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2002

PayPal was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion in October 2002. PayPal had previously been the payment method of choice by more than fifty percent of eBay users, and the service competed with eBay’s subsidiary Billpoint. As a result of the acquisition PayPal's offices moved from Palo Alto to eBay's San Jose campus.

2003

Tesla Motors Founded

Tesla Motors, Inc. is a San Carlos startup focusing on the production of high performance, consumer-oriented battery electric vehicles. The firm was incorporated in July 2003 by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning. Eberhard, a computer engineer, combined his passion for sportscars with his concerns about global warming to conceive of the company.

2004

Facebook Moves to Palo Alto

Facebook came about as a spin-off of a Harvard University version of Hot or Not called Facemash. Mark Zuckerberg, while attending Harvard as a sophomore, concocted Facemash on October 28, 2003. According to The Harvard Crimson, Facemash "used photos compiled from the online facebooks of nine Houses, placing two next to each other at a time and asking users to choose the 'hotter' person." The following semester, Zuckerberg founded "The Facebook" and its base of operations was moved to Palo Alto.

2005

ILM Moves to the Presidio

In summer 2005, Industrial Light and Magic moved to the Letterman Digital Arts Center. For the first time in the company's history, all of the Lucas award-winning businesses including ILM, LucasArts Entertainment, Lucas Licensing, Lucas Online and Lucasfilm Ltd. were under one roof. The custom-designed 23-acre campus is located at the Presidio in San Francisco.

2006

Twitter Created

Jack Dorsey of San Francisco created Twitter, the internet-based text messaging service. The prototype took him about two weeks to build. BusinessWeek named him one of technology's "Best and Brightest". Dorsey's three guiding principles, which continue to guide the company, are simplicity, constraint and craftsmanship.

SolarCity Founded

SolarCity of Foster City was founded in July 2006 by brothers Peter and Lyndon Rive, including a $10M investment by entrepreneur Elon Musk (the South African cousin of the Rive brothers and co-founder of PayPal). SolarCity was the top provider of residential solar power in California in 2007 and 2008, according to the database kept by the California Solar Initiative.

2007

SunPower Corporation acquired PowerLight Corporation, a leading global provider of large-scale solar power systems, in January 2007. The San Jose-based SunPower designs and manufactures high-efficiency silicon solar cells, roof tiles, and solar panels based on an silicon all-back-contact solar cell invented at Stanford University.

2009

ZAP Unveils Alias

The newest addition to Zap electrics vehicle line, the Alias, is scheduled for a Fall release. The all-electric roadster can attain speeds higher than 75 mph and will go 100 miles per charge from any 110v outlet.