Well, he’s only taking some of his rockets. The bulk of the billionaire’s SpaceX empire and its thousands of workers remains firmly ensconced in Hawthorne.
Musk announced his decision to head for the hills of West Texas — near Austin, to be more precise — last week at a Wall Street Journal conference.
But the Twitter-loving, tantrum-prone visionary has been sending up signal flares for some time now that he was ready to decamp from Southern California.
He’d sold off his many homes in the area. He’d battled with Gavin Newsom and authority in general over pandemic restrictions. And he’d floated the idea of pulling up stakes at Tesla’s Northern California headquarters and moving the company’s operations elsewhere.
Musk will be missed, of course. He’s a source of endless fascination and, at times, inspiration.
And his departure, if it sticks, will reshape the Business Journal’s Wealthiest Angelenos countdown next year — Musk topped the list in 2019 and again in 2020 when his wealth soared faster than one of his Falcon 9 launch vehicles.
Then again, it’s now a work-from-anywhere world, which Musk has known for a long time. And like many tech titans, he has stretched his presence across multiple locations and time zones for years.
Something tells us that even when he’s not here physically, Musk will remain a fixture in multiple ways on the L.A. scene.
• • •
If you’re distraught over the idea of Musk’s departure, another member of the Wealthiest Angelenos club has a way to soothe those frazzled nerves. Shawn Carter, aka Jay-Z, who sits at No. 45 on our billionaire’s list, last week rolled out the first products from his new cannabis line, Monogram.
Announced in October, the company’s artisanal strains of cannabis are produced and distributed via ecommerce in partnership with San Jose-based Caliva, which uses the iconic hip-hop star as chief visionary officer.
• • •
Congrats to all the nominees and winners from last week’s Business Journal Beauty Awards. Companies earning top honors included home hair color business eSalon as brand of the year and Beautycounter as clean beauty brand of the year. Coverage of the event, including a recap of the webinar, starts on page 19.
