I admire Elon Musk because he is not afraid of taking on the challenge of solving big problems. He has an impressive resume, but I want to focus on Tesla Motors and SpaceX, which are two companies he founded using much of his own money. Through these companies, Musk is developing technological advances that are pushing the human race forward.
Tesla Motors aims to produce affordable electric cars that are available to mass-market consumers. In addition to reducing carbon emissions, Tesla Motors is answering the question of what will society do when the price of oil makes driving a car too expensive for the average person. At the end of 2012, Tesla Motors will starting selling the Tesla S for less than $50,000. This car will be able to go 160 miles on one charge of its battery pack.
With SpaceX, Elon Musk is working on making space launch vehicles that are low cost and have high reliability. SpaceX is launching its Dragon capsule that will dock with the International Space Station in early 2012. Even more remarkably, Musk recently said that he will put humans on Mars within ten to twenty years.
Both Tesla Motors and SpaceX are good examples of the technological advances private companies can produce. That said, both Tesla Motors and SpaceX have taken money from the government in the form of contracts, credits, and grants to solve these problems. Perhaps, this is where the government can be the most effective in this area, which is giving incentives to private companies that are solving big problems.
The work of Elon Musk’s companies makes the accomplishments of the average tech startup look trivial. Reading about Musk makes a person reconsider whether or not they should be working on improving ad performance on the Internet when he or she could be helping to put a man on Mars.
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