It’s not a deification to recognize that the total upheaval and reinvention of three industries - automobiles and aerospace and finance - is something that very, very few people could do, even if they had luck and fortune going into it.
Aerospace sure, but automobiles and finance? Musk just bought Tesla, and he was fired from PayPal because he wanted to replace all of their Unix infrastructure with Windows.
I’m not saying he’s dumb, he’s clearly a smart guy, but I don’t think he’s anything special
That just is doing a lot of heavy lifting there. When Musk took over Tesla, it was a very small startup with 6 employees or so. All the subsequent growth into the behemoth that it is today has happened under his management.
If someone adopted a newborn and raised him to adulthood, would you dismiss them as not-a-real-parent of that kid?
Musk's role in Tesla is similar to Ray Kroc's in McDonald's. Not a founder either, but the person that took over a totally irrelevant small business and developed it into a world class superpower in its field.
To be dismissive of such an accomplishment is unwise at best.
I don’t know much beyond the surface w.r.t. PayPal, but it’s quite a distortion of history to claim that all Musk did was ‘just buy Tesla’.
Why I think he upended the auto industry:
- He bought Tesla within the first two years (IIRC) of it being founded; before there was even a working prototype
- He laid out the groundwork for the three-stage plan, and followed through
- Stage 1: Prototype -> Roadster
- Stage 2: Model S/X
- Stage 3: Model 3/Y
- He adopted high-tech in Teslas which make them compelling and ‘cool’ (for the general public), through Autopilot, games (Cuphead, Asteroids, etc), video (Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, etc), OTA software updates, and more
And, the most important piece:
- He led and developed the Supercharger network initiative, partially solving the problem of EVs as true ICE replacements
Each of those decisions could have, and likely would have, been handled differently by Random CEO. It was only through each of those decisions, and a lot of luck, that Tesla is a viable car company today.
I’m quick to criticize Musk, but what he did with Tesla is truly incredible and deserving of praise.
Zip2: Musk wrote the software for drawing vector maps & calculating point to point directions anywhere in US. Sold it for $300M.
PayPal: Musk founded X.com. X merged with PayPal. Through that merger, Musk became PayPal's largest shareholder. He was ousted as the company's CEO. He did attempt to move the company's tech onto Windows. None of this invalidates his accomplishment's at PayPal. To wit, he walked away with $100M.
Tesla: Musk did not buy Tesla. 8 months after Tesla was founded, he funded the majority of Tesla's series A at which time he became the chairman of its board. He then stepped into the CEO role and has maintained that role ever since.
SpaceX: Musk trained himself in rocket engineering and pioneered private spaceflight while pushing rocket tech far into the future. Self landing rockets. <- I don't even need a full sentence. Self. Landing. ROCKETS!!!!
Its very important to get the facts right before moving on to interpretation.
Of course, Musk didn't do all of this himself. He has again and again hired top notch engineers and scientists. But even in the most biased publications, his critics begrudgingly acknowledge his technical prowess and commercial acumen.
Again, just look at the list of accomplishments. He is a man, not a god. But in these domains, he is absolutely something special. Many sigma special.
He's an asshole but an effective one. I didn't take a job with him because I didn't like him, but I also don't think I would have made the same choice at a different phase of my life.
