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RAW Elon Musk Interview from Air Warfare Symposium · Elon Musk Podcast

0:00
Please, welcome afas. Central Florida, Martin H
0:05
happen. Harris chapter president Todd
0:08
freeze. Thank you. 36 years ago, our
0:19
chapter establishes great Symposium and has been working
0:22
closely with AFA to keep it. One of the premier professional
0:25
development events for Airmen today is our honor to
0:29
participate in continuing that great tradition by hosting the
0:32
session. I am pleased to introduce our
0:35
keynote event to include conclude our Symposium
0:39
Lieutenant General. John Thompson is responsible for
0:43
approximately 6,000, Airman worldwide.
0:46
He commands an annual budget of over seven billion dollars to
0:50
support the research design development, launch acquisition
0:55
and sustainment of satellites and their Associated command to
0:58
control systems. Accompanying.
1:00
General Thompson is global innovator.
1:03
Elon Musk in 1980. In 1993, he taught himself
1:13
computer programming at the age of 12.
1:16
So the code for a basic based video game called blaster for
1:21
approximately five hundred dollars and in 1990 and 1995.
1:26
He started zip to web software company later renamed PayPal in
1:32
2001. But more recently, you might
1:35
know him for revolutionising, electric cars as CEO and product
1:40
architect of Tesla Motors development.
1:45
That's all the Tesla owners. Development and Manufacturing
1:50
Advanced rockets and spacecraft for Missions to and beyond Earth
1:54
orbit. As founder of space exploration
1:56
Technologies SpaceX. And conceptualizing high-speed
2:04
Transportation known as hyperloop.
2:09
And if you haven't heard some of these quotes by Elon Musk or
2:12
musk isms, let me introduce this one.
2:15
Here's my first one. When I first read it, I thought
2:19
Well, it applies to Innovation. It's also written into the
2:22
contract of every Airman in this room and every man and woman,
2:25
who served, the quote is, if something is important enough,
2:31
even if the odds are against you, you should still do it.
2:36
Now, looking back to our speech, this morning by dr.
2:39
Roper. And he talked about innovation,
2:42
One of the musk ISM quotes is failure, is an option here.
2:47
If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough.
2:52
But my favorite quote. I would like to die on Mars.
2:57
Just not on impact. General Thompson, mr.
3:01
Musk over to you. Thank you.
3:03
Welcome. Elan.
3:10
Thanks so much for being here today, as you know and many
3:13
people in the audience. Know, we are reprising a
3:18
fireless fireside chat that we did at Air Force Space pitch day
3:24
back. In November, I ran into General
3:27
goldfein, the chief of staff of the United States, Air Force
3:29
this morning and maybe I was being a little bit, too
3:33
confident, but I said, hey, I think That we did such a good
3:37
job together at space pitch day, that Ilan.
3:41
And I got invited back for a much bigger audience, higher
3:45
stakes, and everything like that.
3:47
And general goldfein looked at me and went, no, JT, you guys
3:50
are going to do it until you get it, right.
3:53
So, so we're going to talk a little bit today about
3:57
Innovation for those of you in the audience that nothing that
4:03
was introduced about Elon. Made it to the prefrontal cortex
4:09
and you're like I still don't know who this guy is.
4:12
You may remember him from the movie role in Iron Man 2 or the
4:17
TV show. The Big Bang Theory, you may
4:22
remember him. If you're old like me, when you
4:24
used to have to do dial-in modems, you may remember how
4:29
PayPal actually worked over a dial in modem.
4:33
Yeah. And if Justin Case, you've had
4:36
your head in the sand for the last decade.
4:39
You absolutely have to know him for space exploration
4:42
Technologies. SpaceX tremendous partner of the
4:45
United States Air Force in in the space business and for
4:50
Tesla. So for just just for grins this
4:56
fastest-growing Auto Company on the planet, most amazing
5:02
capability. And when Ilan pulled up, he
5:04
pulled up he and Is Entourage. And three different Tesla's this
5:08
morning, how many Tesla owners do we have in the audience?
5:13
Stand up, stand up if you're a test loner, all right, very
5:20
nice. So, he'll on you and I have
5:28
talked about whether the Air Force is the most Innovative
5:31
service, the department of the Air Force now and the last time
5:35
we interviewed it was it was just the Air Force now where the
5:38
Air Force and the space force as part of the Department of the
5:40
Air Force. Most of those people who stood
5:42
up, we're in the front row, we have a lot of first adopters
5:45
here in the front of the audience apparently, or maybe
5:48
those are the folks that just make the most money, who knows?
5:51
Okay. So again today's Today's
5:54
discussion is about Innovation and how we can make the
6:00
department of the Air Force. The most Innovative Department
6:04
within the Department of Defense and perhaps across the United
6:08
States government. So, Elon question.
6:10
Number one, when you put a weapon system or a product into
6:17
production and you start delivering it to your customers
6:22
very, very frequently. There is a Push back within the
6:26
production organization that you know, we don't want to change
6:31
that product too much. It's successful.
6:34
We have a lot of Legacy systems that were responsible for in the
6:37
department of the Air Force. There is a lot of of reticence
6:43
at times to incrementally improve or add new capabilities
6:48
to those systems from the context of Tesla and SpaceX.
6:53
How do you You motivate your Workforce.
6:56
How do you work with your customers?
6:59
How do you work with technologists in your ecosystems
7:05
your various ecosystems to try and make sure that products
7:09
don't become stagnant and they continue to inclement
7:13
incrementally improve over time. I sure will.
7:17
It was well, thanks for having me here.
7:18
It's an honor to be here with you.
7:20
And with, with everyone else from the space, / Air Force and
7:30
are sad long, long relationship with the Air Force and very much
7:33
appreciate the support of the year.
7:34
So I just want to make sure I to say that and look forward to
7:39
doing a lot of interesting things in the future.
7:43
I think it's actually it's cool that there is a book that the
7:49
creation of the space forces is happening.
7:52
I think it. Does it make sense that there's
7:55
a major Branch for every domain, you know, with that?
8:01
And so, the domain of this case, the domain of error are both
8:06
important. But I think space is is is
8:12
certainly a medium of its own. and, I think there's some very
8:19
exciting things that are possible if I may just say like
8:24
what, you know what the public wants?
8:27
I think and professional pretty confident that the public does
8:30
want. This is Starfleet Academy.
8:33
You know, would like yeah, like how do we make stock?
8:38
How do we make Star Trek real, you know, that'd be pretty
8:42
amazing. I'd love that it, you know.
8:48
And so I think like the fastest we can make sort of Starfleet
8:52
real, then there's try to do that well.
8:57
So Iman speaking, speaking for the United States, space force
9:02
there, already is a Starfleet Academy.
9:04
It's the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs,
9:07
Colorado? Sure.
9:10
I've been there are given a talk and, you know, the first launch
9:15
of Falcon 1. We had a falcon sat from the Air
9:19
Force Academy, but that rocket blew up.
9:22
But but, but, but then funny thing is that it blew up, he's
9:29
as truth is Stranger Than Fiction.
9:31
The the satellite was shot through the fairing, octoroo the
9:38
air. A couple hundred meters and then
9:41
plunge through the roof of a tool shed and then landed on the
9:45
floor and was actually in reasonably good shape.
9:49
I mean for crashing through the ceiling, but you know, you like
9:52
recognizable, you know, and and we get we get to give it back
9:57
and so we've not lost one of your satellites.
10:01
So so from a SpaceX perspective of it up, a partial Mission
10:05
success. Well, it's not lost.
10:08
I'm just saying It's a little the worst way, there's a little
10:12
worse for wear, but you know, I've been here but then we
10:17
looked subsequently launched a future Falcon.
10:19
Sets to actual orbit was great. So so as I think there's I think
10:29
we can go a long way towards making Starfleet real and making
10:33
these sort of utopian or semi year.
10:38
Took some utopian future is real if but it will definitely
10:43
require radical Innovation one. Can't get there by incrementally
10:50
innovating Expendable boost. There's just no way.
10:53
Yeah. So The I think we need to push
11:00
for radical breakthroughs, and if you don't push a radical
11:04
breakthroughs, you're not going to get radical outcomes.
11:09
And that does mean taking risks. And, and common sense that the
11:16
if you take a big risk, in order to have a big reward, there must
11:19
be a big risk. It's most the time you cannot
11:23
find big reward for small risk. So those are rare.
11:28
So you're gonna have some proportionality, the risk and
11:30
reward. But if the goal is important
11:35
enough and I think increasingly the goal is important for for
11:41
many reasons. The goal of having the best
11:47
technology in space. That that is I think going to
11:53
become increasingly important and will be increasingly
11:55
increasingly important for the United States to use what I
11:58
think is its greatest attribute which is invention and
12:05
Innovation to to create space technology.
12:09
That is the best in the world. and in fact, I think if the
12:15
United States does not use breakthrough Innovation, it will
12:20
fall behind So I think this is the, this is not something that
12:26
was a risk in times past, but I think is a risk now.
12:30
Okay. So Yeah.
12:37
Do you characterize that risk in terms of peer adversary
12:41
competition around the planet? Are you, are you?
12:46
Are you suggesting that? It's our adversaries that
12:50
require us to be that those radical innovators?
12:55
Or is it just we can't become complacent and stay
12:59
incrementally, improving our systems.
13:03
We must take those giant leaps forward as a nation regardless
13:06
of the petition. I think there's there's little I
13:12
have zero doubt that if the United States does not take
13:15
that, does not seek great Innovations in space.
13:18
It will be second and space. okay, with as sure as night
13:22
follows day, So it is a big deal.
13:28
But this, this, this is a very Innovative that, you know,
13:33
there's no country more Innovative and inventive than
13:36
United States. So it's just important to use
13:39
that attribute. That's that's the ace card.
13:42
Okay. Yeah.
13:44
And since so, since it seems like we're going down the
13:46
geopolitical path here on the on the questions.
13:50
How does the United States as a nation?
13:54
Pain, that Innovative Edge that, that ability to invest in things
14:02
and take those risks. What kind of governmental
14:07
policies or processes? Do we have to encourage the
14:12
right kinds of behavior in your view?
14:15
Well, I think having outcome-based procurement is
14:20
actually very important, okay? So you say, like, this is the
14:24
outcome that is sought and who can achieve this outcome or
14:29
achieve, this outcome to a greater degree, that company
14:33
will, that that's who the boss will do business with, and will
14:37
will procure. The thing that is the, that is
14:40
radically innovative as measured by the, what is important for
14:44
leadership? Open space. so, I mean I do
14:53
think it's an absolutely fundamental to achieve full
14:56
reusability and access this case.
14:59
This is, this is the Holy Grail of space at the point of which
15:03
you have full reusability for overall Rockets.
15:07
Then you have a profound Advantage over anyone else.
15:13
Just profound it would be like if in the Air Force, if if you,
15:20
if you had planes that could be used once and or here.
15:24
If you're here at multi-use planes, that can be flown over
15:27
and over again, like normal and all your adversaries had
15:31
single-use planes. That would be no contest.
15:36
It's the same thing in space. Okay.
15:38
Yeah, this is extremely fundamental.
15:44
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Ilan back plays.com Ilan backblaze.com heel on So the the
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cost of a propellant. Is typically on the order of.
18:04
One percent of the cost of the rear of the vehicle or less. so,
18:13
if you have a vehicle that is say, Lox kerosene, like, Falcon
18:19
die or something like that. It's the, the, the oxygen and
18:25
the fuel. Our Gap, maybe half a million
18:29
dollars or something like that, but then depending upon the
18:32
mission mission price can be anywhere from like 60 to 100
18:36
million dollars. So, The Falcon 9 is a partially
18:42
reusable vehicle, but not fully the vehicle were working on
18:46
right now. Quite difficult is Starship.
18:52
and, Yeah, that that has the potential for full reusability.
19:00
But but I think it'd be great to have other companies as well
19:04
that are doing full reusability. I think competition is a good
19:07
thing. It may seem at times that you
19:11
know, shouldn't we? Focus.
19:15
All our efforts on on one system and brought rather than divide
19:20
them and have two competing systems.
19:25
Like you're not to cause controversy bit, like my
19:29
appearing, like Joint Strike Fighter, should be a competitor
19:35
to Jaso. That.
19:37
That's another controversial subject.
19:39
But you know what? I think it's not good.
19:43
It's not good to have one. One provider.
19:48
It's good to a competition with that competition is Meaningful
19:51
and somebody can actually lose that like, you know.
19:54
So then so, Yeah. Okay, so in radical Innovation,
20:07
obviously the workforce is a really key component of that.
20:13
I mean, as I mean during your PayPal days you were actually
20:17
doing coding right? But in Space X and Tesla they
20:21
are so large that Elon can't do everything.
20:26
What sort of things do you think about in terms of motivating a
20:30
Workforce? It's like like we have in the
20:33
department of the Air Force that will help them become more
20:38
radically Innovative. What sort of things do you look
20:41
for in people or in processes that make the workforce better?
20:46
Sure. Well, I think the massive thing
20:50
that can be done is to make sure your incentive structure is such
20:53
that Innovation is rewarded, and lack of innovation is punished,
20:58
they go to be characteristic. So If somebody is innovating and
21:06
doing making good progress, then they should be promoted sooner.
21:11
And if somebody is completely failing to innovate, not every
21:15
role requires Innovation, but if they're in a role where
21:19
Innovation is who should be happening?
21:22
And it's not happening then they should either not be promoted or
21:25
exited. And we tell you, except promote
21:28
your get, you'll get Innovation real fast.
21:31
Okay? Let's stick.
21:33
Yeah. It's like how much do you want?
21:34
Yeah. So does that does that carrot
21:41
and stick approach? Help.
21:43
Do you think people be more risk-averse or less risk-averse?
21:53
Well for when, when trying different things you got to have
21:59
some acceptance of failure as you alluding to earlier.
22:02
Failure, must be an option. If failure is not an option, is
22:04
gonna result in extremely conservative choices and you may
22:09
not, you may get something even worse than lack of innovation.
22:12
Things may go backwards. so, if what you really want is, Risk
22:23
risk to you. Want reward and punishment for
22:27
you to be proportionate to the actions that you see.
22:31
So if if what you're saying is innovation then reward success
22:37
and Innovation and only there should be minor consequences for
22:45
lack of Mi Tekonsha quinces for trying and failing.
22:49
There should be minor a significant rewards for trying
22:53
and succeeding minor consequences for trying and not
22:58
succeeding and big and major negative consequences for not
23:04
trying, okay? So if you have that incentive
23:09
structure, you will get Innovation like I believe.
23:12
Okay, so you've you've talked at Tesla shareholder meetings and
23:18
in various interviews that you consider the machine that builds
23:24
the machine to be just as important if not more important
23:28
than the machine itself. Yeah.
23:30
So we talked about the workforce aspects, are there processes
23:34
that you use within your company that are parts of that machine
23:38
that you think are particularly valuable for innovative?
23:42
Radical change. Well, what I mean by the machine
23:47
that builds the machine is that the The Productions.
23:53
But designing, the production system of a new product is I
23:59
think at least an order of magnitude.
24:03
Or 292 to hotter than designing, the initial prototype.
24:06
Yeah. the, I think, like in America there's been less of a
24:15
Less important in modern times placed on manufacturing and I
24:19
think this is this is a mistake. I would like at this point.
24:24
I would really classify an effect.
24:26
I sent an email to the to SpaceX just saying this.
24:30
Like, at this point I think designing a rocket is Trivial
24:33
just trivial there's like tons of books.
24:35
That'll you read them? You know, can understand
24:39
equations. You can design a rocket real
24:42
easy. Yeah, as if you say like to
24:47
stage two and two percent of your left with Master orbit,
24:52
It's from a just to design something like that.
24:54
Piece K. Now, you say, you want to go
25:00
into production with that. Or if you want you want to
25:02
actually make the say, the next step is you want to make even
25:05
one of those things. Okay, I'm making even one of
25:08
those things and getting it to orbit is hard.
25:12
For the designing of it is not hard, the making of it is of
25:15
even one is hard, the making of a production line that builds in
25:20
which has many is extremely hard.
25:23
And then the next level beyond that would be creating a fully
25:31
reusable system and having that be in volume, production and
25:34
volume lunch. That's that's super, super hard.
25:41
So that's it would be out by balloon.
25:44
She had Bulls machine. I mean, I mean, creating the
25:46
production system and I keep emphasizing to SpaceX.
25:54
The hard part is making it. And making lots of them and
25:58
launching frequently because reuse must not just be, it can't
26:05
be reused like the shuttle. It's got to be rapid and
26:08
complete reuse. So the shuttle was a case where
26:11
the ReUse was very slow and it was not complete.
26:17
The main tank was lost every time.
26:19
And revoking, the shuttle between flights was extremely
26:23
expensive. It is whatever.
26:26
Or whether it was worth recovering those.
26:28
The booster shells from the ocean.
26:31
So so just like an aircraft, you the rocket must be rapidly and
26:38
completely reusable and then you need lots of them.
26:44
And then I've been sort of just that doing back in a back of the
26:48
envelope of what's needed to establish a self-sustaining City
26:52
on Mars. And these are like big numbers
26:55
but thank you need on the order of a million tons to the surface
27:00
of Mars useful. Payload something like that.
27:03
Hmm because we sit on the top of a massive basic infrastructure
27:08
or the economy is you think of all the things that are mind and
27:14
then Unrefined and then, and then many steps in the
27:16
refinement. And in order to produce, like,
27:19
your phone, or your toaster, even, there's, there's a vast
27:24
base of Industry that was required to produce.
27:27
Even a simple household item. Yeah, very difficult.
27:31
So So, you got to recreate that on Mars.
27:39
It's a million times on Mars means we're just talking orders
27:44
of magnitude here. Hopefully, it's not 10 million
27:46
tons and hopefully, maybe it's less than willing towns, but
27:50
probably not a hundred thousand times.
27:53
So that means you need to get about about 5 million tons to
28:02
Earth orbit of useful payload. So we token like them like so
28:08
essentially unless you have a launch system that is somewhere
28:11
in the Megaton per year, range to orbit.
28:18
It's not relevant. Okay, yeah.
28:21
So starlink as you're scaling to build more and more, Starling
28:29
satellites to go on more and more reusable Rockets, what are
28:33
some of the challenges you've had to overcome in starlink
28:36
production so that you can perfect that machine machine
28:40
that builds the machine It started selling production is
28:45
going. Well, actually the that's the
28:49
Those are hard. That's a hard thing to get,
28:52
right? We made many, many iterations on
28:58
the stalling prototypes and then, as I said, the, the been
29:01
building installing production line was 1000% harder than
29:06
designing the satellite to begin with, but but it is important to
29:10
have like a To to design for manufacturing and have a quote
29:17
tight feedback loop between the design of the object and the
29:20
manufacturing system. So, as you weren't when, when
29:24
you designed the object of first, you realize all the parts
29:27
that are really difficult to make manufacturer and so having
29:32
the manufacturing system and the design bring those up at the
29:36
same time so that you're actually in the beginning,
29:39
making a thing that you know, is wrong, but you're actually
29:42
figuring out what's hard to manufacture guess.
29:44
The real No problem. So we brought up these the
29:49
starlink production line before we actually had the design
29:53
finalized which, which is actually the right thing to do
29:56
and then we discover oh there's all there's all these things
29:58
that in the design that are very difficult to make and so
30:02
therefore we must change the design.
30:06
And the, the satellite ended up having the same capability but
30:11
just was very easy to make and launch.
30:16
So what we say very easy, it's not some sort of hard but it is,
30:23
but it's being done and we or the satellites are being
30:28
produced at a rate now faster than we can launch them.
30:31
So, and and the cost of the satellite has dropped below the
30:36
cost of transporting it to orbit, even when taking the
30:42
Falcon 9 in the most reuse configuration, which is to get
30:44
the booster back and you get the bearings back, the cost of the
30:50
trend of transporting satellite to orbit exceeds the cost of the
30:54
satellite. Hmm, so the satellites are good,
30:57
good situation, okay. And the cost that satellite will
30:59
keep coming down. As we ramp up rates and make
31:02
design improvements. But so we really need Starship
31:07
to carry starlink in order to get the total delivered cost to
31:13
orbit to be much better than it is today, okay?
31:17
I'm still very good. When you when you so in terms of
31:24
deciding what to build, you can take feedback from customers and
31:29
let customers can hold to you what they want or you can be
31:33
radically Innovative within your company or you know the small
31:37
set of individuals are and develop something and push it
31:39
into the industrial base. So customer pull would be Tesla.
31:44
Tesla owners wanting new features on the existing Fleet.
31:51
Push would be, you know, company push would be something like
31:56
when Apple push the iPad to everybody and nobody knew what
31:59
an iPad was until they touched it and went.
32:01
Wow. So everybody wants an iPad.
32:03
Now, what do you all think about?
32:05
In terms of that balance between customer pole and Company push,
32:11
well, it would be any nobody wanted to Tesla like so that the
32:18
were made the original sort of rose to the sports car.
32:23
If you were like, why would I want electric car?
32:24
That's my gasoline car works fine.
32:28
Like no, electric cars better has tried and it was hot.
32:34
They're hard to get people to do a test drive or foot first one.
32:38
Nobody knew who we were, and IT behooves company and like yeah,
32:41
renamed after Nikola, Tesla know.
32:43
Like, I know, so For sure, we were doing push in the beginning
32:51
because people said there was no one telling us that they want an
32:54
electric car. So it was not it was not out of
32:56
like You know it was like it lets people coming up to me
33:00
saying hey I really want to electric car and I heard that 0
33:03
times something like it's like man we're going to make an
33:08
electric car and show that these things can be good and then
33:11
people want them you know it's like because like Henry Ford
33:15
said like the were sold out the Model.
33:18
T is like if you ask the public what they wanted, that's a
33:22
faster horse. So if you would like a big
33:25
survey and say what hey public before, Owner bills.
33:29
What would you like us? Like?
33:30
Well, I'd like my horse to go 3 miles an hour faster and eat
33:33
less food and, you know, be stronger and live longer.
33:40
And like I think there will be basically, as a bunch of
33:44
incremental improvements on horse because you want, what do
33:48
we say? Like, what about it wouldn't be
33:50
all that. Call it drives itself.
33:51
Like, what are you talking about?
33:52
That's not, it sounds crazy. But when you actually make an
33:57
automobile and give People and say, okay.
33:59
Now this is a horse. We can keep it in the bond and
34:02
if you leave for a month, it still alive.
34:08
Yeah. So carry more wig, more weight
34:12
than a horse and go further and that kind of thing.
34:15
So are the it's like when it's erratically a new product,
34:20
people don't know that they want it because it's just not in
34:22
their in their scope. I think when they first started
34:27
making TVs, did a nationwide survey.
34:30
I think it's might have been like 46 or 48.
34:34
It's like famous Nationwide. Survey will you ever buy a TV
34:39
out? I was like 96 percent of
34:41
respondents said no. Hmm.
34:44
Some like some crazy number like basically everyone's like would
34:47
you buy TV and really put a price on there?
34:49
Something I don't know. But it was famously almost.
34:53
Everyone said they would not buy TV but they don't know what
34:55
they're talking about. So the big game-changing stuff
34:59
at the beginning is a company, push kind of a thing most of the
35:03
time but then changes to the product over time can be a lot
35:08
more customer pole kind of a focus.
35:11
Yeah, change changes. The product over time can be
35:15
incremental changes. Then the customers can certainly
35:19
tell you. It's good to be customer
35:21
feedback to say, how can we improve the product?
35:25
And once they're using it, they can say okay, I like this thing
35:28
about it. I don't like this other thing
35:30
and then we can improve the product over time.
35:32
Customer feedback after they they have the fundamental thing
35:37
is great. Okay.
35:39
Okay so in the audience here we have a lot of air in space War
35:44
Fighters, we have so people who use systems we have a lot of
35:49
Developmental teams on both the government and the industry side
35:54
and we have the Air and Space leadership of the nation.
35:58
So I got a little lightning round here for you, right to try
36:02
and influence, maybe some of those younger folks in the back
36:04
who are looking for the for the next big thing.
36:08
So, in terms of different kinds of Technology, whether it's
36:12
artificial intelligence or medical or batteries or
36:17
whatever, in the next five years, what technology?
36:22
Do you think we'll see the most advancement?
36:29
What's a field? Take to assess most in those
36:32
contexts because they're very different, but I think the part
36:35
of the most transformative most fundamentally transformative
36:37
will be a i AI. Okay.
36:40
And if you were recommending to some of the young officers and
36:46
enlisted troops in the room, what sort of degrees to pursue
36:51
at college, or what sort of Education that they should
36:55
prioritize for themselves in the Genera, what would you recommend
37:00
computer science and physics computer science and physics,
37:03
okay? How many computer science people
37:05
do we have out there? How many physics people?
37:10
Okay, we need more apparently. Okay, it's essentially
37:15
information Theory and physical theory.
37:17
If you want to understand the nature of the universe and have
37:21
these have very good, predictive power physics and computer
37:27
science, okay? Yeah.
37:29
Okay. As a nation, that is interested
37:33
in radical Innovation to maintain its Competitive Edge.
37:36
What are the things that the department of the Air Force
37:39
should? Investing more in other than
37:42
reusable Rockets from your perspective.
37:47
Yeah. And I can't emphasize enough.
37:48
How important reasonable Rockets are.
37:54
You love it? It's great.
38:01
So and I think that you could actually do point to point on
38:07
Earth with to go long distances and be much better than aircraft
38:13
because I mean basically just think of like ICBM - the new
38:18
Cadillac and you know it's a it's a sort of in the option
38:22
package just yeah uncheck nuke and then add Landing system and
38:30
and that's definitely gonna get you wherever you want to go as
38:32
far the fastest That's why they made it icbms I get there, the
38:37
fastest so and I think that that's going to be pretty
38:42
exciting. Yeah, I think.
38:54
Once you have dramatically lower cost access to space then then
38:59
many things are enabled. The you think it's like once you
39:03
got the Union Pacific Railroad then you know, getting to the
39:06
West Coast was much faster and much less dangerous.
39:11
Yeah, you know, like you to sort of end up eating your
39:13
compatriots in a snowy situation, you know?
39:19
It's so You just take the train. So so you know beginning they
39:29
thought why the heck of a building at stupid Railway?
39:32
There's nobody there's nobody there and I like but once about
39:38
the railway they're like okay now it's easy to get to the West
39:41
Coast and now a huge portion of the u.s. population is on the
39:45
west coast and actually California is the most populous
39:49
state in the nation. But it used to be, well least
39:55
populous, I suppose for pretty low.
39:58
So many things are possible. Once you once the transport
40:04
problem is solved. So that's why I think it's so
40:09
fundamental. Because you can't get there or
40:14
getting, there is takes a long time and you can't risk.
40:18
And every Mission has got to work.
40:20
Then it's very hard to innovate. It's got to be that, okay?
40:24
Some missions won't work and they on the cost of running the
40:27
experiments is low. That's why I'm hot.
40:30
I'm having so much on the cost of Transport.
40:34
So You know, once you're there, I think I say establishing a
40:42
base on the moon or base on Mars.
40:45
There's just a tremendous amount of work work that's needed to
40:48
create a self-sustaining based on the moon or Mars and it opens
40:53
up a tremendous amount of opportunity.
40:54
Just as the Union Pacific Railroad did by making access to
40:59
the West Coast. Not much easier.
41:03
Okay? Yeah.
41:08
Wait outside of the space. A space where all my think?
41:10
There's a lot of opportunity and tunnels.
41:14
I think I've been saying that for a long time and tunnels are
41:20
great. I really great and foreign
41:27
companies about to finish. Its first tunnel in Vegas.
41:29
I encourage encourage people to copy, please copy the boring
41:32
company for do better. That'd be there's, A lot of.
41:42
So in terms of domains you have Subterranean.
41:45
Yeah, obviously Tesla, Tesla covers the ground domain as
41:51
capabilities you've got the space domain covered with SpaceX
41:55
and starlink capabilities. I think this is this is the air
42:00
Warfare Symposium. Folks might not in the audience,
42:03
might be interested in if you have any ideas for the are
42:05
domain specifically For the air domain.
42:13
I think things like things are very definitely going to go into
42:17
kind of autonomous locally or autonomous drone Warfare, is
42:23
where it's at with future will be, I'm just saying, let's not,
42:28
I want the future to be this, it's just this is what the
42:31
future will be. Okay, is autonomous drone
42:33
Warfare. and at a local local level, the you know I can't
42:44
believe I'm saying this because this is this is like dangerous
42:46
but it's simply what will occur is sort of a drones locally
42:53
being autonomous and But I think we still want to retain.
43:03
Sort of like, you know, I thought e to damage or destroy
43:09
it. You're a thing that that isn't
43:14
an autonomous drone. Keep that Authority back here
43:18
with the blue person in the loop.
43:20
Okay, but it's the fighter jet era has passed.
43:25
That is it's just Yeah, why did you are is passed, okay, so it's
43:32
drugs. let's go back to failure for a minute and And and the
43:42
mindset that that you have, you and your leadership team at
43:46
Tesla and SpaceX have on failure.
43:47
I mean, the SpaceX blooper reel that you guys did.
43:51
And I think, as 2017 time frame was definitely.
43:56
Hey, we Embrace this learning that occurs more recently with
44:01
the the Tesla truck and the and the ball through the window.
44:06
Also that month grew out of that.
44:13
That that mindset, that Embraces failure.
44:16
How do you personally? I mean, it's those kinds of
44:21
failures would drive a lot of us in this room nuts, but doesn't
44:25
seem to drive you nuts. Seems like you're very
44:27
comfortable with it. Can you talk about the mindset
44:29
that requires for you to be that accepting of that kind of
44:33
failure. Sure, Sweet.
44:35
Roll the video. No, we're not.
44:38
No, we should not roll the video not yet.
44:39
Okay. Okay.
44:42
Okay. Well, I think of the things is
44:47
just there's certain amount of time and within that time you
44:52
want the the best net outcome. So for, you know, all the set of
45:00
actions that you can do, there's going to be some Bush will fail
45:05
some, which will succeed and you want the, the net useful.
45:11
Output of your set of actions to be the highest. so, I really
45:21
like these like a baseball analogy like You know, baseball
45:25
in unless you just sit there and wait for the perfect pitch until
45:29
you get it. Real easy one that you can give
45:31
you three shots. Third one they say okay maybe
45:35
get off the go back to the put somebody else up there.
45:40
So these are three strikes on baseball.
45:46
Like yeah, not on bad anymore. So see what you're what you're
45:51
really looking for is like what's the batting average?
45:54
You know how you doing on on score and just there's going to
46:01
be some amount of failure. But you want your net output.
46:10
That useful output to maximized failure is essentially
46:13
irrelevant unless it is catastrophic okay, okay?
46:19
Intellectual property, obviously Tesla SpaceX SolarCity have
46:26
amazing capabilities that they're bringing to the to the
46:30
public and to the government every day.
46:33
How do you protect your intellectual property and a
46:36
world where it seems like the cloud and Rivers and things are
46:40
constantly under attack from people wishing to free you of
46:45
their your intellectual property.
46:48
Yeah, well actually a Tesla. We just open sourced out
46:51
patents, some years ago. So, anyway can use our patents.
46:55
So we really have not been tried to protect intellectual property
46:59
in that sense. We've tried to actually smooth
47:03
the path because the overarching goal of Tesla is to accelerate
47:07
the Adventist sustainable energy.
47:09
And so if we created a patent portfolio, That discouraged
47:16
other companies from making electric cars, there will be
47:19
inconsistent with our mission. So we open sourced all the
47:22
patterns, okay? In order to help the other
47:25
anyone else who wants to make an electric car.
47:28
So, I guess that's the opposite of protecting IP.
47:34
Now, the real way, I'll take you, you actually achieve
47:37
intellectual property protection, right?
47:38
Is by innovating fast enough. If your rate of innovation is
47:43
high, then you don't need to worried about protecting the IP
47:47
because other companies will be copying something that you did
47:51
years ago. And that's fine, you know.
47:57
Just make sure you rate of innovation is fast.
48:02
Speed is really, the speed of innovation is what is what
48:05
matters and I do, I do say it's my teams, like quite a lot that
48:11
Innovation per unit time as I go Innovation per year if you will
48:15
say like is is what matters not Innovation absent time.
48:19
Because if you wanted to take say a hundred percent
48:23
Improvement in something and that took 100 years old.
48:26
One year, that's radically different.
48:30
So it's like, what is your rate of innovation that that matters
48:35
and is the rate of innovation? Is that accelerating or
48:40
decelerating? And weird thing happens when
48:44
companies get big, is that most companies or organizations the
48:48
bigger, they get, they tend to get less Innovative but just
48:54
less Innovative on a per person basis, but less Innovative in
48:57
the absolute And I think this is probably because the incentive
49:02
structure is not. It's not there for Innovation,
49:10
it's not enough to use words to encourage Innovation.
49:14
The incentive structure must be aligned with that.
49:18
That's fundamental. So taking that from a business
49:25
level to a national level in terms of obviously United States
49:29
largest economy in the world China the second largest economy
49:33
in the world currently and gaining fast.
49:36
What sort of things that could you share with the audience
49:39
here? That are your thoughts on the
49:42
competition? Economic or military between the
49:46
United States and China. Sure, well, I think China's are
49:52
real interesting country have to say the thing to appreciate
49:58
about China's, just that there's a lot of really smart really
50:01
hard working people there, and they're going to do a lot of
50:06
great things. This is sort of repetitive of
50:13
Chinese gun policy. They're just going to do a lot
50:15
of interesting things. The thing that will be that will
50:21
feel pretty strange. Is that the Chinese economy is
50:24
going to be probably at least twice as big as the US economy.
50:30
Maybe three times but at least twice.
50:35
So that assumes our GDP per capita is still less than the
50:39
us. But since they have about four
50:45
or five times the population, then it would only require
50:49
getting to a GDP per capita, of half the United States for their
50:54
economy, to twice the size of ours.
50:58
And as I'm sure people in this room know, the foundation of war
51:02
is economics. and so, if you If you have half the resources of
51:12
the counterparty, then you better be real Innovative.
51:16
If you're not in a bit of, you're going to lose.
51:21
I'm not sure whether that's a cyberattack that's ongoing or
51:24
not here, so, The clock says I have 11 minutes
51:39
left. Is that not true?
51:45
So sweet. So smash smooth jazz, you Lon
51:51
That's coming through the house system.
51:53
We're working to get it shut off.
51:55
Thank you. Yes.
52:03
Well alright. so yeah, with with respect to China China's economy
52:16
is going to be Two to three times as high as the US economy.
52:21
At least at least double. Therefore in order for the u.s.
52:25
be competitive on Military level, the innovation has to
52:31
overcome a gigantic Gap in economic output, okay?
52:36
So in the absence of radical Innovation, the US will be
52:39
militarily second. Okay?
52:45
Basic what from the standpoint of radical Innovation.
52:55
We already talked about Workforce, we talked about
52:57
processes, we talked about protecting intellectual property
53:01
rights. Let's talk about overall
53:04
culture. That culture that you try and
53:08
push into your company's that makes them successful, any of
53:13
us, And I sat right next to one of your SpaceX employees on the
53:16
plane here yesterday, a young engineer, it was motivating for
53:22
me just to talk to her about what she was doing every day and
53:26
how important her job was and I just felt like the only other
53:30
place I've seen that kind of culture is frankly in the
53:34
department of the Air Force, with some of our young folks
53:37
that are sprinkled around the back of the room.
53:39
How do you create that culture at SpaceX and Tesla to, to make
53:43
it? Employees like that. well, while
53:47
this was jazz on us with a Vengeance, it's like, when a big
53:55
elevator So, first puzzle weren't when we interview
54:07
people? We do ask for some evidence of
54:10
exceptional ability, which in most cases includes Innovation,
54:15
this is what said, everyone needs to be Innovative.
54:17
It's we certainly need those that are doing Advanced
54:21
engineering to be Innovative. And ideally everyone is, at
54:25
least some to some degree in a very Innovative.
54:28
So, at the interview point, we select for people who want to
54:36
create new technology and then the incentive structure is set
54:42
up that such that Innovation is rewarded making mistakes along
54:50
the way. Does not come with a big penalty
54:53
and but, but failure to try to innovate at all.
54:58
Comes with a big penalty, you'll be fired.
55:01
Okay? Yeah.
55:03
All right. The carrot and the stick?
55:05
Yes, the stick. If you don't even try or
55:09
somebody doesn't even try to invade or the renovation,
55:12
aspirations are very are Not not, not very good.
55:18
Then yeah, they will no longer be at the company.
55:21
Okay. Yeah.
55:22
All right, so we got about five minutes left.
55:25
And what I'd like to do is just turn it over to you Ilan, to
55:29
talk about whatever you'd like to talk about.
55:31
If you have a message for the audience here, you have, you
55:35
know, a thousand plus are in space professionals and the
55:39
greatest air and space force on the planet.
55:42
So what do you want to tell him? We got to make Starfleet happen.
55:55
So so we were like real big spaceships that can go far
56:00
places and that's probably give me the most trouble whole I
56:05
think this should be a new uniform.
56:07
That's that that's like cool uniforms.
56:15
Cool spaceships. Yeah I think that's what when
56:18
the when the public hears space force, that's what they think
56:21
it's like. Okay we're going to have like
56:23
some Sweet spaceships and like pre look good uniforms and stuff
56:28
that would be the sort of the polygons.
56:31
So yeah. We're The Sci-Fi Futures, the
56:36
the good Sci-Fi Futures to be real and ideally to become real
56:40
while we're still alive, you know, and everyone to see it
56:44
happen. And so I think we really need to
56:48
drive the rate of innovation to be such that we would see a big,
56:53
big breakthroughs, big improvements in space technology
56:57
and in the years to come So yeah, it's like we're trying to
57:04
make stuff lead happen as soon as humanly possible and
57:08
definitely why worship while we're still alive.
57:11
Yeah. So I'm not sure about warp drive
57:14
but we can do other stuff I think can be done match, help.
57:18
Well, private teleportation, Holly not but big space ships
57:22
that can go far places, definitely that can be done
57:25
understood. All right, ladies and gentlemen,
57:27
Elon Musk I'm not sure about warp drive but we can do other
57:15
stuff I think can be done match, help.
57:18
Well, private teleportation, Holly not but big space ships
57:22
that can go far places, definitely that can be done
57:25
understood. All right, ladies and gentlemen,
57:27
Elon Musk