
Listed below are seven issues you might not find out about Musk.
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Pic: AP
Baby online game creator
Within the early Nineteen Eighties, on the age of 12, Musk created the online game Blastar.
He created the sport, which duties gamers to make use of their keyboards to shoot at alien fighter spaceships, via his information of coding and programming, which he picked up on the age of 9, in accordance with Ashlee Vance’s 2015 biography of the tech mogul.
By 1984 the sport was so good, Musk offered it to PC and Workplace Know-how journal for $500 (£371), the place it featured within the publication’s December situation.
First large pay cheque
From the get-go, it was clear Musk had a expertise for enterprise. In 1995, age 24, he arrange his first firm, Zip2 together with his brother, Kimbal.
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Musk created Zip2 together with his brother within the Nineties. Pic: Reuters
Earlier than cashing in on the success of Zip2, Musk stated he and his brother had been just about broke and each slept within the workplace the place they labored – a behaviour he reportedly replicated within the early days of Tesla.
From the sale of the corporate, Musk walked away from Zip2 with a cool $22m, and the very first thing he purchased was a McLaren F1.
He instructed CNN on the time: “Just three years ago I was sleeping on the office floor, and now I’ve got a million-dollar car.”
Musk’s musk
Regardless of having big success, a few of Musk’s concepts haven’t proved to be as long-lasting.
In 2022, he launched a fragrance referred to as Burnt Hair, which is described on his The Boring Firm web site as “the essence of repugnant desire”.
The scent, which price $100 (£74) a bottle, was a smash hit, in accordance with Musk, who stated it had offered 10,000 bottles in just some hours, incomes him 1,000,000 {dollars}.
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Elon Musk walks with Donald Trump earlier than a Area X launch. Pic: Reuters
“With a name like mine, getting into the fragrance business was inevitable – why did I even fight it for so long!?” Musk stated on the time.
It’s unknown if the product was critical, and (sadly) is not obtainable on The Boring Firm web site.
Along with fragrance, Tesla launched its personal tequila in 2020, and in the identical yr, Musk adopted via on a joke to promote restricted version pairs of Tesla brief shorts as a method to show traders who wager towards the electrical automobile maker mistaken.
The unique PayPal
Lengthy earlier than Twitter grew to become X, Musk created X.com, a web based banking and monetary companies firm.
The platform rapidly attracted a big buyer base, and within the yr 2000, it merged with Confinity, which was co-founded by tech entrepreneurs Peter Thiel and Max Levchin.
The platform was later renamed PayPal.
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Musk with PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel (L). Pic: AP
Musk went on to turn out to be chief government of PayPal, however was later ousted from the place as arguments over the corporate’s identify and general path emerged.
In 2002, the banking web site was purchased by eBay for $1.5bn (£1.4bn). Years later, in 2017, eBay offered the area X.com again to Musk.
Inspiration for Iron Man
Musk’s life as a billionaire entrepreneur feels like the beginning of a Hollywood blockbuster. And in actuality, Musk’s persona and accomplishments had been partly used as inspiration for Robert Downey Jr’s portrayal of Iron Man within the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
In a 2022 interview, Iron Man screenwriter Mark Fergus stated his model of Tony Stark was based mostly on a end result of Musk, Mr Trump and Apple creator Steve Jobs.
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Robert Downey Jr as Tony Stark in Iron Man 2. Pic:
Marvel/THA/Shutterstock
“Musk took the brilliance of Jobs with the showmanship of Trump. He was the only one who had the fun factor and the celebrity vibe and actual business substance,” Mr Fergus instructed New York Journal.
Musk’s uncommon connection to the fictionalised billionaire was performed out on digital camera when he made a cameo in Iron Man 2 in 2010.
The actual Tesla founder?
Opposite to perception, Musk didn’t begin Tesla. He was truly an early investor within the firm and was the fourth chief government when he took over the position in 2008 – shortly after the corporate launched its first automotive – the Roadster sports activities automotive.
It was in truth, Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning who based the corporate in 2003, albeit Musk was the one to propel it on to a worldwide stage.
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Musk in a Tesla showroom in California in 2008. Pic: AP
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A Tesla Roadster. Pic: Reuters
Need for the ‘all the pieces app’
After taking up social media platform X for $44bn in 2022, Musk grew to become one step nearer to reaching his aim of making an “everything app”.
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The tech mogul has beforehand stated he needs for X to turn out to be just like WeChat – a Chinese language app that provides a variety of options past messaging, together with funds, ordering taxis, sharing social media posts and conducting enterprise – consider it as a combination between Fb, Apple Pay, WhatsApp and Google.
Musk’s imaginative and prescient of this “super app” appears to be shared by these at X, together with chief government Linda Yaccarino, who stated on the finish of final yr that 2025 could be the yr that X “connect[s] you in ways never thought possible. X TV, X Money, Grok and more”.
And this seems to be considerably coming true.
In January, Musk introduced X had partnered with cost large Visa, which is able to permit customers to maneuver funds between conventional banks and a digital X pockets and make funds to buddies.
