Tunnel vision

摘要

ELON MUSK can seem flakily up himself. His newish tunnelling business appears to be a case in point. The project has a cute name (the Boring Company), a wacky way of raising money (an "Initial Hat Offering" raised almost $1m by selling baseball caps), a physicist-knows-best approach to a social problem (putting private cars on high-speed underground trolleys to reduce urban congestion) and a quirky, memorable goal (to produce a tunnelling machine that goes faster than a snail, in this case a snail called Gary). But it also showcases the techniques that have made Mr Musk a success.