Elon Musk got down on one knee and apologized to Google co-founder Sergey Brin after having an affair with his wife at a fancy art festival in Miami Beach last year, according to a bombshell report.
Brin filed for divorce after learning his wife cheated on him with Musk, whose electric car company Tesla was backed by Brin during the 2008 financial crisis.
The two tech titans were longtime friends, with Musk saying he regularly crashed at Brin’s Silicon Valley home for years, until the Tesla titan’s brief fling with Nicole Shanahan last year, the Wall says Street Journal.
Brin and Shanahan were separated but still living together at the time of the affair in December, a person close to her told the Journal.
Brin, who is worth $95 billion, filed for divorce in January, citing “irreconcilable differences.”
The move came several weeks after he discovered that Musk and Shanahan had been hooking up, people familiar with the matter told the Journal.
Brin also ordered his financial advisers to liquidate their investments in Musk’s various companies amid growing tension between the billionaires, sources told the Journal.
The world’s richest man apologized to his longtime friend at a party earlier this year, people with knowledge of the shocking incident told the WSJ.
Brin acknowledged Musk’s professed remorse but still does not speak to him regularly, the sources added.
The fling took place in December at the annual Art Basel event, a multi-day fair featuring international gallery exhibitions and panel discussions attended by deep-pocketed collectors, after Musk broke up with the Canadian pop singer Grimes in September.
Shanahan’s marriage to Brin was also strained at the time over issues related to the COVID-19 pandemic shutdowns and the care of their daughter, people familiar with the relationship told the Journal.
Shanahan is reportedly seeking more than $1 billion from Brin, who is worth $95 billion, and the couple is involved in divorce mediation proceedings.
They have been unable to reach an agreement, with Brin’s side saying Shanahan wants much more than a prenuptial agreement calls for and Shananan’s side saying she signed the pact under duress while pregnant, sources familiar with the negotiations told the Journal.
In 2008, Brin provided Musk with a $500,000 lifeline for Tesla when it was struggling to ramp up production amid the Great Recession.
Musk, now worth $253 billion, later rewarded Brin by giving him one of Tesla’s first all-electric SUVs.
Musk, a 51-year-old divorcee, has had 10 children, the first of whom died of sudden infant death syndrome in 2002.
Five of the other children were born to Musk’s ex-wife, Justin Wilson. Musk also had three children with Canadian singer Grimes, one born by surrogate, and earlier this month he confirmed having twins with an executive at his brain company Neuralink.
These children were born just weeks before Grimes gave birth to her second child.
“Doing everything we can to help the underpopulation crisis,” Musk tweeted on July 7.
“A collapsing birth rate is by far the greatest danger facing civilization.”
An attorney for Brin declined to comment, the Journal said.
Neither Musk nor a spokeswoman for Shanahan, who runs a foundation focused on reproductive justice, responded to requests for comment, the Journal said.
This article was originally published by the New York Post and is reproduced with permission
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