Evan Spiegel

Evan Thomas Spiegel (born June 4, 1990)[1] is an American businessman who is the co-founder and CEO of the American social media company Snap Inc., which he created (as Snapchat Inc.) with Bobby Murphy and Reggie Brown while they were students at Stanford University. Spiegel was the youngest billionaire in the world in 2015.[3]

Evan Spiegel
Spiegel in November 2013
Born
Evan Thomas Spiegel

(1990-06-04) June 4, 1990[1]
Citizenship
  • American
  • French
EducationCrossroads School for Arts and Sciences
Alma materStanford University
OccupationEntrepreneur
Known forCo-founder of Snap Inc.
Net worth US$9.6 billion (December 2020)[2]
TitleCEO of Snap Inc.
Spouse(s)
(m. 2017)
Children2

Early life and education

Spiegel was born in Los Angeles, California, into a family of lawyers John W. Spiegel and Melissa Ann Thomas.[4] He grew up in Pacific Palisades, California, where he was raised Episcopalian.[5] He was educated at the Crossroads School for Arts and Sciences in Santa Monica, and attended Stanford University.[1]

Spiegel took design classes at the Otis College of Art and Design while still in high school and at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena the summer before entering Stanford.[1] He also had an unpaid internship in sales at Red Bull.[1] While a student, he worked as a paid intern for a biomedical company, as a careers instructor in Cape Town, South Africa, and at Intuit on the TxtWeb project.[1] Spiegel is a member of the Kappa Sigma fraternity.[6]

Career

Spiegel at the 7th Annual Crunchies Awards on February 10th, 2014 in San Francisco.

In April 2011, while studying product design at Stanford,[7] Spiegel proposed an app with ephemeral messaging as a product design class project, an idea which his classmates ridiculed.[8] Later that year, Spiegel worked with fellow Stanford classmates Bobby Murphy and Reggie Brown to launch a prototype of this concept called "Picaboo", which they later renamed as Snapchat.[9][10] The app's popularity grew significantly and in 2012, Evan left Stanford to focus on Snapchat shortly before completing his degree.[1][11] By the end of 2012, Spiegel's Snapchat app had reached 1 million daily active users.[9]

In February 2017, Spiegel and Murphy pledged to donate upwards of 13,000,000 shares of Class A common stock over the next 15–20 years to an arts, education and youth non-profit. They have created the Snap Foundation which is a non-profit organization targeted to help in these areas. Their mission is to "develop pathways to the creative economy for underrepresented youths in Los Angeles." Recently they have donated $3 million to people affected by COVID-19.[12][13][14] In January 2017 The Wall Street Journal reported that after the predicted March 2017 IPO for Snap Inc., Murphy and Evan Spiegel would hold over "70% of the voting power" in the company, and own around 45% of the total stock.[15]

On July 19, 2018, Spiegel revealed to "Stay Tuned", NBC News's show on Snapchat that he completed his degree requirements and graduated from Stanford in 2018. He notes that his baby, Hart Kerr Spiegel, was his motivation to complete his collegiate education so that he can inspire his son to graduate from college as well.[16]

Controversy

In 2014, emails sent by Spiegel during his time at Stanford were leaked to Gawker. The emails included misogynistic and homophobic comments, openly encouraged getting women heavily drunk in an attempt to convince them to have sex, and encouraged underage drinking. The emails included comments about getting his friends laid by wasted "sororisluts", and shooting lasers at "fat girls".[17][18][19][20]

Personal life

Spiegel began dating Australian model Miranda Kerr in 2015.[21][22] They became engaged on July 20, 2016.[23][24] They married in a private ceremony in Los Angeles on May 27, 2017.[25] Just a month before Spiegel's engagement to Kerr, he purchased a 7,164 square foot, $12 million house that was previously owned by Harrison Ford.[26] In November 2017, Kerr announced that she and Spiegel were expecting their first child.[27] On May 7, 2018, Miranda gave birth to their son Hart Kerr Spiegel, named after Spiegel's grandfather.[28][29] In March 2019, the couple announced that they are expecting their second child together, Kerr's third.[30] In October 2019, Kerr gave birth to Myles Spiegel.[31]

As of 2016, Spiegel was ranked at number 854 on the Forbes 400 with $4 billion in wealth.[32] After, in 2017, Spiegel became one of the youngest public company CEOs at age 26 when Snap began trading in March.[33] Spiegel is also a member of the Berggruen Institute's 21st Century Council.[34][35][36]

In 2018, he and his son Hart received French citizenship through a clause in the naturalization laws that waives French residency requirements for applicants that contribute to the French culture or economy.[37]

References

  1. Van Grove, Jennifer (November 26, 2013). "Snapchat's Evan Spiegel: Saying no to $3B, and feeling lucky". CNET. Archived from the original on December 7, 2013. Retrieved December 10, 2013.
  2. "Evan Spiegel". Archived from the original on August 18, 2020. Retrieved September 3, 2020.
  3. Robehmed, Natalie. "The World's Youngest Billionaires 2015: 46 Under 40". Forbes. Archived from the original on September 24, 2017. Retrieved September 19, 2017.
  4. "StartupBook » Curated News and Advice for Entrepreneurs » 24-Year Old Snapchat Co-Founder Probably Threw The Best Parties Ever In High School". StartupBook. Archived from the original on February 1, 2014. Retrieved January 22, 2014.
  5. Maddaus, Gene (October 17, 2013). "Snapchat Went From Frat Boy Dream to Tech World Darling. But Will it Last?". LA Weekly. Archived from the original on October 4, 2020. Retrieved January 23, 2020. John Spiegel strove to make sure his children understood that their life was privileged. Every Christmas, he would take them to hand out food at Head Start centers. Through their church, All Saints Episcopal in Beverly Hills, they traveled to Mexico to build houses for the poor.
  6. "5 Facts About Evan Spiegel, Snapchat's Often Controversial Co-Founder". Entrepreneur.com. Archived from the original on May 15, 2016. Retrieved June 3, 2016.
  7. "Evan Spiegel". CrunchBase. Archived from the original on May 20, 2019. Retrieved December 10, 2013.
  8. Colao, J.J. (November 27, 2012). "Snapchat: The Biggest No-Revenue Mobile App Since Instagram". Forbes. Archived from the original on November 28, 2015. Retrieved December 31, 2015.
  9. "Snapchat: An Abridged History". Fortune. Archived from the original on August 25, 2018. Retrieved August 24, 2018.
  10. MacMillan, Douglas (November 20, 2013). "Snapchat CEO: 70% of Users Are Women". Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on December 27, 2015. Retrieved December 31, 2015.
  11. Matthews, Natalie (November 14, 2013). "Finally, a Tech CEO With Style: A Closer Look at Snapchat's Evan Spiegel". Elle. Archived from the original on January 3, 2015. Retrieved December 10, 2013.
  12. "Snap Foundation". www.snapfoundation.org. Archived from the original on August 15, 2020. Retrieved September 3, 2020.
  13. Taylor, Harriet (February 2, 2017). "Snap co-founders create Snap Foundation to support non-profits". CNBC. Archived from the original on February 25, 2017. Retrieved February 24, 2017.
  14. Velazco, Chris (February 2, 2017). "Snap Inc, Quietley created A Foundation to support arts and education". engadget. Rochester, New York. Archived from the original on March 3, 2017. Retrieved March 3, 2017.
  15. Farrell, Maureen (January 20, 2017), Snapchat Parent Plans to Pay Banks 2.5% of IPO Proceeds, New York: The Wall Street Journal, archived from the original on January 21, 2017, retrieved January 22, 2017
  16. Stay Tuned. July 19, 2018. NBC News.
  17. Biddle, Sam. ""Fuck Bitches Get Leid," the Sleazy Frat Emails of Snapchat's CEO". Gawker. Archived from the original on August 15, 2020. Retrieved August 9, 2020.
  18. "Confirmed: Snapchat's Evan Spiegel Is Kind Of An Ass". TechCrunch. Retrieved August 9, 2020.
  19. Manning, Ben Grubb and James W. (May 29, 2014). "Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel 'mortified and embarrassed' by sexist, derogatory emails". The Sydney Morning Herald. Archived from the original on October 2, 2019. Retrieved August 9, 2020.
  20. "Evan Spiegel's Leaked Fraternity Emails Prove He's Actually Even Worse Than You Thought". Bustle. Archived from the original on August 14, 2020. Retrieved August 9, 2020.
  21. "Miranda Kerr introduces beau to parents". Thespec.com. August 15, 2015. Archived from the original on December 17, 2015. Retrieved December 31, 2015.
  22. "Miranda Kerr introduces boyfriend to her parents – The West Australian". Yahoo! News. August 17, 2015. Archived from the original on December 8, 2015. Retrieved December 31, 2015.
  23. Christie D'Zurilla, Model Miranda Kerr engaged to Snapchat co-founder Evan Spiegel Archived June 27, 2018, at the Wayback Machine, Los Angeles Times, July 20, 2016.
  24. Biz Carson, Meet LA's newest power couple: Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel and supermodel Miranda Kerr profile Archived July 23, 2016, at the Wayback Machine, Business Insider, July 20, 2016.
  25. Desantis, Rachel (May 28, 2017). "Miranda Kerr weds Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel". Daily News. New York. Archived from the original on May 28, 2017. Retrieved May 28, 2017.
  26. Green, Dennis (May 10, 2016). "Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel and model Miranda Kerr just bought a $12 million home together". Archived from the original on October 26, 2017. Retrieved September 19, 2017.
  27. "Miranda Kerr and Evan Spiegel Are Reportedly Expecting Their First Child Together". Vogue. Archived from the original on January 12, 2018. Retrieved January 11, 2018.
  28. "Miranda Kerr and Evan Spiegel Welcome 'Beautiful' Son Hart: 'Words Cannot Explain How Happy We Are'" Archived July 31, 2018, at the Wayback Machine. People. May 7, 2018.
  29. "Miranda Kerr Gives Birth to Baby No. 2!" Archived March 30, 2019, at the Wayback Machine. Yahoo!. May 9, 2018.
  30. "Miranda Kerr is expecting her second child with husband Evan Spiegel". Harper's Bazaar UK. Archived from the original on September 26, 2019. Retrieved September 26, 2019.
  31. Jensen, Erin. "Miranda Kerr and Evan Spiegel welcome baby boy Myles: 'We are overjoyed'". USA TODAY. Archived from the original on June 4, 2020. Retrieved April 24, 2020.
  32. Forbes 400 2016: Youngest Archived August 31, 2017, at the Wayback Machine Forbes. Retrieved December 20, 2016.
  33. Forbes 400 2017: Youngest Archived October 7, 2019, at the Wayback Machine Forbes. Retrieved March 19, 2019.
  34. "Berggruen Institute". Archived from the original on January 6, 2017. Retrieved January 12, 2017.
  35. Gardels, Nathan (November 5, 2015). "China's New Five-Year Plan Embraces the Third Industrial Revolution". HuffPost. Archived from the original on July 21, 2020. Retrieved May 12, 2020.
  36. Benner, Katie. "Snap's Chief Taps Into the 'Right Now'" Archived February 2, 2017, at the Wayback Machine, New York Times, February 1, 2017. "Mr. Spiegel has also involved himself in some political conversations. In 2015, he met with China's president, Xi Jinping, as a member of the 21st Century Council at the Berggruen Institute. Its founder, Nicolas Berggruen, said he impressed a group that includes Mohamed El-Erian, the economist, and former President Nicolas Sarkozy of France with his 'thoughtful and mature approach to people.'"
  37. "EXCLUSIF Comment le PDG de Snapchat est devenu Français". Les Echos. December 16, 2019. Archived from the original on December 16, 2019. Retrieved December 16, 2019.
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