(单词翻译:单击)
Zip2
Zip2公司
Musk realized that, as more and more companies established an online presence, they would need to have their printed materials converted into digital documents. If he could fill that need, he would be onto a winner. Elon teamed up with his younger brother Kimbal to develop content publishing software designed for news and media companies. At a time, when many venture capitalists had never even heard the word 'internet', it was a major risk. The product that the Musk brothers came up with was called Zip2. It started life as a tool that would help people to search for maps and directions on the internet, with people also being able to post information through something similar to a micro-blogging system. Things were tough for Musk in these early days. He had no money, not even enough to rent an office and an apartment at the same time. So, he rented an office where he slept on a futon, taking care of his personal hygiene down at the local "Y".
马斯克意识到，越来越多的公司会开发在线业务，他们需要将纸质材料转换成电子文档。如果他能满足这一需要，他就会成为赢家。埃隆和他的弟弟金布尔合作开发了为新闻和媒体公司设计的内容发布软件。当时，许多风险投资家甚至从未听说过“互联网”这个词，这是一个巨大的风险。马斯克兄弟研发的产品叫做Zip2。它最初是一个工具，可以帮助人们在互联网上搜索地图、辨别方向，人们也可以通过类似于微型博客系统的东西来发布信息。起初，马斯克过得很艰难。他没有钱，甚至没有钱同时租办公室和公寓。因此，他租了一间办公室，睡在沙发上，而且只能在当地的YMCA洗澡。
Staring with small newspapers, Musk was able to quickly grow his client base. Agreements were made with large media companies, including the Chicago Tribune and the New York Times to allow those companies to use Zip2 to make their content readily available to their readers via the internet. The program was then used by many similar companies, along with e-commerce sites, as a platform for their web presence. By 1999, the Zip2 Corporation was providing web hosting, web development and maintenance services for close to two hundred websites. They came to the attention of the online city guide CitySearch, who were interested in a merger. This deal didn't work out, but another one did. After just four years of operation, the Zip2 Corporation was sold to Compaq Computers for $307 million in cash and $34 million in stock options.
马斯克非常关注小报，并迅速扩大了他的客户群。他们与《芝加哥论坛报》和《纽约时报》等大型媒体公司达成协议，同意这些公司使用Zip2，读者可以通过互联网看到内容。该程序随后被许多类似的公司和电商网站一起用作其网站展示的平台。截至1999年，Zip2公司为近200个网站提供网页托管、网页开发和维护服务。他们吸引了在线城市指南“城市搜索”的注意，他们对并购很感兴趣。这笔买卖没有成功，但另一笔成功了。在仅仅运营了4年之后，Zip2公司就以3.07亿美元的现金和3400万美元的股票期权卖给了康柏电脑公司。
PayPal
贝宝
At the age of 28, Elon Musk was a multi-millionaire. But, he was just getting started, and even before the ink was dry on the Zip2 deal, he had thrown himself into his next venture - X.com. Musk's vision was to create the world's first online bank and he invested $10 million to kick it off. The goal was to offer every service that you could get from a conventional bank, but with the added benefit that you could send and receive money securely using only your email address. X.com was an immediate success. After just a year of operation, it was merged with a money transfer system called Confinity. The combined businesses were renamed Paypal in 2001. Now working with Confinity founders Peter Thiel and Max Levchin, the business dropped the idea of a fully functional online bank and focused on the feature that seemed to grab everyone's attention - the ability to send money to and from anyone who had the same app. At this early stage, the system relied on a Windows based handheld device. During the first months of the merger, from January 1999 to October 2000, Musk was CEO of X.com. During this time he set up a viral system that grew it into the world's largest e-mail payment system. New customers were offered a twenty dollar cash card, along with an additional ten dollars for referring a friend. Within two months, more than a hundred thousand new customers came onboard.
28岁时，埃隆·马斯克成为了一名千万富翁。但他才刚刚起步，甚至在Zip2的合同签完没多久之后，他就已经投入了下一个风投项目——X.com。马斯克希望打造全球第一家网上银行，他投资了1000万美元来启动该项目。他的目标是提供可从传统银行获得的全部服务，但它的另一个好处是，你只需使用电子邮件就可以安全地收发资金。X.com迅速取得成功。在仅仅运营了1年之后，它就与一个名为Confinity的转账系统并为一体了。2001年，合并后的公司更名为贝宝。如今，该公司与Confinity创始人彼得·蒂尔和马克斯·列夫钦合作，放弃了建立一家功能齐全的网上银行的想法，而是专注于似乎吸引了所有人注意力的功能——能够向所有拥有相同应用程序的人收发资金。在早期阶段，该系统只能在基于Windows的手持设备上使用。在合并的前几个月，也就是1999年1月到2000年10月，马斯克担任X.com的首席执行官。在此期间，他创建了一个极受欢迎的系统，后来成为世界上最大的电子邮件支付系统。新顾客可以得到一张20美元的现金卡，推荐朋友使用还可以获得10美元。不到2个月的时间里，就有十几万名新客户加入。
But not all was well within the company's management. The problem was Musk's management style, which can best be described as dictatorial. Both Thiel and Levchin found it difficult to work with him. They were especially frustrated at his need to micromanage everything. Disputes and divisions arose over which technologies to use and how to brand the company. As a result of such divisions, Thiel and Levchin organized a coup against CEO Musk while he was meeting with prospective customers overseas. He returned to the country to discover that he had been fired as CEO by the board and replaced by Thiel. Shortly thereafter the name of the company was changed to PayPal. From there it grew exponentially, leading to a buy out by Ebay in 2002. The cost of the sale was a staggering 1.5 billion dollars. As the largest shareholder, Musk walked away with $165 million.
但在公司的管理范围内，并非所有事情都是一帆风顺的。问题在于马斯克的管理风格可以用独裁来形容。蒂尔和列夫钦都觉得和他合作是一件困难的事，特别是对他的事无巨细感到沮丧。在使用哪些技术以及如何打造公司品牌的问题上，他们出现了争议和分歧。出于这种分歧，泰尔和列夫钦在首席执行官马斯克到外国会见潜在客户时组织了一场“政变”。他回到美国后发现自己被董事会解雇了，泰尔取代他成为了首席执行官。此后不久，公司改名为贝宝。从那时起，公司呈指数级增长，2002年，易趣收购了贝宝。这次出售的价格高达15亿美元。作为最大股东的马斯克获得了1.65亿美元。
