Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and a space entrepreneur, was chosen Time magazine’s Person of the Year,2021 on Monday, describing him as an embodiment of the technological shifts but also worrying tendencies that are transforming people’s lives.
Musk, who last year surpassed Amazon founder Jeff Bezos as the world’s wealthiest person, has an impact on the ground with his Tesla electric car company and beyond with his SpaceX rockets.
CEO of a trillion dollar company
Musk’s electric car company was valued at over a trillion dollars in October, and SpaceX has partnered with NASA to launch numerous missions, including a test flight to defend Earth from an asteroid.
According to Forbes’ real-time billionaires list, the South African-born 50-year-old has seen his wealth jump to nearly $250 billion during the pandemic.
Musk has expressed an interest in settling Mars and is planning orbital flights as part of SpaceX’s planned American return to the Moon next year.
“Overall, the goal has been to make life multi-planetary and enable mankind to become a spacefaring civilization,” Musk said in an interview with Time that coincided with the announcement of the Person of the Year.
Musk’s influence on the world market
With a single tweet, he has been known to shift markets and the value of cryptocurrencies, but his greatest earthly effect is currently with his electric automobiles.
Neuralink, the Boring Company, and SolarCity are among Elon Musk’s other ventures. He’s also known for his controversial tweets on topics ranging from bitcoin to his connection with pop singer Grimes. Musk acknowledges to Time, “But you know, not all jokes land.”
Elon Musk has dominated the news for a long time, to the point that some of his tweets have drawn regulatory attention in the past.
According to the magazine piece, Elon Musk’s SpaceX has jumped ahead of Boeing and others to claim control of America’s space destiny. Tesla, the automotive firm he founded, now owns two-thirds of the multibillion-dollar electric-vehicle market and is worth a cool $1 trillion. Musk is now worth more than $250 billion as a result of this.
Elon Musk “bends governments and industry to the power of his ambition,” according to the profile.
The award has been given out by the TIME magazine in the United States since 1927,Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were voted Person of the Year last year. Charles Lindbergh, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Adolph Hitler are among those who have graced the cover as Person of the Year.
On Monday, the hashtags Musk and Person of the Year were trending on Twitter. While many on the social media platform welcomed him, others questioned his decision or used it to criticise Musk. Senator Elizabeth Warren, who has previously criticised Musk, tweeted that it’s time to “fix the corrupt tax code so The Person of the Year will actually pay taxes and stop freeloading off everyone else.”
Brief on Elon Musk’s journey
Musk was born in Pretoria, South Africa, and travelled to the United States to pursue a PhD at Stanford University, but dropped out. He co-founded the internet mapping service Zip2 and the electronic payment service PayPal, both of which were sold to Compaq and eBay, respectively.
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