Childhood and family. Elon Reeve Musk was born on June 28, 1971, in Pretoria, South Africa's administrative capital. He is of British and Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry. His mother, Maye Musk (née Haldeman), is a model and dietitian born in Saskatchewan, Canada, and raised in South Africa.

While Musk hasn't explicitly named a favorite, he frequently drives Tesla models, suggesting a personal preference for their performance and sustainability. He's also expressed admiration for the classic Jaguar E-Type and the iconic McLaren F1.

Musk wears many different hats, and in addition to the above, he's also a father of 11 children that he's had with three different women. The X owner shares three kids with the musician Grimes, twins with tech executive Shivon Zilis and five children, a set of twins and triplets, with his ex-wife, Justine Wilson.

Elon Musk cofounded the electronic payment firm PayPal, and in 2002 he founded SpaceX, a company that makes rockets and spacecraft. He was a major early funder of Tesla, which makes electric cars and batteries, and became its chief executive officer in 2008. He cofounded Neuralink, a neurotechnology company, in 2016.