Elon Musk is now the father of ten children, after secretly welcoming twins with Shivon Zillis, 36, in November, in Austin, Texas. Elon and Shivon, the director of operations for his A.I. company Neuralink, petitioned the court to change their children’s names to “have their father’s last name and contain their mother’s last name as part of their middle name,” according to a report by Business Insider. Elon confirmed Insider’s report by tweeting on July 7, “Doing my best to help the underpopulation crisis. A collapsing birth rate is the biggest danger civilization faces by far. Mark my words, they are sadly true.” He also further confirmed the news to Page Six by saying “thanks”, when they asked about the twins.
Elon has been dating Natasha Bassett, 29, since February, so it’s unclear what the status of his current relationship with Shivon is — but there’s no doubt she’s one impressive woman. Find out about the artificial intelligence specialist, below.
1. Shivon attended Yale University on a scholarship.
After graduating from Unionville High School in northeast Toronto, Shivon was awarded both an academic and a sports scholarship to Yale University. She ended up studying economics and philosophy and played goalie for the Yale varsity women’s hockey team.
2. She made the Forbes Magazine ’30 Under 30′ List in 2015.
After graduating, Shivon made her mark as a venture capitalists and was as one of the top “30 under 30: Top Young Investors of Venture Capital” by Forbes magazine. She was recognized by the publication for her work as a founding member of the investment team at Bloomberg Beta, a $75-million venture capital pool that invests in early-stage startups focused on machine and artificial intelligence.
3. She’s Canadian and grew up in a suburb of Toronto.
Shivon grew up in Markham, Ontario and revealed in a 2015 interview that she was born to an Indian-immigrant mother and a Caucasian father. In the interview she gave credit to her Punjabi heritage for her “big eyes.” She revealed in her Yale school bio that her favorite food is Indian, and her favorite band is ‘Our Lady Peace‘.
4. Shivon’s expertise in artificial intelligence led to her first meeting with Elon.
Shivon met Elon through OpenAI, the artificial intelligence research nonprofit he helped found in 2015. She sits on the OpenAI board of directors. Her first job with Elon was at Tesla, where she worked as a project director for the electric car company’s Autopilot program. In 2017 she joined Neuralink, the company Elon co-founded that develops implantable brain–machine interfaces. The neurotic company is designing computer implants with the aim of allowing` people’s brains to control electronic devices.
5. In 2020 she defended Elon on Twitter after he moved Tesla to Texas.
This makes me sad. No one’s perfect but I've never met anyone who goes through more personal pain to fight for an inspiring future for humanity – and has done so tirelessly for decades. Everyone’s entitled to their opinion but mine is that there’s no one I respect and admire more https://t.co/pkNvYrrX96
— Shivon Zilis (@shivon) May 11, 2020
Taking to her Twitter on May 9, 2020, Shivon wrote that “there’s no one I respect and admire more,” after Elon was attacked on-line for his controversial decision to move his Tesla headquarters from California to Texas, over his disdain for Covid-19 restrictions. The tech billionaire made the move after he came under fire for reopening the Tesla factory in Fremont, CA in 2020, at the start of the coronavirus pandemic, in spite of Covid-19 regulations.