Elon Musk Interview

..."Elon: Yeah. I think a lot of people think I'm kind of a business person or something, which is fine. Business is fine. But really it's like at SpaceX, Gwynne Shotwell is Chief Operating Officer. She manages legal, finance, sales, and general business activity. And then my time is almost entirely with the engineering team, working on improving the Falcon 9 and our Dragon spacecraft and developing the Mars Colonial architecture. At Tesla, it's working on the Model 3 and, yeah, so I'm in the design studio, take up a half a day a week, dealing with aesthetics and look-and-feel things. And then most of the rest of the week is just going through engineering of the car itself as well as engineering of the factory.Because the biggest epiphany I've had this year is that what really matters is the machine that builds the machine, the factory. And that is at least two orders of magnitude harder than the vehicle itself."...

I am sure that last sentence is a true statement in every way.

He makes a good point. The reason we know the brand Ford today is because of the factory, not the car. I think much of Musk's success can be traced to his choosing to improve upon boring existing technologies rather than chase revolutionary technologies that rarely pan out.

While others search for a magic battery technology, he builds a gigafactory and uses mass production to drive battery costs down. When others were investigating space shuttle type approaches to orbital launches, he worked on maximizing the potential of traditional rockets and recovering 1st and 2nd stages for reuse. When others tried to build a cheap electric cars, he built expensive electric sports cars, because gas engines can't match electric motors for acceleration and control.

The point is, he accomplishes the extraordinary by maximizing the potential of the ordinary. At least that's how I see him.

http://www.ford.co.uk/experience-ford/Heritage/EvolutionOfMassProduction

Thanks! That was indeed interesting. I wish him continued success in all his endeavors.

After watching this video I can say that he definitely can be an idol for many Engineering Students, since he has such revolutionary ideas and he was capable to make business out of something so far from us in the future.

However, I do not think that he said anything new many of us have not thought about, or at least speaking for myself. It is just that I would not invest on something that is likely to make me fail. He is taking risks from projects where the chance of success is less than 10%, where I would not take anything below 80 or 90%. And at the same time, he is investing in technologies that are all totally different, that it is just really difficult to be an expert in all of them.

Technological advances are too precious to take them lightly. I know he has succeeded in Tesla Motors, but it is not like anyone can be the new Elon Musk by overcoming fear and creating a futuristic company. The knowledge and the experience in the technology are certainly needed. Same as Engineering is not for everyone.

Did you know that Elon meets with every potential new employee before they are hired? Sure they are screened and checked and tested before they meet with him but before they are hired he personally meets with them and contributes to the final decision. I think that in itself is pretty darn amazing.