Shivon Zilis, an executive at Neuralink, has welcomed four children with tech entrepreneur Elon Musk through in vitro fertilization (IVF) in less than four years. The children include twins Strider and Azure, daughter Arcadia, and son Seldon Lycurgus.
According to People, Zilis, who specializes in machine learning and artificial intelligence, first met Musk in 2016 when she joined OpenAI, a startup he cofounded. She currently serves as the director of special projects at Neuralink, one of Musk’s companies.
In 2020, Zilis expressed her admiration for Musk on X (formerly Twitter), stating that there was “no one I respect and admire more.” When Musk, who has been vocal about his concerns regarding declining birth rates, approached her about having children together through IVF, she readily agreed. Zilis told Walter Isaacson for his 2023 Musk biography that choosing between an anonymous sperm donor and “the person you admire most in the world” was an easy decision for her.
The story behind their first set of twins
The Yale graduate followed Musk from Silicon Valley to Austin, Texas, where they welcomed their first children together, twins Strider Sekhar Sirius and Azure Astra Alice, in November 2021. The twins’ existence became public knowledge when Insider published court documents in July 2022, revealing that the pair had petitioned to give the children Musk’s last name while incorporating Zilis’ last name in their middle names.
The twins’ birth came just weeks before Musk welcomed another child with singer Grimes, who later acknowledged that “communication about the twins wasn’t handled super well.” Zilis occasionally shares updates about the twins on her X account, referring to them as the “lil loves of my life.” In May 2025, she posted photos of the children visiting SpaceX, showing them wearing company T-shirts.
The couple welcomed their third child, daughter Arcadia, on February 28, 2024. While Bloomberg first reported the news in June 2024, Zilis didn’t publicly discuss her daughter until her first birthday. Musk confirmed the birth to Page Six, emphasizing that the child wasn’t “secretly fathered” as all their friends and family were aware of the situation.
Their fourth child, son Seldon Lycurgus, was announced by Zilis on X in February 2025. She described him as “built like a juggernaut, with a solid heart of gold.” The announcement came alongside Arcadia’s birthday celebration, with Musk responding to the post with a heart emoji. These four children bring Musk’s total number of known offspring to fourteen, as he has ten additional children with three other women.
Published: Jun 13, 2025 11:09 am