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Somewhat of topic but: > Tesla co-founder and CEO Elon Musk Why do people keep thinking Elon founded Tesla? Pretty sure he wasn't one of the founders, so I do

Somewhat of topic but: > Tesla co-founder and CEO Elon Musk Why do people keep thinking Elon founded Tesla? Pretty sure he wasn't one of the founders, so I don't get why people think so.

forgotmysn 5y ago
when he invested, he was granted the title of both ceo and co-founder, even though the company was already 4 or 5 years old iirc
ajayyy 5y ago
The founder sued him for it. The result of the lawsuit leaves him as a co-founder legally
cjpearson 5y ago
Because he calls himself a founder and Tesla calls him a founder. Basically a Ray Kroc situation.
nabla9 5y ago
There were two founders originally, Eberhard and Tarpenning. Musk was just a investor. After Eberhard left he sued Tesla for trying to rewrite history. Then he settled with agreement that Musk and two others (Straubel and Wright) were added to the list of founders. Money solves these things. Now Musk is now officially a Founder.
- NorwegianDude 5y ago
  Either you are a founder, or you're not. It can't be changed, the same way we can't change who was the first man on the moon. Musk isn't a founder of Tesla, and that also means that he'll never be the founder of tesla.
Artistry121 5y ago
He has done a good job and intentional job of making it seem like he was - and both original founders left soon after he started making active moves as an investor. I've been a big fan but this series of videos is tempering my understanding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-FGwDDc-s8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-FGwDDc-s8
camjohnson26 5y ago
Because he retroactively sued the founders and got himself named a founder, he was an early investor but uninvolved I. The first prototype.
- supperburg 5y ago
  Actually this is not the correct sentiment. Elon musk was definitely responsible for the design decisions and success of roadster+ and what tesla ended up being. The early prototype didn’t really have anything super novel and the roadster and other cars weren’t like, a ripoff or remix of whatever prototypes they had. It was a company that was generally setting out to take advantage of high voltage high current switching that had only become possible recently for driving AC motors with duty cycle variation. The label “founder” is definitely not misplaced. But I suppose it’s a matter of semantics.
  - supperburg 5y ago
    Wow, people really dislike this comment even though they can’t offer a substantive counterpoint.
belltaco 5y ago
https://www.tesla.com/elon-musk https://www.tesla.com/elon-musk
- NorwegianDude 5y ago
  That page is "fake news". Musk didn't found Tesla, that's the whole point.

Somewhat of topic but: > Tesla co-founder and CEO Elon Musk Why do people keep thinking Elon founded Tesla? Pretty sure he wasn't one of the founders, so I don't get why people think so.

forgotmysn 5y ago

when he invested, he was granted the title of both ceo and co-founder, even though the company was already 4 or 5 years old iirc

ajayyy 5y ago

The founder sued him for it. The result of the lawsuit leaves him as a co-founder legally

cjpearson 5y ago

Because he calls himself a founder and Tesla calls him a founder. Basically a Ray Kroc situation.

nabla9 5y ago

There were two founders originally, Eberhard and Tarpenning. Musk was just a investor. After Eberhard left he sued Tesla for trying to rewrite history. Then he settled with agreement that Musk and two others (Straubel and Wright) were added to the list of founders. Money solves these things. Now Musk is now officially a Founder.

NorwegianDude 5y ago
Either you are a founder, or you're not. It can't be changed, the same way we can't change who was the first man on the moon. Musk isn't a founder of Tesla, and that also means that he'll never be the founder of tesla.

Artistry121 5y ago

He has done a good job and intentional job of making it seem like he was - and both original founders left soon after he started making active moves as an investor. I've been a big fan but this series of videos is tempering my understanding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-FGwDDc-s8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-FGwDDc-s8

camjohnson26 5y ago

Because he retroactively sued the founders and got himself named a founder, he was an early investor but uninvolved I. The first prototype.

supperburg 5y ago
Actually this is not the correct sentiment. Elon musk was definitely responsible for the design decisions and success of roadster+ and what tesla ended up being. The early prototype didn’t really have anything super novel and the roadster and other cars weren’t like, a ripoff or remix of whatever prototypes they had. It was a company that was generally setting out to take advantage of high voltage high current switching that had only become possible recently for driving AC motors with duty cycle variation. The label “founder” is definitely not misplaced. But I suppose it’s a matter of semantics.
- supperburg 5y ago
  Wow, people really dislike this comment even though they can’t offer a substantive counterpoint.

belltaco 5y ago

https://www.tesla.com/elon-musk https://www.tesla.com/elon-musk

NorwegianDude 5y ago
That page is "fake news". Musk didn't found Tesla, that's the whole point.