how much did Musk pay to get to force the founders of Tesla to allow Musk to say he was a cofounder? Reputation is hard to maintain but something you can buy
It was Eberhard who sued Musk trying to get the courts to declare that only he and Tarpenning can be called co-founders of Tesla.
And that backfired because the judge declared that, actually, Musk and JB. Straubel are also co-founders of Tesla.
https://www.tesla.com/blog/judge-strikes-claim-who-can-be-de...
If you're curious, pick a few companies at random and dig into their history. You might be surprised by how late some of their "founders" became involved in the business.
He was an early investor in Tesla in February 2003 after the first employee had already been hired and the prototype car was already built off the Lotus.
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