Elon Musk Says 'Patents Are For The Weak:' They're Like 'Landmines In Warfare'

Tesla Inc. TSLA CEO Elon Musk took TV host Jay Leno for a tour around SpaceX’s Starbase facility and explained about the Starship and the rocket engines, excerpts of a yet-to-be-aired episode on CNBC showed. The billionaire entrepreneur also took a swipe at the concept of patents.

What Happened: While showing Leno a Raptor rocket engine, Musk said it was the highest pressure engine ever done operationally by any standards of most advanced engineering. 

The counterintuitive thing is making the rocket out of steel, Musk said, while describing the process.

To Leno's question whether SpaceX patents the technology, Musk said the company doesn’t, quipping that “patents are for the weak.”

See also: Elon Musk Spells Out 2 'Giant Kahunas' He Hopes To Accomplish In 2022

Why It Matters: Patents, according to Musk, are generally used as blocking techniques. He likened them to “landmines in warfare.” They don’t help advance things, but stop others from following you and make things expensive, the billionaire said.

On Starship, Musk said it is about 165 feet tall and 30 feet in diameter on the inside. Its payload area has more volume than a [Boeing] 747 jet, he added.

Mission Mars: In another clip shared by CNBC, Musk conceded that life on Mars could be difficult, and dangerous, but it’s whether we are going to be multi-planetary or not.

“Even if we’re sure Earth would be fine forever, do you want to be here forever? I think we want to be a spacefaring civilization,” he said.

"From a multi-planetary species, the next step is to be a multi-stellar species."

The interview will be aired on Sept. 21 at 10 p.m. ET. Ahead of the episode, Leno will host a live YouTube show to discuss the interview with Musk.

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