SteveJobs met with Elon Musk. It did not go well. Steve thought Elon was crazy and his ideas were not a good match to Apple, its culture or its products. They each share life altering childhoods in different ways which impacts a shared trait toward a singular vision.
SteveJobs passed away in 2011. If Apple did nothing at the time of SteveJobs’ death, the company had enough product pipelined to keep it profitable for the next 10 years. Apple has pretty much remained true to that dictum.
Nothing marks the zenith of the company’s rise like its recent iPhone 12 series idevice. Because it pushes forward new technology on the 5G front, A-14 AI processing, computational photography, LIDAR, magnetic charger and its new, old 4S form factor this product is the embodiment of Apple. Apple rules. Apple is the most profitable company in the history of the world.
With that statement clearly and convincingly out of the way Apple begins the integration of the remainder of its product line into a wholistic technology stream. BUT where’s the NeXT big idea? Apple has pretty much handcuffed itself to the iDevice. So much so that the Justice Department is beginning to look into how it has handcuffed not only itself but its customers. Number one on that list being “ search”, a tie-in contract with Google, its advertising driven search engine and Apple’s bundling it into its software product integration with hardware.
Elon long since brushed off that SteveJobs meeting, took his life goal and pursued a different path other than joining Apple. SteveJobs wanted to put a computer on everyone’s desk. This at a time when computers were expensive, owned by giant corporations and used by people with three letter degrees in engineering. Elon wanted to put an electric vehicle in every garage at a time when electric vehicles were research specimens. Ordinary people could only buy battery powered golf carts or drive an electric vehicle on a lease.
Elon found another company, Tesla, who listened - then Elon proceeded to make it into his vision of the future. Contrary to accepted automotive industry practice, Elon adopted SteveJobs’ integrated model of software and hardware development. Whereas current automotive manufacturers were ICE, internal combustion engine, gear heads adding features and electronics to its models, Tesla would be a software developer that makes products for sustainable living on planet Earth.
Elon would add Solar City (solar on every rooftop) to power the cars Tesla sold. He began integrating the machines that make the cars and engineering the computers that drive the electronics in the cars that Tesla manufactures. It was not even a leap of imagination to drive the cars by the computers Tesla was designing - that was genius.
Tesla could never fulfill Elon’s life goal, not entirely. Elon had been hounded by a realization early in his life that humanity had no Plan B. The geological record was replete with extinction events over planet Earth’s lifetime. The human race is the least oldest record written into that timeline. This undeniable evidence grated against Elon Musk’s intellect and survival instincts which could never rest.
SpaceX would be his boldest endeavor bravely placing his own money where his instincts dictated. Ten years later SpaceX found the unimaginable, a sustainable business use-case. Thanks to Elon, “ reuse” finally has proven its worth. Again, thanks to reuse, Elon envisioned how reuse could make a better Internet. Reusing expended rocket boosters, for free, as in free beer; his next company Starlink would launch thousands of little satellites around the globe. Using lasers each satellite could communicate to each other and provide space to ground communication much faster than terrestial cable. To the winner go the spoils. In this instance, Starlink funding nurtures Elon’s grandest instinct, SpaceX mission to MARS.
Elon Musk builds machines that build other machines. People love the cars that Tesla builds. As Starlink provides what people want and humanity needs most, Starlink will fund his next machine for humanity to live off-planet Earth. SteveJobs’ baby, Apple, meanwhile, is making the same machine (iDevices) it has since he passed away. Ten years ago SteveJobs rejected an Elon Musk who had just been kicked out of his own startup PayPal - an irony Steve knew too well. Before that SteveJobs had rejected the idea of Apple building a car, when people thought it obvious Apple could do a better job than car manufacturers who had just introduced a new old Beetle, at the time. A new Beetle that is no longer made, it was an unsustainable product. Now everyone thinks the next new thing is the electric vehicle. The only thing that has changed is Elon Musk’s Tesla makes the most popular and the most innovative electric car that people aspire to drive.
SteveJobs proved that software companies that also make things are superior to a traditional company structure. SteveJobs pioneered integrating rather than outsourcing, which Elon Musk has validated beyond all doubt - just works. Apple has never been an inventor, rather it is a third generation innovator producing products that “just work”. Elon Musk verifies that innovative products in an established market yields market disruption as his SpaceX rocket booster reuse saves 70% on rocket cost by reusing it over again. AND as Starlink reuses boosters that launch thousands of satellites into orbit for a fraction of traditional cost, ElonMusk teaches that a synergy on top of integration paves the way to your next market. Already DOD and military have shown interest in Starlink satellites for battlefield communication. They also are interested in rocket delivery by SpaceX landing anywhere on planet Earth within an hour’s notice; a second generation new product innovation from its reuse technology.
Elon Musk as the new SteveJobs would be a lazy cliché that does disservice. Elon more than having done one better is showing that Apple is under-utilizing its innovations and missing out on its contribution to inventive new synergy products. Elon could have, just gloated the day SpaceX simultaneously landed two rocket boosters side-by-side successfully for all the world to see - live on TV. What did he do? Instead, shortly it will be time to witness a death-defying flip of a booster before landing. Why? Because Elon Musk is onto the next innovation to reuse a mammoth-sized booster for landing on Mars.
Elon Musk eclipses SteveJobs innovation, engineering and inventiveness. His grasp of the organizational efficiency in several startup companies eclipses SteveJobs’ focus on one company to rule them all. Elon’s genius at comprehending complexity on the level of physics and rocket science equals Steve Jobs’ intuitive understanding of “ how” to use technology so that it “ just works” for people. Its that SteveJobs’ paradigm shift in seeing what everyone missed or is not able to see - that SteveJobs and Elon Musk both bring to the market.
BUT the single most valuable characteristic that sets Elon Musk apart from SteveJobs’ genius is Elon’s willingness to ask one question - Next? It’s a simple question that summons the intellect. In a chess-like manner it challenges insights, possibilities and conventions to envision the impossible and ask anew “ why not?”. It demands vision to see the next move a piece can make on the chessboard.
ElonMusk is proving that more than making a dent in the universe - knowledge in understanding how the universe works IS the game!