Evan Spiegel American internet entrepreneur Date of Birth: 04.06.1990 Country: USA

1. Biography of Evan Spiegel
2. Early Life and Education
3. Entrepreneurial Journey
4. Co-Founding Snapchat
5. Success of Snapchat

Biography of Evan Spiegel

Evan Thomas Spiegel is an American internet entrepreneur and the co-founder of the company 'Snapchat', an instant messaging service, where he also serves as the CEO. The company was valued at three billion dollars when it received a purchase offer from the social networking site Facebook. However, Spiegel declined Mark Zuckerberg's offer.

Early Life and Education

Evan Spiegel was born on June 4, 1990, in Los Angeles, California, into a financially privileged family. His father, John, was a partner at the law firm 'Munger, Tolles & Olson', and his mother, Melissa Ann Thomas, was a successful lawyer at 'Pilsbury, Madison & Sutro' before leaving her career to raise their children. Spiegel grew up in the affluent neighborhood of Pacific Palisades, California, and attended an Episcopal church. He received his education at the prestigious Crossroads School for Arts and Sciences in Santa Monica before enrolling at Stanford University.

Entrepreneurial Journey

During his time at Stanford, Spiegel studied graphic design and developed the idea for 'Snapchat' as one of his student projects. Prior to this, he had completed design courses at the Otis College of Art and Design, as well as summer courses at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena. Spiegel also gained entrepreneurial experience through internships at companies such as 'Red Bull' and a biomedical company. Reflecting on his sales experience at 'Red Bull', Spiegel mentioned that he had personally sought out the opportunity by reaching out to a friend who worked there. He pursued an unpaid internship to gain insight into marketing and worked on various computer and design projects. He even traveled to Cape Town, South Africa, and collaborated with the company 'Intuit' to create a mobile application called 'TxtWeb'.

Co-Founding Snapchat

Spiegel, along with Robert Murphy, another co-founder of Snapchat, were both members of the fraternity 'Kappa Sigma'. Together, they created the website FutureFreshman.com, which helped students navigate the college application process. Eventually, they decided to explore a new idea involving disappearing messages and images. According to reports, the main brain behind the concept was Frank Brown, and the trio spent the summer of 2011 bringing the idea to life. Brown, who had no programming experience, took on marketing tasks and resolved patent issues. It is rumored that Brown was later ousted from the company, and he is currently engaged in a legal battle with Spiegel.

Success of Snapchat

According to the Pew Research Center, 9% of adult smartphone owners in the United States use the Snapchat service. Spiegel has expressed admiration for the accomplishments of Google. In terms of his personal life, it is known that he previously dated model Lucinda Aragon.