Elon Musk explains how to get startup ideas

When asked how he comes up with startup ideas, Elon responds:

“I tend to think of things from a sort of physics standpoint… what’s the best way to accomplish something? And then pursue that. That’s also a good way to determine if something’s far from its optimum.”

He gives rockets as an example:

“You could reason by analogy and say the rocket is going to cost a certain amount because that’s what prior rockets have cost. Or you can say, well, what is a rocket made of? What are the material constituents? What do they weigh? What’s the cost per unit mass? And that sets the limit asymptotically for what a rocket can be. So if you can figure out some creative way to rearrange those elements into a rocket shape, then you can achieve a much better outcome.”

He also thinks combining ideas from different industries is really helpful for innovation:

“What have people discovered in one industry and can that be applied to other industries? That’s I think also a great source of ideas. But usually you just struggle on a solution and try a bunch of things. Most of them don’t work and occasionally one does.”

Full video: Vanity Fair “Elon Musk Speaks About Tesla and SpaceX at Vanity Fair’s New Establishment Summit” (Oct 2014)

P.S. We’ve put together a YouTube playlist with every Elon Musk insight we’ve ever shared. You can watch it here: "Best startup advice from Elon Musk"