Elon Musk Beats Out Mark Zuckerburg, Steve Jobs as The Most Admired Tech Leader

By Precious Gem de Peralta
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk
Elon Musk beats out Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and Apple's Steve Jobs as the most admired tech leader in a survey among 700 founders. Web Summit via Flickr

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk beats out Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and Apple's Steve Job as the most admired tech leader among 700 founders. The survey by VC firm First Round Capital was conducted from August to September 2016 and published just recently.

Musk received 23 percent of the votes. Amazon's Jeff Bezos was way behind at only 10 percent. He was followed by Zuckerberg with just 6 percent and Jobs got 5 percent. Another Facebook executive, Sheryl Sandberg was the most cited female with one percent. According to the Country Caller, Musk was described by the San Francisco-based firm as "more revolutionary than the legendary Steve Jobs".

Musk is nothing short of an ambitious businessman. He has several unearthly goals up his sleeves. From setting up a global high-speed internet connection through thousands of satellites to establishing a colony on Mars by 2024. SpaceX wants to be the first one to send an unmanned spacecraft to the famous Red Planet by 2018. The company has also been a constant partner of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). In fact, SpaceX has been striking deals with NASA. According to Recode, they are set to launch satellites "that will monitor the earth's surface water and climate change".

But this is not to say that SpaceX did not suffer from any hurdles along the way. Their rocket has exploded a few months ago. The investigation is still underway and the definite cause is yet to be determined. Though the said Falcon 9 rocket is planned to be launched on Dec. 16 since the incident.

As for Tesla, the US automaker had a good third quarter earnings. Musk was also instrumental for the company's shareholders to vote in favor of SolarCity's acquisition. Tesla's Autopilot driver assistance system hit the news after a fatal crash incident that involved a driver while using the said technology. Germany even sent a letter to Tesla owners and reminded them to not rely entirely on the Autopilot.

The California Department of Motor Vehicles has also a proposed regulations that would prohibit Tesla and other carmakers to use the word "auto-pilot" or "self-driving". Apparently, they are only misleading consumers as they are being used in marketing. Still, Musk just confirmed that Tesla will be releasing an Enhanced Autopilot feature. This is a step towards the company's goal of fully autonomous cars.

Imagine once Musk is able to achieve those feats regarding Mars and cars, he will be admired much more.

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