How Many Businesses Do Elon Musk Owns?

With an estimated net worth of $221.5 billion as of October 27, Elon Musk was listed as the richest person in the world by Forbes. According to Britannica, the South African businessman is best known for serving as the CEO of the space exploration corporation SpaceX and the electric automobile manufacturer Tesla Motors. Along with his commercial ventures, Musk has garnered a lot of attention for his extremely divisive political views. Due to Musk's advocacy of far-right ideologies, his transgender daughter, who is his only child, legally broke connections with him (via Mercury News). In July of 2020, Musk also sent a transphobic comment on Twitter with the words "pronouns stink." Due to his purchase of the social media site Twitter, Musk has recently returned to the media's attention. According to the BBC, Musk just paid an astounding $44 billion for Twitter, putting an end to months of executive and company conflict and scandal. The action is being taken at a time when advocates for free speech and civil rights are concerned about rising censorship and the spread of the far-right on the platform. That said, Twitter is just one of several businesses that Musk now owns. Also Read: Is Tesla Prepared to Bring Useful AI to the Real World? Musk has a lengthy history of starting new businesses or buying them. Twitter, Neuralink, Tesla, The Boring Company, the Musk Foundation, and OpenAI are among the businesses that Musk owns, according to Insider. He supposedly also has connections to a few other businesses, including Wyoming Steel, a limited liability firm. Musk's initial tweet about The Boring Company was primarily intended as a joke after he expressed his annoyance with Los Angeles traffic on social media. "I'm going to create a tunnel boring machine and just start digging since the traffic is driving me crazy" (via Investopedia). Musk eventually started digging and established a business whose sole purpose is to build car-transport tunnels. Beyond his other businesses, Tesla Motors may be the one for which Elon is best recognized. According to Britannica, Tesla, Inc. is one of the more significant producers of electric cars, having contributed to the revival of interest in electric vehicles as a viable gasoline substitute. Contrary to popular belief, Martin Eberhard, the CEO, and Marc Tarpenning, the CFO, really founded the company in 2003, not Elon. Nevertheless, Elon Musk is now regarded as a co-founder as a result of a 2009 lawsuit. After the 2008 financial crisis, when Eberhard was fired from the company, Elon took over as CEO.