10. Elon Musk is the real Iron Man
“Some people don’t like change, but you need to embrace change if the alternative is disaster.”
Vital stats:
- Born in South Africa, Elon Musk has become a Silicon Valley darling and an international celebrity.
- He is even being called ‘the real Iron Man’.
By now, most South Africans probably know that Elon Musk is one of us – he was born in South Africa, though he made a name for himself outside our borders.
He made a fortune by backing PayPal, but is best known now for electric-car company Tesla and space exploration firm SpaceX.
Like other super-entrepreneurs such as Steve Jobs and Richard Branson, Musk is a trailblazer and a visionary. Not content to sit on a beach and enjoy his fortune, he ploughed the fortune he made off of PayPal into Tesla – gambling that people would be willing to buy into the idea of electric cars.
He also wants to help humanity explore the cosmos and colonise other planets, which is why he started SpaceX. “SpaceX is only 12 years old now,” Musk has said. “Between now and 2040, the company’s lifespan will have tripled. If we have linear improvement in technology, as opposed to logarithmic, then we should have a significant base on Mars, perhaps with thousands or tens of thousands of people.”
Top lesson:
Musk isn’t afraid to take big risks and bet on emerging technologies. “When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favour,” he says.