Elon Musk is a South African-born entrepreneur and technology executive who serves as CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, maintaining an estimated net worth of $424.7 billion that has established him as the world’s wealthiest individual since 2021. Born June 28, 1971, in Pretoria, Musk co-founded PayPal before launching SpaceX in 2002 and joining Tesla in 2004, while also founding Neuralink, The Boring Company, and briefly leading Twitter’s transformation into X. Further exploration reveals his extensive impact across multiple industries.
When Elon Musk acquired Twitter for $44 billion in October 2022, the South African-born entrepreneur added yet another high-profile venture to his already expansive portfolio of companies spanning electric vehicles, space exploration, and artificial intelligence. Born on June 28, 1971, in Pretoria, South Africa, Musk demonstrated early interests in computing and entrepreneurship before emigrating to Canada in 1988, where he would begin building the foundation for his future business empire.
Musk’s educational journey took him from Queen’s University to the University of Pennsylvania, where he earned degrees in economics and physics, before briefly attending Stanford University’s graduate program for just two days. His departure from Stanford in favor of entrepreneurial ventures proved prescient, as he co-founded Zip2, an online city guide software firm that Compaq acquired in 1999, marking his first major business success.
Musk’s bold departure from Stanford after just two days to pursue entrepreneurship ultimately led to his first major business triumph with Zip2.
The entrepreneur’s next venture, X.com, founded in 1999, eventually became PayPal after a strategic merger, with eBay acquiring the company in 2002 for a substantial sum that would fuel Musk’s subsequent investments. That same year, he founded SpaceX, revolutionizing the aerospace industry through innovations in reusable rockets and commercial spaceflight, while simultaneously becoming an early investor and later CEO of Tesla in 2004, transforming the electric vehicle market.
Musk’s leadership extends across multiple cutting-edge companies, serving as CEO and chief engineer of SpaceX, CEO and product architect of Tesla, and CTO of X, the rebranded platform formerly known as Twitter. His technological ambitions expanded further with the founding of Neuralink in 2016, focusing on brain-computer interface technology, and The Boring Company in 2017, which aims to revolutionize urban transportation through innovative tunneling projects.
The billionaire’s influence in artificial intelligence research began with co-founding OpenAI in 2015, though he later departed due to strategic differences, subsequently establishing xAI as his response to developments in AI leadership. His technological contributions include leading development of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Dragon spacecraft, overseeing creation of Tesla’s groundbreaking Roadster, and proposing the Hyperloop concept for high-speed transportation. Neuralink successfully conducted its first clinical trials after receiving FDA approval in September 2023.
With an estimated net worth of $424.7 billion as of May 2025, Musk has maintained his position as the world’s wealthiest person since 2021, earning recognition as Time magazine’s Person of the Year in 2021. His cultural and political impact extends beyond business, influencing public discourse on technology through social media engagement and playing significant roles in shaping electric vehicle and private spaceflight industries while remaining actively involved in American politics and AI policy debates. Following his political shift and endorsement of Donald Trump, Musk was appointed to lead the Department of Government Efficiency, though he resigned from this role in May 2025 over disagreements with the administration’s spending policies.
