Elon Musk facts for kids

Musk at the Heisenberg Media summit in 2013

Elon R. Musk (born June 28, 1971) is a business owner, investor and inventor. He was born in South Africa, moved to Canada, then became an American. Musk is the current CEO & Chief Product Architect of Tesla Motors, Solar City, and CEO & CTO of SpaceX. As of April, 2016 he was worth over $10 billion, making him the 37th richest American.

Elon Musk and his brother started Zip2, a software company, in 1995. In 1999 he sold it and become a millionaire. He then started X.com, which merged with the company that owned PayPal. The company was renamed Paypal, and he focused on growing that part of the company. He then started SpaceX and became the CEO of Tesla.

Musk was born to a Canadian mother and a South African-born British father in Pretoria, South Africa. His parents divorced in 1980 and he mainly lived with his father in many different places in South Africa. He went to Waterkloof House Preparatory School and graduated from Pretoria Boys High School. He then moved to Canada in 1988 when he was 17, after he obtained Canadian citizenship through his mother. He got it before his South African military service was to begin. He felt that it would be easier to immigrate to the United States from Canada than from South Africa. He spent two years at the Queen's School of Business in Kingston, Ontario. He then transferred to the University of Pennsylvania where he earned a bachelor's degree in economics from the Wharton School. He stayed a year to finish his second bachelor's degree in physics. Then he moved to California to attempt to pursue a PhD in applied physics at Stanford but he left the program after only two days because he wanted to pursue his entrepreneurial aspirations (start businesses) in the areas of the Internet, renewable energy and outer space. He became an American citizen in 2002.

Images for kids

Musk and President Barack Obama at the Falcon 9 launch site in 2010
Musk observing an assembly demo at the reopening of the NUMMI plant, now known as the Tesla Factory (Fremont, California) in 2010
Musk standing in front of a Tesla Model S in 2011
Musk and Senator Dianne Feinstein next to a Tesla Model S (2010)