Shivon Zilis, who is reportedly the mother of Elon Musk’s third child, built her reputation in the venture capital field before joining Neuralink, Musk’s brain chip company. Though she has gained attention for having multiple children with Musk, Zilis also has an impressive career.
Describing herself on the platform X (formerly Twitter), she stated: “Artificial intelligence, biological intelligence, anything that exists between them and beyond.”
Born on February 8, 1986, in Markham, Ontario (Canada), to an Indian mother and a Canadian father, Zilis earned degrees in economics and philosophy from Yale University in 2008. During her time as a student, she gained recognition for her performance on the ice hockey team, serving as captain and setting a school record for scoring.
Zilis began her career at IBM in New York, working in fintech, particularly in developing countries like Peru and Indonesia. She was also one of the key contributors to the IBM Watson project, a computer system designed to answer questions in natural language.
A passionate individual with an early interest in AI
Zilis revealed that she became interested in AI at the age of 12-13, after hearing about it in the album Spiritual Machines by the band Our Lady Peace. During a keynote speech at an AI conference hosted by a Canadian university in 2021, she mentioned that both the album and the book of the same name by Ray Kurzweil sparked her passion for AI.
In 2011, Zilis left IBM to co-found Bloomberg Beta, a venture capital fund, and worked as an investor. During this period, she prioritized machine learning projects. Zilis described herself as an “unsexy investor,” focusing on dry topics, analyzing everything “by thesis,” combining philosophy to develop logical reasoning, and always maintaining a broad perspective.
In 2015, Zilis was named to Forbes’ “30 Under 30” list in the venture capital category. Around the same time, she met Musk through a nonprofit project at OpenAI. In 2016, Zilis joined OpenAI, becoming its youngest board member until March 2023. In 2017, she moved to Tesla as a project director, working on AI for self-driving cars and chip design. She later became the director of special projects at Neuralink.
Her relationship with Elon Musk
Before news about her children with Elon Musk emerged, Zilis maintained a private personal life. However, in 2020, when Musk publicly criticized California’s government for restricting movement due to COVID-19, Zilis took to Twitter to express that individuals’ opinions should be respected.
The couple’s first set of twins was born in November 2021, just weeks before Musk and musician Grimes welcomed their second child through surrogacy. According to Musk’s biographer, Grimes was initially “outraged” when she found out about the twins but later met Zilis.
Up until Bloomberg revealed the existence of their third child this past weekend, Zilis had frequently shared posts about her two children (a boy and a girl) with Musk. For instance, in May, she posted a video of her son holding Musk’s hand. When Musk pointed at a logo and asked what it was, the boy responded, “Tesla.”
