Elon Musk read every book in his school library in fourth grade, mastered programming s𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁s at age 9, and is worth $19.9 billion at age 47.

Elon Musk is considered a prodigy, having learned to read and write at the age of 2.

Elon Musk was 𝐛𝐨𝐫𝐧 in 1971 in South Africa to a middle-class family, his father was an engineer and his mother was a model. However, Elon had a difficult 𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘭𝘥hood, being isolated at school and soon suffering from his parents’ divorce when he was 9 years old.

Since 𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘭𝘥hood, Elon Musk has shown unusual qualities and often talked about unrealistic dreams about life. Therefore, he was always considered eccentric and was often bullied at school. Once, Elon Musk was pushed down the stairs by his classmates and beaten until his body was bruised.

With no friends, Elon Musk found joy in books. He spent 10 hours a day reading, mainly about science. By the fourth grade, Elon Musk had read every book in the school library, including the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Elon Musk loves reading science fiction books. Photo:  Business Insider. 

At the age of 9, Elon Musk found his second passion when he first came into contact with the Commodore VIC-20 computer. Elon mastered every s𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 in the programming manual in just 3 days, while it took engineers 6 months to learn.

At the age of 12, with the knowledge he had accumulated, Musk designed a video game called Blastar and sold it to a computer magazine for $500 (equivalent to $1,200 today).

Born and raised in South Africa, Elon Musk could not integrate into his homeland’s culture and was always looking for a place to develop himself. After graduating from high school, Elon Musk moved to Canada to attend university.

Elon Musk attended Queen’s University in Kingston, where he worked many jobs, including shoveling dirt in boiler rooms, working as a bank errand boy, and selling computers in dormitories to help pay for his living expenses.

“Every day I only dare to spend $1 on food and the most essential necessities,” Elon confided.

Two years later, Elon Musk went through the University of Pennsylvania’s university transfer program and set foot in the United States. Upon arriving in the land of the stars and ᵴtriƥes, he was completely overwhelmed by the growth rate of the world’s largest economy and decided to start a business here.

During his time in college, Elon Musk began to think about the fields he wanted to start a business in. With the idea of ​​revolutionizing the future of humanity, Elon Musk thought that only 5 fields could do this: Internet, sustainable energy, space exploration, artificial intelligence and biotechnology that changes the human genome.

After graduating with a double bachelor’s degree in economics and physics, he enrolled in a PhD program at Stanford University to study sustainable energy. However, after only two days of enrollment, Elon Musk decided to drop out to start his own business.

Turn a series of unrealistic ideas into reality

In 1995, when the Internet was just 𝐛𝐨𝐫𝐧, Elon Musk decided to try his luck with it. Elon and his younger brother Kimbal founded a company called Zip2. Elon Musk and his brother were penniless and had to work, eat, sleep and live at the Young Men’s Christian Association.

Elon Musk (right) and his brother Kimbal had a tough time starting a business in the US.

The Zip2 app was the idea that would lead to a series of search and location apps like Google Maps. When it first launched, Zip2 was not well received by businesses. The brothers spent a lot of time convincing customers to try it and survived on a small allowance from their father. Eventually, the company got customers and gradually grew.

In 1999, the Internet exploded and Compaq Technology bought Zip2 for $307 million. At that time, Elon Musk was only 27 years old and had about $22 million in his hands.

As soon as he had money from the Zip2 sale, Elon Musk implemented the idea of ​​electronic banking. This was a bold move because at that time there was no online payment tool. He used 10 million USD to build an online platform X.com, which provided services for checking balances, savings deposits and brokerage accounts.

Elon Musk and Confinity founders at the global launch of PayPal. Photo: CNN.

In 2000, X.com merged with Confinity to form the world-famous electronic payment company PayPal. The merger led to many conflicts within the company’s leadership. Those who opposed Elon pushed him out of the CEO position and PayPal was quickly acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002. After this deal, Elon Musk earned $180 million.

Also in 2002, Elon Musk invested $100 million to research rocket technology and build SpaceX. His goal is to reduce costs for the space industry and realize his ambition of bringing humans to live on other planets.

Two years later, Elon launched Tesla, an electric car company focused on clean and sustainable energy. This fantastical project of Elon Musk had no investment, forcing him to spend his own money to carry it out.

In 2006, Elon Musk continued to spend 10 million USD to establish another company called Solar City, specializing in installing solar battery systems produced from fossil fuels.

Turn the tables to reap success

After the sale of PayPal, Elon Musk’s pursuits were considered impossible and a waste of money. Many people considered him a paranoid tech millionaire.

In 2008, Elon Musk was in a crisis as a series of projects were at risk of failure. SpaceX had figured out how to produce rockets, but three test launches all exploded before reaching orbit. Meanwhile, to raise capital from investors, the project was required to successfully launch rockets. Elon Musk was in a mess when the remaining funds were only enough for one more launch, and if it failed, SpaceX would be wiped out.

SpaceX ran out of capital and fell into a difficult situation when consecutive test rocket launches failed. Photo: CNBC.

Meanwhile, Tesla was also in trouble. Tesla ran out of money and was considered the most failed technology project of 2007. At that time, his beautiful 8-year marriage ended in complications and pain.

Elon Musk quickly changed the situation with consecutive successes that made the whole world admire. First, in August 2008, SpaceX successfully launched a rocket and Elon Musk won a contract worth 1.6 billion USD from NASA.

The next day, Elon Musk scraped together the last of his money to save Tesla, and five months later, the company received a $50 million investment from Daimler.

Tesla is currently launching many electric car models priced from only 35,000 USD and is supported by many consumers. Photo: CNBC. 

To date, SpaceX has successfully launched 20 rockets and improved its technology to deliver cargo into space at low cost. The company has continuously received many valuable contracts from countries such as the US, Russia, and China. SpaceX is also testing spacecraft to take people to Mars. SpaceX is currently valued at about $12 billion.

Tesla also began launching its first products, the electric Model S, shaking up the entire auto industry.

In 2012, SolarCity was officially invested and became the largest solar panel installation company in the US. In the same year, Tesla’s stock increased sharply, making Elon Musk a self-made billionaire with a net worth of up to 2 billion USD.

Currently, Elon Musk is also researching and developing the world’s fastest Hyperloop train system. He owns a fortune of up to 19.9 billion USD and is the 54th richest person in the world.

Love path is bumpy

Elon Musk and his new lover – singer Grimes – at an event last April. Photo: The Money. 

In addition to his career, Elon Musk’s love life is also of great interest. After ending his marriage with his wife, who gave 𝐛𝐢𝐫𝐭𝐡 to six sons, in 2008, he dated actress Talulah Riley and married her in 2010. In 2012, they divorced and reunited a year later. Three years later, the two officially went their separate ways. In 2016, Elon dated Hollywood hottie Amber Heard, but the relationship quickly ended in 2017. After a series of difficult love affairs, the tech billionaire has now found love with singer Grimes, who is 16 years his junior.