Elon Musk
Holds dual bachelor's degrees in physics and business from the University of Pennsylvania (Wharton). Dropped out of a Stanford materials science PhD after two days to co-found Zip2, which sold to Compaq for $307M in 1999. Co-founded X.com, which became PayPal and sold to eBay for $1.5B. Went on to found SpaceX (2002) and joined Tesla as an early investor, becoming its CEO in 2008. Co-founded OpenAI in December 2015 alongside Sam Altman and others, serving as Co-Chair and helping shape its founding mission of developing artificial general intelligence safely and broadly. Left the board in 2018 citing potential conflicts with Tesla's autonomous driving AI work. His vocal concern about existential AI risk — he called AI "potentially more dangerous than nukes" in 2014 — was a driving motivation behind OpenAI's creation. Publicly known for a first-principles engineering mindset and a willingness to litigate; he sued OpenAI in 2024 alleging departure from its founding mission.













