Innovation and Entrepreneurship: Qualities of Elon Musk and Challenges Faced by SpaceX

This report explores the qualities of Elon Musk as an entrepreneur, including his passion for innovation, strategic direction, and personal integrity. It also highlights the challenges faced by SpaceX, such as cash flow generation, hiring employees, delegation of authority, marketing, and capital infusion. Additionally, it discusses the research on the entrepreneurial performance of Hyperloop, including its current position and impacts.

Innovation and
Entrepreneurship

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
1. Personal qualities of an entrepreneur - Elon Musk.................................................................3
Passion for Innovation................................................................................................................3
Strategic Direction......................................................................................................................4
Personal Integrity/Influence........................................................................................................4
2. Entrepreneurial challenges face by SpaceX............................................................................5
Cash flow generation..................................................................................................................5
Hiring employees........................................................................................................................5
Delegation of authority...............................................................................................................6
Marketing of the product and services........................................................................................6
Capital infusion...........................................................................................................................6
3. Research on entrepreneurial performance of Hyperloop........................................................7
Current position/assets................................................................................................................7
Impacts........................................................................................................................................8
Critical Analysis..........................................................................................................................8
Future Target markets.................................................................................................................8
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
Entrepreneurship is pushed by the need for the creation, building and a passion for
thriving for learning and development. It requires a great amount of persistence and lay hold on
the opportunities. It consist of visualisation of the of new paths to solve problems, value creation
and firm vision (Crum and et.al, 2019). In present the organisations are still see innovation a
difficult task. Innovation is a blend of processes, mindsets and results. Innovation allows to
incorporate and adopting new elements, techniques and methods to existing processes and
methods to bring change and improvement (Kahn, K.B., 2018). In this report outlined the
qualities of an entrepreneur “Elon Musk” and his business ventures. Further highlighted the
challenges faced by him in the “SpaceX” venture and the performance of the Paypal corporation
its innovative approaches, future target markets and its current market position. The report will
represent the entrepreneurship and the use of innovation in the expansion and success of the
business ventures.
MAIN BODY
1. Personal qualities of an entrepreneur - Elon Musk
An entrepreneur is a person who generates new ideas that provide innovative solutions of
the problems. He is recognised as an innovator and a source of fresh thoughts. A South-African
entrepreneur and visionist Elon Musk is the founder of Tesla Motors, Paypal and SpaceX. In his
late 20s he becomes multimillionaire and in 2012 his company SpaceX launched a rocket to send
a commercial vehicle in the space. From his early childhood he develops keen interest in
inventions and computers. Elon Musk's first company was Zip2 Corporation. He has a fondness
of creating and present creative ideas and support these ideas with his passion and ambition.
Being an entrepreneur is a challenging profession. It is associated with bringing the remarkable
changes by introducing new ideas, business modals, products and services. They are said to be
the problem solvers that provide innovative and effective solutions (Dimov, D., 2017).
Passion for Innovation
Innovation is the application of ideas that results in new ideas, products and services. It is
a complex process that requires a structure, process, aim and outcome. People see Elon Musk as
the most innovative businessman. It is said that Mr. Musk believes in innovation for solving
every problem. As a passionate innovator Mr. Musk led his ideas with the incorporation of the

new perspective and emerging technologies. He strives for continuous progressing in all the
characteristics of the businesses. The utmost aim for the innovation would be go beyond the
imagination, improving the quality of the life and creation of the bright future. Thus, the use of
innovation in the business venture is done to search for innovative solutions, look for more
dynamic approaches to speculate future and creation of the strategies to reduce and remove
obstacles that will influence the future (Lee and et.al, 2018).
Example: in childhood when Elon Musk was 12 year old, he taught himself software
programming and created a game named Blaster. Another was the creation of the ventures like
Paypal, SpaceX and Hyperloop.
Strategic Direction
Strategic Direction known as planning and structure that is needed for the organisation to
progress and fulfil its goals and vision. The organisation's strategic direction include objectives
that are to be targeted to improve organisation's productivity. It has been seen that Mr. Musk
takes a scientific viewpoint to perform a task of team-creation that are subjected to the
behaviour, skills and attitude of the employees. He believes in turning his visions into actual
results and building an appropriate team that is devoted to achieving the organisational
objectives. He surround himself with the individuals that posses great extent of skills and talents
that guide him towards sustainable success. The firms performs better by focusing on the
resource based strategies for increasing the capabilities of the organisation. The entrepreneur
brings the innovative strategies for the development and achieving overall performance of the
organisation (Hellström and Olsson, 2017).
Example: The company Zip2 was the first venture of Elon Musk which was sold to a division of
Compaq computer corporation at $307 Million.
Personal Integrity/Influence
It involves being honest, ethically well behaved personality of self. Integrity is seen as
moral dependency of the understanding of good and bad things. As per Elon Musk it is being
said that he is more in setting examples for the employees being as a leader. Has a strong sense
of values that help him earn respect from the employees, peers and from the society. He has a
strong sense of providing contribution to the world by generating new and valuable ideas that
help to improve things and creating solution of the problems. Integrity creates an impact on the

leadership and creation of values in all human activities. Ethics plays an important role in
creating influence (Vakilbashi and et.al, 2017).
Example: Elon Musk has a vision for the exploration of the space and commercial space travel.
He has a great influence over the people who share the same kind of vision. The company
SpaceX is established on that view.
Along with it Elon Musk possess other qualities that are self-confidence, Positivity, risk taker,
work ethics, trusting others, introspection, continuous learning, etc.
2. Entrepreneurial challenges face by SpaceX
SpaceX is a company that is founded by Elon Musk in year 2002. In year 2008 National
Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) enter into a contract with the company to handle
space cargo transportation for the International space station. So, basically the company working
in the industry that requires huge funds and challenges. Elon Musk as an entrepreneur face
various types of issues for handling the operations of the company SpaceX these are as follows:
Cash flow generation
Working capital is important for any business for running smooth day-to-day operations.
There are many small transactions that arises in the day for the businesses. SpaceX as a highly
technology based company requires large cash-flows for performing its operations. Payment of
invoices for the supplies and resources that arises for performing experiments and research have
to be made at a regular intervals (Salas-Molina and et.al, 2019). The components used in the
rockets and commercial vehicles are expensive and are not easily available and to perform
experiments and provide services the resources has to be ready and in working conditions.
Hiring employees
Conducting screening of the employees and staffing of the candidates is a long and
extensive process. It may take many days to complete and the screening process is to be made
tough as to find and hire a suitable candidate. Hiring process consists of identifying the open
position, planning, advertisement of the open position, reviewing candidates applications,
screening and interviews, selecting qualified candidates and hiring (Steingold, F.S., 2017). For
the company SpaceX hiring employees is a complex process as the company is working in the
field of aerospace and technology. So, the company requires highly expert personnel of these
field.

Delegation of authority
It is the assigning of the authority to other person. In order to achieve company's goals
the leader delegate the authority of completion of the task to its team members. The process has
three elements i.e. authority, responsibility and accountability (Brandsma and et.al, 2017). For
the company SpaceX the delegation of authority is tough because the employees are highly
skilled in their respective field and to allocate any one the authority of making them perform the
task leadership task is difficult. The person must need to posses the management and team
handling skills along with the technical skills. The leader who is assign the responsibility in the
company must be skilled and posses knowledge of every aspects of the overall tasks. The
company performs technical and complex tasks of aerospace and engineering that requires
expertise in the field. So for some task delegation of authority is not possible for the company's
management.
Marketing of the product and services
Opportunities of being successful for the companies are driven by the companies ability
to scale up and make its presence known in the industry. Marketing of the products and services
of the companies help the company to expand and diversify in new horizons. The process of
marketing is done in various stages viz. Market segmentation, Choosing market segment, Find
out most viable market segments, analysing the possible outcome of the market segment,
Estimation of sales, Channelisation of product distribution, Promotional activities and After-sales
services (Sadchenko and et.al, 2020). SpaceX use various marketing techniques like digital
advertising, content marketing, social media marketing, creating events, promotion through
video content, and can appoint influencers which will help them to create awareness in their
following groups. For SpaceX marketing is an important aspect, brand creation and sales
generation helps the company to diversify its products and service portfolio. For that purpose the
company needs to do innovation and development of new products and services. The promotion
made by the company create awareness in the people that helps in generating credit worthiness in
the industry.
Capital infusion
Funds are needed to establish any type of business. Capital consists of procurement of the
finance for the purpose of initially starting a business or for a start-up. There are many ways to
get funds for the business viz. through debt or equity. Venture capitalists and angel investors are

also take interest in funding new and innovative business ideas (Marx, K., 2018). New business
needs capital to grow and diversified and need funds to grow and survive in the industry. For
company SpaceX that is part of the aerospace industry needs huge amount of funds. The
company has the mission to exploring the space and dispersion of the humanity to multiple
planets (Dimov, D., 2017). They have launch different rockets and is working for the
transportation of cargo for international space station. These operations requires large amount of
money that is only done via procurement of capital.
3. Research on entrepreneurial performance of Hyperloop
Hyperloop is said to the fastest commuter and freight transport system estimated to
operate at the top speed at 750 miles per hour. It is the revolutionary transportation concept and
the idea of the entrepreneur Elon Musk. The research, development and its operations upon the
concept is managed by the company SpaceX and Tesla. Hyperloop is created for the purpose of
provide fastest commute between cities. The technology uses metallic tubes and inside it a use of
travel pods to travel across the distance. It works by thrusting specially designed transportation
pods by applying the force of electromagnets inside a metallic vacuum tube. The aims of Elon
musk to provide an alternate travelling option for the air travel. And offering ticket for a very
low price (Hyperloop: How Elon Musk’s Tube Travel Concept Works, 2021.). Along with Elon
musk's owned companies, he also formed partnership with other companies in the industry to
develop and deliver technology across the globe. He also owns a company named as The Boring
Company, which develops and create underground transportation tunnels and metallic tubes for
hyperloop system. Elon musk's one of the statement is that the hyperloop technology provides
fastest inter-city transportation at a cost of $6 billion. It is to be said that the design of hyperloop
is similar to the concept of 'Vactrain' proposed in the year 1914. To expand the curiosity of
innovative minds reach and generating solutions for the technology, hyperloop is experimenting
to search for the best option for pods.
Current position/assets
According to Elon Musk's the hyperloop technology takes $6 billion to create a fully
functional commuter system. Several interdisciplinary innovative minds students led teams are
developing the hyperloop technology as Elon musk has open sourced this concept. SpaceX
company has created a 0.6 miles long test track for pod designing for Hyperloop Pod

competition. Hyperloop technology is said to be completed and made available to the people to
commute within the cities in the year 2020.
Impacts
The competitor of the hyperloop concept is a crowd-funded company named Hyperloop
Transportation Technologies. The company is announced to construct a structure in UAE. Japan
had proposing a concept of maglev train technology that will reach around 310 miles in 67
minutes. But the concept of hyperloop is advancing as the alternative and more advance
technology and according to Elon Musk is much more cheaper (What is Hyperloop? Everything
you need to know about the race for super-fast travel, 2021.). The planning and development of
Routes in UK, Mexico, Canada and India had already begun by the syndicate of start-up
businesses of Elon Musk.
Critical Analysis
An experimental hyperloop system was created with the help of open-source model by
the researchers to evaluate the cost and performance. A study shows that the consumption of
energy usage in the maintenance of tube system is high and same as the amount of energy
required to push propel tubes. Hence, the overall cost of the operation of the whole system
increases significantly. It has been said that the hyperloop technology will be the cheapest and
fastest travelling medium. It also creates lessor pollution than other means of transportation.
Cost of building Hyperloop
According to the analysts most of the cost arises in developing the network of metallic
tubes and its support system i.e. $ 4 billion (hypothetical figure). The cost of building a capsule
is approximately around $1.30 million. The overall cost is to estimated at $6-$8 billion for
building a fully operating hyperloop system.
Virgin Hyperloop One is one of the company developing commercial Hyperloop system.
The company had raised $295 million in 2017.
Future Target markets
Elon Musk expected to run the hyperloop system in between Los Angeles and San
Francisco and to expand its reach to all over the world. Along with it the system to be developed
in Canada, India, Mexico, United Kingdom, China, South-Korea, France, Chez-Republic, and

UAE. The pace which the competition of developing the technology the humanity is going to
witness hyperloop transport system around the globe.
CONCLUSION
From the above evaluation of the study it has been concluded that Elon Musk is proved to
be an innovator and a risk lover. The study analyse the life of the esteemed entrepreneur Elon
Musk that had taken many endeavours that had lead him to the success. He is known to be a
technology lover and fondness of promoting innovative approaches. With the creation of his first
computer game at the age of 12 to founding his own company Zip2, he stuck to his passion for
innovation. He has extraordinary ability to find unique ideas and entrepreneurial skills with
integrity (Decker and et.al, 2017). Further , how the company SpaceX is established and the
challenges faced by the company viz. cash-flow generation, hiring employees, delegation of
authority, requirement of capital and marketing is outlined. The project of Elon musk i.e.
hyperloop is a concept and is in developmental stage. Experiments are made and developing the
system is advancing rapidly. The concept use the metallic tube and propulsion of pod with the
help of electromagnetic force. The technology is advancing as other ventures are also developing
the same technologies. Elon musk is attempting to provide humanity unique solutions of the
problems.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Brandsma and et.al, 2017. Controlling the EU executive?: The politics of delegation in the
European Union. Oxford University Press.
Crum and et.al, 2019. Supporting entrepreneurship and innovation. Emerald Group Publishing.
Decker and et.al, 2017. Conceptual feasibility study of the hyperloop vehicle for next-generation
transport.
Dimov, D., 2017. The reflective entrepreneur. Taylor & Francis.
Hellström, D. and Olsson, A., 2017. Managing Packaging Design for Sustainable Development:
A Compass for Strategic Directions. John Wiley & Sons.
Kahn, K.B., 2018. Understanding innovation. Business Horizons, 61(3), pp.453-460.
Lee and et.al, 2018. Innovation for creating a smart future. Journal of Innovation &
Knowledge, 3(1), pp.1-8.
Marx, K., 2018. Capital volume 1. Lulu. Com
Sadchenko and et.al, 2020. Modern marketing to scale the business. International Journal of
Advanced Research in Engineering and Technology (IJARET), 11(4).
Salas-Molina and et.al, 2019. On the formal foundations of cash management
systems. Operational Research, pp.1-15.
Steingold, F.S., 2017. The employer's legal handbook: Manage your employees & workplace
effectively. Nolo.
Vakilbashi and et.al, 2017. The impact of integrity on leadership effectiveness. Advanced
Science Letters, 23(9), pp.9334-9336.
Online
Hyperloop: How Elon Musk’s Tube Travel Concept Works, 2021. [Online]. Available through:
<https://www.discovery.com/technology/Hyperloop-Elon-Musk-Tube-Travel>
What is Hyperloop? Everything you need to know about the race for super-fast travel, 2021.
[Online]. Available through: <https://www.zdnet.com/article/what-is-hyperloop-
everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-future-of-transport/>