Biography
Elon Musk is the world's first trillionaire and the most consequential entrepreneur of the 21st century. Born in Pretoria, South Africa, he taught himself programming at age 10 and sold his first video game, Blastar, for $500 at age 12. He moved to Canada at 17, then transferred to the University of Pennsylvania, where he earned degrees in economics and physics.
His first major success came with Zip2, a city-guide software company co-founded with his brother Kimbal. Compaq acquired it for $307 million in 1999. He immediately invested the proceeds into X.com, an online payments startup that merged with Confinity to become PayPal — sold to eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002. Musk pocketed $180 million.
Instead of retiring, he bet everything. He founded SpaceX in 2002, invested in Tesla in 2004, and co-funded SolarCity with his cousins. By 2008, all three were on the verge of bankruptcy simultaneously. A last-minute NASA contract saved SpaceX. A last-minute loan saved Tesla. Today, Musk's empire spans rockets, electric vehicles, brain implants, underground transport, social media, and AI — making him not just the world's richest person, but arguably history's most productive allocator of capital.
Did You Know?
Elon Musk's first game, Blastar, was written in 167 lines of BASIC and published in a South African computer magazine for approximately $500. The code is still online. He was 12.