Elon Musk Innovation Quotes

I think there are probably too many smart people pursuing Internet stuff, finance, and law,” Musk said on the way. “That is part of the reason why we haven’t seen as much innovation.

One of the biggest mistakes we made was trying to automate things that are super easy for a person to do, but super hard for a robot to do.

If you punish people too much for failure, then they will respond accordingly and the innovation you will get will be very incrementalist. Nobody's going to try anything bold for fear of getting fired or punished in some way. The risk/reward must be balanced, in favor of making bold moves.

At SpaceX, we specialize in converting things from impossible to late.

To anyone I've offended, I just want to say 'I reinvented electric cars and I'm sending people to Mars in a rocket ship, did you also think I was going to be a chill, normal dude?” ~ Elon Musk, Saturday Night Live, 8th May 2021.

You can feel whatever you want about Elon’s behavior,” Gates said, “but there is no one in our time who has done more to push the bounds of science and innovation than he has.

The only thing that makes sense to do is strive for greater collective enlightenment.

The fear of failure can be more crippling than failure itself. While it can be the case that people bite off more than they chew, innovation entails risk.

The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.” ~ Steve Job

Elon Musk over promises to deliver proprietary-to-novel products in short time but delivers a bit late. The advantage of this tactic is it drives global PR ad also lures pre-orders.

In 2015, Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk quipped, “We have this handy fusion reactor in the sky called the sun. You don’t have to do anything. It just works. It shows up every day and produces ridiculous amounts of power.

Musk believed that innovation was driven by setting clear metrics, such as cost per ton lifted into orbit or average number of miles driven on Autopilot without human intervention. For Starlink, he surprised Juncosa by asking how many photons were collected by the solar arrays of the satellite

If you want to do something really innovative, you have to apply a sort of first principles analysis. And don’t reason by analogy. Analogies are referencing the past. First principles mean you look at the most fundamental truths in a particular arena, the things that really are almost indisputably correct, and you reason up from there to a conclusion. And if you see that that conclusion is at odds with what people generally believe, then you have an opportunity. You can’t operate like that on all things, because it takes too much mental horsepower, so most of your life, you have to operate by reasoning by analogy, but if you really want to innovate, you must reason from first principles to identify the problem.” - Elon Musk

Dontchev was born in Bulgaria and emigrated to America as a young kid when his father, a mathematician, took a job at the University of Michigan. He got an undergraduate and graduate degree in aerospace engineering, which led to what he thought was his dream opportunity: an internship at Boeing. But he quickly became disenchanted and decided to visit a friend who was working at SpaceX. “I will never forget walking the floor that day,” he says. “All the young engineers working their asses off and wearing T-shirts and sporting tattoos and being really badass about getting things done. I thought, ‘These are my people.’ It was nothing like the buttoned-up deadly vibe at Boeing.” That summer, he made a presentation to a VP at Boeing about how SpaceX was enabling the younger engineers to innovate. “If Boeing doesn’t change,” he said, “you’re going to lose out on the top talent.” The VP replied that Boeing was not looking for disrupters. “Maybe we want the people who aren’t the best, but who will stick around longer.” Dontchev quit. At a conference in Utah, he went to a party thrown by SpaceX and, after a couple of drinks, worked up the nerve to corner Gwynne Shotwell. He pulled a crumpled résumé out of his pocket and showed her a picture of the satellite hardware he had worked on. “I can make things happen,” he told her. Shotwell was amused. “Anyone who is brave enough to come up to me with a crumpled-up résumé might be a good candidate,” she said. She invited him to SpaceX for interviews. He was scheduled to see Musk, who was still interviewing every engineer hired, at 3 p.m. As usual, Musk got backed up, and Dontchev was told he would have to come back another day. Instead, Dontchev sat outside Musk’s cubicle for five hours. When he finally got in to see Musk at 8 p.m., Dontchev took the opportunity to unload about how his gung-ho approach wasn’t valued at Boeing. When hiring or promoting, Musk made a point of prioritizing attitude over résumé skills. And his definition of a good attitude was a desire to work maniacally hard. Musk hired Dontchev on the spot.

Finding the right mentor is not always easy. But we can locate role models in a more accessible place: the stories of great originals throughout history. Human rights advocate Malala Yousafzai was moved by reading biographies of Meena, an activist for equality in Afghanistan, and of Martin Luther King, Jr. King was inspired by Gandhi as was Nelson Mandela. In some cases, fictional characters can be even better role models. Growing up, many originals find their first heroes in their most beloved novels where protagonists exercise their creativity in pursuit of unique accomplishments. When asked to name their favorite books, Elon Musk and Peter Thiel each chose “Lord of the Rings“, the epic tale of a hobbit’s adventures to destroy a dangerous ring of power. Sheryl Sandberg and Jeff Bezos both pointed to “A Wrinkle in Time“ in which a young girl learns to bend the laws of physics and travels through time. Mark Zuckerberg was partial to “Enders Game“ where it’s up to a group of kids to save the planet from an alien attack. Jack Ma named his favorite childhood book as “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves“, about a woodcutter who takes the initiative to change his own fate. … There are studies showing that when children’s stories emphasize original achievements, the next generation innovates more.… Unlike biographies, in fictional stories characters can perform actions that have never been accomplished before, making the impossible seem possible. The inventors of the modern submarine and helicopters were transfixed by Jules Vern’s visions in “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” and “The Clippership of the Clouds”. One of the earliest rockets was built by a scientist who drew his motivation from an H.G. Wells novel. Some of the earliest mobile phones, tablets, GPS navigators, portable digital storage desks, and multimedia players were designed by people who watched “Star Trek” characters using similar devices. As we encounter these images of originality in history and fiction, the logic of consequence fades away we no longer worry as much about what will happen if we fail… Instead of causing us to rebel because traditional avenues are closed, the protagonist in our favorite stories may inspire originality by opening our minds to unconventional paths.

But the rules for success in the twenty-first century are emerging, and they are radically different from the rules in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. You can make art, you can create, and you can sell those creations—or at least make them well enough that you or your loved ones would be thrilled to own the things you have made, be they chairs, desks, plates, cups, clothing, lamps, computer accessories, or whatever. If you are willing to climb the knowledge ladder needed, maybe you, too, could become the next Elon Musk, Jack Dorsey, Jim McKelvey, or even Jazz Tigan. Here is the thing: You must learn to learn. We must learn to learn. We must develop our skills at creating, developing, and nurturing things and services that others value. The age of being a cog in a big machine and marching one’s way to a defined benefit plan retirement is over. In its place is a global talent pool with access to the same tools, knowledge, and equipment as everyone else and with competition coming from every angle inside and outside of the industry. Nokia and Motorola owned the cell phone industry top to bottom, and then BlackBerry came in to mess it up. But BlackBerry was just a harbinger of the change coming. Apple, at the time just a computer company, assaulted the cell phone cartel and won. It won big. And then Google—how crazy that is in retrospect—jumped in and changed it all up again. Now Samsung is making a good run at both of them.

Airbus Group Ventures business to be led by Tim Dombrowski, a former partner of technology venture capital powerhouse Andreessen Horowitz. The unit’s mandate is to “invest in promising, disruptive and innovative business opportunities generated around the globe,” Airbus said on Friday. Paul Eremenko, who was director of engineering at Google’s secretive Advanced Technology and Projects organization and also worked for the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency technology incubator, will be chief executive of Airbus Group Silicon Valley technology and business innovation center, the company said. “Silicon Valley serves as a unique hub for technology breakthroughs and we see huge opportunities to learn from, and partner with the many players based there,” Airbus Chief Executive Tom Enders said in a statement. Mr. Enders has become concerned that newcomers to the industry may turn into formidable rivals to the European aerospace giant along with more traditional competitors such as Boeing Co. That’s already happening in space where entrepreneur Elon Musk’s space company, Space Exploration

make a decision not just because of the profit you will gain but because you want to do it.

Keeping your body sound is a statement of appreciation to the entire universe.

The most valuable blessing we can offer anybody is our consideration.

I think the probability of us discovering another top-one-hundred-type invention gets smaller and smaller,” Huebner told me in an interview. “Innovation is a finite resource.

Gustavo Solivellas dice: Warming...

Why should we think like monks? If you wanted to know how to dominate the basketball court, you might turn to Michael Jordan; if you wanted to innovate, you might investigate Elon Musk; you might study Beyoncé to learn how to perform. If you want to train your mind to find peace, calm, and purpose? Monks are the experts.

2. Parent CEOs push the company to grow and evolve. They take big risks for larger rewards. Innovative founders—like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos—are always parent CEOs. But it’s also possible to be a parent CEO even if you didn’t start the business yourself—like Jamie Dimon at JPMorgan Chase or Satya Nadella at Microsoft. Pat Gelsinger, who recently took over the Intel CEO position, seems to be Intel’s first parent CEO since Andy Grove.

If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough,

Elon Musk is indeed the man of the moment for entrepreneurship and innovation in this era. In our time, he has propelled proprietary innovation in various industries: finance, automotive and space travel.

Elon Musk is a synthesizer of engineers. He has brilliantly played human resource and hired amazing engineers to create ‘material-discovery-novelty to proprietary-novelty’ innovations.

Everything comes from something, and anything new is made out of things already in existence.

It is worth noting that Elon Musk enjoys certain privileges that may not be available to everyone. For instance, he is situated in the United States, which is a developed country with a large population of over 300 million people, and where funding opportunities are relatively more abundant. His previous entrepreneurial successes have also placed him in favourable positions to secure funding for his ambitious projects.

Despite Elon Musks’ privileges and advantages, I believe that his approach to innovation is adaptable and can be replicated to varying degrees.

Elon Musk calculated that by producing about 80% of their hardware in-house for SpaceX, they could cut the cost of launching for customers and still enjoy a 70% gross margin.

One of the most notable innovations of SpaceX is the creation and engineering of reusable rockets. Prior to this innovation, once a rocket was used, it was done with, resulting in significant financial loss.

Innovators have artisan-like hands. They have ability to deconstruct innovations, reassemble them, and even generate their own iterations of innovative products.

Elon Musk, a multifaceted industrial designer, engineer, and technologist, also possesses these artisan-like hands. He has the capacity to deconstruct complex systems, identify areas for improvement, and construct his own enhanced versions.

Innovators possess the drive and determination to act upon their interest to learn a skill or pursue a vision, even if it means hiring skills to develop or create for them. Again still, they possess the drive and determination to act upon their visions, turning them into tangible realities. Their actions set them apart from the rest, as they actively engage with the challenges, uncertainties, and possibilities inherent in the creation process.

To become an innovator, one must first be in motion, continuously pursuing their passions and engaging in meaningful activities. This proactive mindset, coupled with the drive to explore and create, is what sets the stage for innovation. Just like Dr. Fleming, who made groundbreaking discoveries by actively conducting experiments and pushing the boundaries of his field, true innovators understand the value of taking action.

Innovation itself can be viewed as a stack of interconnected elements. Consider a chair, for instance, which combines wood or other solid materials with a specific geometric shape designed for comfortable seating, primarily suited for humans. Adding cushions to the chair further enhances its innovation by increasing comfort.

To become an innovator, one must possess the ability to envision novel innovations across a range of domains, from material discoveries to proprietary-novelty. Acquiring diverse skills and cultivating a mindset that embraces cross-disciplinary thinking and exploration paves the way for the generation of groundbreaking ideas. The breadth of knowledge and expertise allows innovators to traverse different realms, connect seemingly unrelated concepts, and ultimately push the boundaries of what is possible.

As you acquire more skills, your ability to create a wider range of products expands. With each new skill, you gain increased confidence, practicality, and boldness, enabling you to pursue and develop even more daring and innovative creations. Elon Musk's approach to innovation operates in this manner.

Elon Musk hires smart people and let them figure solutions. At the founding of SpaceX, Musk hired various engineers to help build these would be novel rockets that would cost clients a fraction of the then going rate.

Elon Musk suffers from over promising and delivering a tad bit late – but not under-delivering.

Innovation is a mix of different innovations, e.g., internet + banking = internet banking.

I see Elon Musk as a combination of Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, and Steve Jobs, of our time. In his entrepreneurial pursuits, he has played the role of a programmer, industrial designer, product architect, mechanical engineer and physicist.

The Falcon 9’s two launch stages are engineered to return to earn. The first part of the rocket propels the rocket head and then returns to earth and lands where it fired from. This is done by using grid fins and the engines performing retry burning.

The Raptor engine is another advanced innovation, as it is the first full-flow staged combustion rocket engine ever flown and produces the highest combustion chamber pressure ever reached by an operational rocket engine (330 bars). The previous record holder did 290 to 300 bar in one mode of operation is the (Soviet's RD-701 engine) in the 1980s.

Overall, the success of SpaceX serves as an example of how re-imagining manufacturing and applying new materials and proprietary innovations can lead to significant cost reductions and novel innovations. It is important to always remain on the lookout for new ideas and improvements and to have a technically capable team in place to make them a reality.

A great frame inferred to encapsulate Musk’s hiring philosophy is the ‘two-hands test’. It means the candidate must have first-hand experience and a hands-on expertise in testing. Passing the two-hands test proves you have skin in the game.

Exponential Organizations are founded by innovative owners who value speed and early adoption of innovation. Think Tesla/SpaceX and Elon Musk, Amazon and Jeff Bezos, Apple and Steve Jobs. In these companies, the visionary tech founder has the ability to dictate speed and direction. From inception, these company cultures are oriented toward rapid Experimentation and data-driven decision-making rather than the comfort of humans living in the status quo.

Going from PayPal, I thought: ‘Well, what are some of the other problems that are likely to most affect the future of humanity?' Not from the perspective, ‘What's the best way to make money?

One version of Borrowed thinking is a technique I call the Different Lens. To begin, brainstorm a list of people, industries, or perspectives. Examples may include: an archaeologist, a 4-year-old, someone living 200 years in the future, Elon Musk, a Navy SEAL, a zoologist, Brad Pitt, Picasso, a professional bowling champion. The more diverse and strange, the better. Next, take a stack of index cards and write one name or role from your list on the back of each. You’re now armed for a Different Lens brainstorm session. First, clearly articulate the real-world challenge you’re facing. Perhaps it is developing a new product to combat a competitive launch. Maybe you’re looking for a way to improve closing rates throughout your sales force, attract and retain Millennial workers, or reduce error-rates in your manufacturing plant. Once the challenge has been identified, turn over one card. If the card reads “architect,” the group brainstorms how an architect would approach their real-world challenge. Once the ideas start to dwindle, flip over the next card and look at the problem through the next lens. Instead of thinking about how your competition is solving this problem, think about how Beyoncé would slay it. Before long, you and your team will see the problem in a whole new light, and by borrowing the thinking from others, you’ll gain a fresh perspective that will lead to the innovative solutions you seek.

If things are not failing you are not innovating enough.” —Elon Musk Excuses

stuff. Shotwell made sure to emphasize the lean, innovative

The mere fact the Tesla Model S exists at all is a testament to innovation and entrepreneurship, the very qualities that once made the American automobile industry the largest, richest, and most powerful in the world.

Thought Leadership “Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future” Book by Ashlee Vance “Take risks now and do something bold. You won’t regret it.” - Elon Musk (CEO of SpaceX and Tesla) #smitanairjain #leadership #womenintech #thoughtleaders #tedxspeaker #technology #tech #success #strategy #startuplife #startupbusiness #startup #mentor #leaders #itmanagement #itleaders #innovation #informationtechnology #influencers #Influencer #hightech #fintechinfluencer #fintech #entrepreneurship #entrepreneurs #economy #economics #development #businessintelligence #business

I think there are probably too many smart people pursuing Internet stuff, finance, and law,” Musk said on the way. “That is part of the reason why we haven’t seen as much innovation.” MUSK

battery prices will fall to $100 per kilowatt-hour by 2023 just by following the 16 percent per year cost improvement that the world saw between 2010 and 2016. And that’s probably a conservative estimate. GM has predicted that its lithium-ion cell costs will hit $100 per kilowatt-hour by 2021. Keep in mind that these cost reductions require no breakthrough in battery technology, and they don’t take into account improvements likely to arise from increased competition, consolidation, scale, and innovation as automakers and utilities push further into the market. The effect will be dramatic.

In May 2017, the company replaced Fields as CEO with Jim Hackett, who had been responsible for Ford’s autonomous driving efforts. To realize its forward-looking vision and become a leader in automotive technology, Ford would need the services of the world’s best software developers, which would mean competing not only against other automakers but also against Silicon Valley’s hottest companies. In the new era of automotive, software is king. With that shift comes an opening for software-focused companies like Tesla. “In many cases, large car companies or truck companies are not focused on software, they’re not focused on sensors or batteries,” Straubel said in 2016. “And this gives an opportunity for innovation for new companies and new entrants to play on a bit more of a level playing field than there ever was in the past.

the autonomous-driving side of things, Alphabet (formerly Google), which has logged several million self-driving-car test miles, continues to lead the pack. At the end of 2016, it created a new business division, called Waymo, for its autonomous driving technology. In May 2017, Waymo and Lyft announced that they would work together on developing the technology, and later in the year, Alphabet invested $1 billion in the start-up. Others, like Cruise Automation (which GM acquired for $1 billion) and Comma.ai, which offers open-source autonomous driving technology in the same vein as Google’s Android mobile operating system, are chasing hard. Baidu, China’s leading Internet search company, has an autonomous-driving research center in Sunnyvale. Byton—backed by China’s Tencent, Foxconn, and the China Harmony New Energy auto retailer group—has an office in Mountain View, as does Didi Chuxing, the Chinese ride-sharing company in which Apple invested $1 billion. Many of these companies have taken not just inspiration but also talent from Tesla. Part of the value of an innovation cluster like Silicon Valley lies in the dispersal of intellectual labor from one node to the next. For instance, PayPal is well known in the Valley for producing a number of high performers who left the company to start, join, or invest in others. The so-called PayPal Mafia includes Reid Hoffman, who founded LinkedIn; Max Levchin, whose most recent of several start-ups is the financial services company Affirm; Peter Thiel, a Facebook board member and President Trump–supporting venture capitalist who cofounded “big data” company Palantir; Jeremy Stoppelman, who started reviews site Yelp; Keith Rabois, who was chief operating officer at Square and then joined Khosla Ventures; David Sacks, who sold Yammer to Microsoft for $1.2 billion and later became CEO at Zenefits; Jawed Karim, who cofounded YouTube; and one Elon Musk.

he was reveling in the possibilities inherent in selling a car that behaved like a fighter jet. “Yeah, it’s mad,” he continued, with a dimpled grin. And then he added, “In the option selection, you’ll be able to choose three settings: Normal, Sport, and Insane.” A ripple of laughter washed over the crowd. Then, as if to reassure himself as much as everyone else: “It will actually say ‘Insane.’” He hunched his shoulders forward and laughed. Videos posted by people who had experienced “Insane Mode” during test rides at the event appeared on YouTube the next day. Invariably, the accompanying commentary was littered with expletives and other delighted expressions of shock as the car’s spine-straightening acceleration took effect. In the weeks and months that followed, more reaction videos appeared and spread, with one especially spicy compilation coming to accrue more than ten million views. Insane Mode could be seen as more than just a product feature, more than just a marketing gimmick. It would be the mind-set required to fend off the short-sellers of Tesla’s stock, traditional automakers, political opponents, and an increasingly nervous oil industry. It represented the intensity of fervor needed to win the public over to electric cars. And it was a statement about the velocity of innovation required to transition the world to sustainable energy before the planet’s climate changes beyond repair. Even as a feature for a luxury motor vehicle, though, Insane Mode was audacious in both intent and implication.

Innovation is a finite resource.

When industries don’t change with time, Someone like Elon Musk will push the industry towards the change. Change is an integral part of the evolution process. How can we stop the change to happen?

Huebner told me in an interview. “Innovation is a finite resource.

Tesla, founded by maverick businessman Elon Musk, has actually introduced sales without dealers, but it has run into opposition from dealers. The state of New Jersey even banned Tesla sales because of this dealerless model

The Power of Questions: The quality of your life depends on the quality of the questions you ask yourself. All great innovators like Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, Elon Musk have the habit of asking powerful and imaginative questions.