Tag: Elon Musk

JUST IN: Elon Musk Puts Twitter Acquisition On Hold

 

Elon Musk has announced that he will be putting his $44 billion dollar Twitter acquisition deal on hold.

In a tweet on Wednesday, Musk said he took the decision pending when he’s able to confirm Twitter’s claim that spam and fake accounts indeed represent less than 5% of total users of the microblogging platform.

“Twitter deal temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of users,” he tweeted.

Following the pause, Twitter shares fell by 17.7% to $37.10 in premarket trading, reports Reuters.

This is the lowest price the shares have fallen to since Musk announced that he had purchased a large stake in the company back in April.

This means that the likelihood that the deal will close at the agreed price of $54.20 per share may fall below 50%.

It was reported that Twitter had earlier estimated that fake or spam accounts on the platform represented less than 5% of its monetizable daily active users during the first quarter of 2022, when it recorded 229 million users.

The Tesla CEO has earlier pledged to remove “spam bots” and authenticate all humans on Twitter.

Earlier this week, Musk had revealed that when the deal closes, he would reverse Donald Trump’s Twitter ban, calling the decision to ban him in the first place “a morally bad decision”.

“I do think it was not correct to ban Donald Trump. I think that was a mistake. It alienated a large part of the country and did not ultimately result in Donald Trump not having a voice.

“It was a morally bad decision, to be clear, and foolish in the extreme”, he said.

Trump’s account was ‘permanently suspended’ from the microblogging app since January 2021, after a mob of Trump supporters stormed the United States’ Capitol building on January 6th, due to the ‘risk of inciting further violence’.

THE WHISTLER reported that Twitter agreed to Musk’s offer to acquire the company for $44 billion last month. Musk was excited about the development, saying that he wanted to make Twitter better than ever before by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spambots, and authenticating all humans.

 

Elon Musk’s Space X launches 4 astronauts to Space on recycled rocket and capsule

Four astronauts from three countries bound for the International Space Station launched from the Florida coast early Friday morning as part of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-2 mission.

 

 

 

The Falcon 9 rocket blazed across a black sky just before sunrise and NASA confirmed shortly after liftoff Friday that the astronauts had safely reached orbit.

 

 

After about a 23-hour ride, the Crew Dragon spacecraft is scheduled to dock at the ISS around 5:10 a.m. ET on Saturday.

 

 

“Watching a launch from Kennedy Space Center never gets old for me. I’ve watched many launches and watching a pre-dawn launch is especially exciting and just visually stunning,” NASA’s acting administrator, Steve Jurczyk,​​ said at a post-launch news conference Friday morning. “I could not be more proud of the team.”

The crew is composed of NASA astronauts Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur as well as Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronaut Akihiko Hoshide and European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Thomas Pesquet.

“What an incredible launch, hopefully you guys got to watch it this morning, right as the sun was rising we took off,” Kimbrough said from the Crew Dragon “Endeavor” capsule shortly after the astronauts reached orbit.

“We chased the sun pretty quickly and caught up just a few minutes after we took off. That was really special to see the sunlight coming in shortly after liftoff,” the mission’s commander added.

McArther said, “The ascent was incredible, the ride was really smooth. We couldn’t have asked for anything better.”

Friday’s launch marked only the third time that Elon Musk’s private space-faring firm has flown astronauts.

It also ushered in a new era of reusability in human space exploration, as the mission uses the same Falcon 9 rocket that sent four astronauts to the ISS last November and the same Crew Dragon spacecraft that sent and returned two astronauts during the first crewed SpaceX flight last May.

“I met with the crew last night, they are ready to go,” Jurczyk​​ said at a pre-launch news conference from the Kennedy Space Center on Wednesday. “I asked them what they look forward to most in the mission, and they said launching and getting up on station and getting to work.”

This marks the “third launch in less than a year” for NASA’s Commercial Crew program, he said.

The launch was originally scheduled for early Thursday morning but was moved to Friday due to downrange inclement weather. Liftoff occurred at 5:49 a.m. ET on Friday from the historic Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Prior to liftoff, the U.S. Space Force 45th Weather Squadron had forecast a 95% chance of favorable weather conditions in the area for a launch.

NASA’s live coverage of the launch kicked off at 1:30 a.m. ET on its website and social media accounts.

Jurczyk said Wednesday that NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory team received a call earlier this week from U.S. President Joe Biden, who congratulated the researchers on their success in conducting the first controlled flight on another planet.

“He told the team that his grandson asked him when was he going to travel to Mars,” Jurczyk said. “So that’s something really important that we do.”

“We enable commercial activities in space, we demonstrate leadership, and we inspire the next generation,” he said.

Elon Musk’s SPACE X and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin Battles for Supremacy

Is it a coincidence that the two wealthiest individuals on the planet are both nursing space transport dreams? Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are both front runners in the two foremost and advanced space programs on the planet at the moment.

 

 

 

Although their motive, which is to kickstart some sort of backup civilization for human beings, align, both billionaires disagree on how to go about it. Before we dive into the disparity in Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos’ space visions, let us quickly examine their space programs.

 

Space Exploration Technology Corps (SPACE X) 

Space X was founded by Elon Musk in 2002 and is headquartered at Hawthorn California. The goal of the company is to make Space travel affordable to ordinary people. It hopes to kickstart human colonization and inhabitation of planet Mars.

Space X manufactures two of its foremost space vessels the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch vehicles. It also manufactures other components that make space travel easy and affordable.

Space X is by far the more advanced of the two space programs. It has already put 700 Starlink satellites in space with over 120 being manufactured every month.

According to Business Insider, Space X is worth $33bn dollars

Blue Origin 

Blue origin was founded in 2000 by Jeff Bezos and is headquartered in Kent, Washington DC. Blue Origin aims to make access to space cheaper and more reliable through reusable launch vehicles. It believes it can put 1 trillion people in space making use of hanging colonies on space. Blue Origin is the less successful of the two programs having failed to launch a single satellite into space.

Elon Musk’s Vision 

Elon Musk envisions a life outside the planet Earth. He strongly believes human beings can inhabit Mars in Mega Cities and it can serve as a backup to earth should World War 3 or any major global disaster occur.

According to Business Insider, Elon Musk hopes to create the first sustainable city in Mars by 2050. The Company hopes to commence launching cargoes with building equipment in 2024 and hopefully, a permanent city would begin to take shape by the 2030s.

Elon Musk’s space company is valued at $33bn with its initial funding coming from his big payout from selling PayPal. He funds his SpaceX by getting contracts and investors for it.

Jeff Bezos’ Vision 

Jeff Bezos’ vision for his space program is slightly different from that of Elon Musk. Jeff Bezos does not agree with the Mass Inhabitation of Mars by Elon Musk. He rather believes his Blue Origin company can come up with “floating cities” on space that can house 1 trillion people. Jeff Bezos funds his Blue Origin project by allocating a certain percentage of his Amazon shares for it. Last year he allocated a whopping $3.1bn to his Blue Origin project.

 

Billionaires at play 

Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are the two richest individuals on the planet. Little wonder they can afford to pursue these ambitions. Elon Musk is clearly leading the space race with a more Robust SpaceX and cutting-edge drive, while Jeff Bezos, the older and richer of the duo seems to be taking his time. Jeff Bezos puts in more funds into his blue Origin Project while Elon Musk struggles a bit with funding Space X, relying on contracts and investors to get by.

 

Elon Musk is the younger of the two billionaires and exudes a youthful aura which sort of gives him an edge over Jeff Bezos. He is seen as the exciting youthful tech billionaire who was once smoking pot on live TV.

Both Space X and Blue Origin enjoy subtle help from NASA, America’s authoritative Space Body.

 

Culled Nairametric

Tesla Boss, Elon Musk Lose $8bn just this Week

Tesla boss, Elon Musk, the second richest man on the planet lost $8bn from his net worth this week.

 

 

 

According to Forbes, Elon Musk is currently worth $162.4 billion and is still the richest man. Musk’s net worth is highly intertwined with his shares in his Tesla company.

 

 

This week the shares took a hit which led to the $8bn loss. We are going to briefly explain what led to this loss below.

This week German automobile giants, Volkswagen announced a detailed plan to get involved in the blossoming electric car market. According to the plan, they hope to become the leading electric car manufacturer in the world by 2025.

The announcement drove up Volkswagen company shares by 15%. Experts and analysts strongly believe Volkswagen would be a very competent competitor to Tesla. This led to a 6.9% drop in Tesla shares shaving $8bn from Musk’s net worth.

The automobile industry has been dominated by German companies for a very long time. German automobile companies have at many times in the past set high standards that US carmakers have struggled to compete with.

The entrance of an 84-year-old German automobile company into the electric car market seems to have set off the alarm bells in the US Market.

Elon Musk is still the second richest man in the world behind his American counterpart, Jeff Bezos.

2 Days after hanging out with Elon Musk, Joe Rogan Dave Chapelle Tested Positive to COVID-19

Dave Chappelle has tested positive for coronavirus amid a multi-night standup residency in Austin, Texas.

A representative told TMZ that the veteran comedian is currently in quarantine and is experiencing no symptoms. Nevertheless, he has canceled all of his remaining shows scheduled at Austin concert venue Stubb’s.

Chappelle launched the 10-date residency at Stubb’s last week and had been scheduled to perform there through this weekend. Several of the shows featured Joe Rogan as a co-headliner.

Because of social distancing requirements, no individual seats were sold to the shows. Instead, attendees had to purchase a table of four, six, or eight seats. Upon entry into the event, attendees received a rapid COVID-19 antigen test and were asked to wear face masks at all times.

Prior to testing positive for COVID-19, Chappelle was photographed backstage with Rogan, Elon Musk, Grimes, and restaurateur C.K. Chin. In another photo, he posed alongside Musk, Grimes, and comedians Michelle Wolf, Ron White, and Donnell Rawlings. No one was wearing a mask in either photo.

Grimes herself recently battled coronavirus. On January 9th, she confirmed her positive diagnosis in an Instagram Story, writing, “Finally got COVID, but weirdly enjoying the DayQuil fever dream … 2021.”

Elon Musk Tops Jeff Bezos as World’s Richest Person

Elon Musk just became the richest person in the world, with a net worth of more than $185 billion.

Thursday’s increase in Tesla’s share price pushed Musk past Jeff Bezos, who had been the richest person since 2017 and is currently worth about $184 billion. Musk’s wealth surge over the past year marks the fastest rise to the top of the rich list in history — and is a dramatic financial turnaround for the famed entrepreneur who just 18 months ago was in the headlines for Tesla’s rapid cash burn and his personal leverage against the company’s stock.

Musk started 2020 worth about $27 billion, and was barely in the top 50 richest people.

Tesla’s rocketing share price — which has increased more than ninefold over the past year — along with his generous pay package have added more than $150 billion to his net worth.

Meanwhile, Amazon’s share price has remained more subdued due to the potential for increased regulation from Washington.

Elon Musk passed Warren Buffett in July to become the seventh-richest person. In November, Musk raced past Bill Gates to become the second-richest person. Musk has gained more wealth over the past 12 months than Bill Gates’ entire net worth of $132 billion.

Tesla’s shares closed Thursday at $816.04, up nearly 8%. The company’s market value has grown to more than $760 billion.

While the Bloomberg Billionaires Index had Musk within $3 billion of Bezos’ net worth on Wednesday, before Thursday’s trading, the Forbes Real Time Billionaires List had Musk about $7 billion behind Bezos after the market close Thursday. Forbes pegged Bezos’ net worth at $184.6 billion and Musk at $177.2 billion. Forbes, however, may not be including the value of Musk’s options, which he received as part of his pay package, to buy more than 33 million shares of Tesla.

Exit mobile version