Meet Elon Musk. The man behind SpaceX, Tesla Motors and SolarCity. SpaceX is a company that makes rockets and sends them into space. Tesla is a company that makes electric cars. And SolarCity makes solar cells.
I was flabbergasted by Elon Musk's audacity as portrayed in Ashlee Vance's Elon Musk: How the Billionaire CEO of SpaceX and Tesla is Shaping Our Future (2015). Musk is a man on a mission. He wants to save humanity from self-destruction and extinction. He wants to reverse global warming. He wants to establish human colonies in Mars.
While I could identify with Musk's objective of addressing global warming through the use of electric cars, the goal of Mars colonies was outside my comfort zone. Seemed too far-fetched for me. But Musk aims to see Mars colonies in his lifetime and he intends to settle in Mars after he turns seventy!
The effusive way in which Vance describes Musk was off-putting. I thought it seemed too close to hagiolatry. But Musk's personality seems to demand this. He comes across as one of Ayn Rand's heroes, determined to accomplish his goals at any cost. And it has catapulted him to world fame.
As Vance writes:
"Musk's ready willingness to tackle impossible things has turned him into a deity in Silicon Valley, where fellow CEOs like [Larry] Page speak of him in reverential awe, and budding entrepreneurs strive 'to be like Elon' just as they have been striving in years past to mimic Steve Jobs."
Elon Musk started his career by founding a company called Zip2 which Compaq bought in 1999 for $307 million. Then he founded X.com that later morphed into PayPal which was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002. Musk made $250 million off that deal. He then threw $100 million into SpaceX, $70 million into Tesla and $10 million into SolarCity that almost pushed him to the brink of bankruptcy. But he came out with flying colours and is now one of the richest men in the world with a net worth of around $10 billion.
Musk has transformed every industry he has touched. In 2012, he make remarkable progress. Tesla released the Model S Sedan priced at $100,000 which won rave reviews and sold like hot cakes. In the same year, SpaceX was the only private company to send a payload to and dock at the International Space Station (ISS).
In 2016 (after Vance's book was published), he had even more triumphs. Tesla unveiled the Model 3 Sedan priced at $35,000 with 325,000 people coming forward to reserve cars. On April 8, SpaceX managed to land a rocket in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean on a floating platform for the first time in the company's history. This means that SpaceX can reuse these rockets again and again instead of discarding them after first use. Musk envisions that soon SpaceX will be capable of sending thousands of rockets to space, a first step towards conquering Mars.
Musk's companies build their own parts from scratch within the US rather than sourcing them from other countries. Thus Musk is heralded as an icon of US manufacturing and he has the ears of top government officials from Obama downwards. Tesla Motors has sent shock waves through Detroit as it is the first successful major US auto-company startup since 1925.
At the beginning of this book, I was deeply skeptical of Elon Musk and his idealistic vision. But now, having completed the book I feel years younger and I wonder whether it is possible indeed to imagine Musk's world playing out in reality. I am now rooting for Musk to win and win big.
Let me leave him with his own words (as mentioned in Vance's book):
"I would like to die thinking that humanity has a bright future. If we can solve sustainable energy and be well on our way to becoming a multiplanetary species with a self-sustaining civilization on another planet - to cope with a worst-case scenario happening and extinguishing human consciousness [on earth] - then I think that would be really good."
I was flabbergasted by Elon Musk's audacity as portrayed in Ashlee Vance's Elon Musk: How the Billionaire CEO of SpaceX and Tesla is Shaping Our Future (2015). Musk is a man on a mission. He wants to save humanity from self-destruction and extinction. He wants to reverse global warming. He wants to establish human colonies in Mars.
While I could identify with Musk's objective of addressing global warming through the use of electric cars, the goal of Mars colonies was outside my comfort zone. Seemed too far-fetched for me. But Musk aims to see Mars colonies in his lifetime and he intends to settle in Mars after he turns seventy!
The effusive way in which Vance describes Musk was off-putting. I thought it seemed too close to hagiolatry. But Musk's personality seems to demand this. He comes across as one of Ayn Rand's heroes, determined to accomplish his goals at any cost. And it has catapulted him to world fame.
As Vance writes:
"Musk's ready willingness to tackle impossible things has turned him into a deity in Silicon Valley, where fellow CEOs like [Larry] Page speak of him in reverential awe, and budding entrepreneurs strive 'to be like Elon' just as they have been striving in years past to mimic Steve Jobs."
Elon Musk started his career by founding a company called Zip2 which Compaq bought in 1999 for $307 million. Then he founded X.com that later morphed into PayPal which was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002. Musk made $250 million off that deal. He then threw $100 million into SpaceX, $70 million into Tesla and $10 million into SolarCity that almost pushed him to the brink of bankruptcy. But he came out with flying colours and is now one of the richest men in the world with a net worth of around $10 billion.
Musk has transformed every industry he has touched. In 2012, he make remarkable progress. Tesla released the Model S Sedan priced at $100,000 which won rave reviews and sold like hot cakes. In the same year, SpaceX was the only private company to send a payload to and dock at the International Space Station (ISS).
In 2016 (after Vance's book was published), he had even more triumphs. Tesla unveiled the Model 3 Sedan priced at $35,000 with 325,000 people coming forward to reserve cars. On April 8, SpaceX managed to land a rocket in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean on a floating platform for the first time in the company's history. This means that SpaceX can reuse these rockets again and again instead of discarding them after first use. Musk envisions that soon SpaceX will be capable of sending thousands of rockets to space, a first step towards conquering Mars.
Musk's companies build their own parts from scratch within the US rather than sourcing them from other countries. Thus Musk is heralded as an icon of US manufacturing and he has the ears of top government officials from Obama downwards. Tesla Motors has sent shock waves through Detroit as it is the first successful major US auto-company startup since 1925.
At the beginning of this book, I was deeply skeptical of Elon Musk and his idealistic vision. But now, having completed the book I feel years younger and I wonder whether it is possible indeed to imagine Musk's world playing out in reality. I am now rooting for Musk to win and win big.
Let me leave him with his own words (as mentioned in Vance's book):
"I would like to die thinking that humanity has a bright future. If we can solve sustainable energy and be well on our way to becoming a multiplanetary species with a self-sustaining civilization on another planet - to cope with a worst-case scenario happening and extinguishing human consciousness [on earth] - then I think that would be really good."
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