The struggles involved in financing and operating Tesla (Nasdaq:TSLA), the innovative electric automobile company founded by billionaire businessman Elon Musk, have pressured the company’s stock price and led to growing questions about whether its potential will be fulfilled.

Much of the support for the company seems to hinge on Musk’s track record as a successful South African-born American entrepreneur who has achieved impressive business accomplishments that include founding a company that later became PayPal (Nasdaq:PYPL). Forbes magazine estimates Musk’s net worth at $18.7 billion, but even someone that wealthy needs funding from other sources to carry out his vision of revolutionizing transportation in space and on the earth.

One of the biggest challenges facing Musk is that he simultaneously is trying to pursue two huge dreams: the development of a reliable, reusable launch vehicle through his SpaceX venture formed in 2002 and the creation of electric car manufacturer Tesla started in 2003.

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Paul Dykewicz, www.pauldykewicz.com, is an accomplished, award-winning journalist who has written for Dow Jones, the Wall Street Journal, Investor’s Business Daily, USA Today, the Journal of Commerce,Seeking Alpha, GuruFocus and other publications and websites. Paul is the editor of StockInvestor.com and DividendInvestor.com, a writer for both websites and a columnist. He further is the editorial director of Eagle Financial Publications in Washington, D.C., where he edits monthly investment newsletters, time-sensitive trading alerts, free e-letters and other investment reports. Paul previously served as business editor of Baltimore’s Daily Record newspaper. Paul also is the author of an inspirational book, “Holy Smokes! Golden Guidance from Notre Dame’s Championship Chaplain,” with a foreword by former national championship-winning football coach Lou Holtz.