SpaceX founder Elon Musk has given his advice to the next generation of entrepreneurs.
Elon Musk believes that Mars will be the next hot spot for those looking to make money, if the cost of getting there were not so high. He was speaking at the International Space Station Research & Development Conference in Boston, writes Miriam Kramer for Mashable.
Elon Musk: New business opportunities on the Red Planet
Should the cost of travel to the Red Planet be reduced, it would open up a huge number of new business opportunities, says Elon Musk. “People [on Mars] would want to go create everything from the first pizza joint to the first iron ore factory,”he said. “Some of the things on Mars will be different than we’ve ever imagined on Earth.”
Musk has a deep interest in Mars, and regularly speaks about his desire to see manned missions to the Red Planet. In fact, he set up SpaceX in 2002 in order to bring down the cost of long-distance space travel and and enable manned missions to new locations.
“With SpaceX, it’s trying to help solve the spacefaring problem,” Elon Musk said. “I think that a future where we’re a spacefaring civilization and a multi-planet species is very exciting… In order for that to happen, we’ve got to dramatically improve the cost of spaceflight, and that’s why SpaceX exists.”
Research ongoing into reusable rockets
SpaceX is working on reusable space rockets, and has narrowly failed to land them on barges in the Atlantic Ocean on multiple occasions. Musk remains confident that the company will be successful in developing reusable rockets which would cut the cost of space travel significantly.
With innovations such as this one, Elon Musk believes that one day there will be a “city on Mars.” He added that: “if SpaceX and other companies can lower the cost of transport to orbit and perhaps beyond, then there’s a of potential for entrepreneurship at the destination.”
Despite the ambitious plans, SpaceX has suffered some teething problems. A few weeks ago one of its Falcon 9 rockets disintegrated shortly after launch. Fortunately the rocket was unmanned and was only carrying supplies to the International Space Station.
According to Elon Musk, the exact cause of the disintegration is not yet known, but SpaceX is still investigating.
