Snapchat创始人成世界最年轻亿万富翁 年仅24岁
在前几年，创办Facebook的马克·扎克伯格一直独占世界最年轻亿万富翁的宝座。然而今年，扎克伯格被Snapchat创始人艾文·斯皮格尔取代。近日，Snapchat照片分享应用市值已经超过100亿美元，其创始人斯皮格尔的净资产也达到15亿美元，成为新晋世界最年轻亿万富翁，年仅24岁。类似Facebook初创阶段，斯皮格尔所创办的Snapchat照片分享应用同样免费，并不创收。但是其创收前景和空间则足以引来众多投资者的投资。
Ah, to be young. And rich.
Those are two qualities that not many people successfully piece together
over the course of their lives, but there are those who are pulling it off. A
new generation of entrepreneurs, tech innovators, and young, hungry businessmen
and businesswomen are changing the world and making millions billions doing it.
Whether it be through social media, groundbreaking medical research, or changing
the way we think about well-established industries, the millennial generation is
out there, gunning for the top and breaking the bank at the same time.
The question is, with all of that money flying around Manhattan, Los
Angeles, Silicon Valley, and other hot-beds, which billionaire is the youngest?
For the past several years, that distinction has been held by the young man who
created Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg. But following some recent happenings on the
tech scene, that’s no longer the case.
As of right now, the youngest billionaire in the world is 24-year-old Evan
Spiegel, creator of the photo-sharing mobile application Snapchat.
Snapchat was recently valued at more than $10 billion by investors, meaning
that Spiegel’s net worth has been pegged at around $1.5 billion (he owns roughly
15% of the company). Spiegel’s an interesting case, as his creation is a mobile
app that is used by hundreds of millions of people every day, for free, and
doesn’t generate any revenues. Yet, much like Facebook before it, it’s the
potential to generate those revenues that have investors on board, and which
have inflated the company’s value to such lofty heights.
Despite his newfound billionaire status, Spiegel just recently moved out of
his parents’ house in southern California, after purchasing a $3.3 million home
nearby. At 24, Spiegel has several years on the next-youngest billionaires on
the list, which he supplanted following his company’s 11-figure valuation.
While Spiegel tops the rankings as the world’s youngest billionaire, there
are a few individuals who are also worth mentioning as well, especially since
they are the ones who Spiegel beat out just this past year. One is the world’s
current youngest female billionaire, Elizabeth Holmes. Holmes currently ranks as
the third-youngest billionaire, and made her fortune after dropping out of
Stanford at the age of 19 to pursue her own venture. Her company, Theranos, got
involved in, and subsequently changed for the better, the $76 billion laboratory
diagnostic industry. Essentially, she came up with a new way to run blood tests
at a fraction of the cost, and with much more efficiency.
“I think a lot of young people have incredible ideas and incredible
insights, but sometimes they wait before they go give their life to something,”
Holmes told CNN, regarding her decision to leave one of the nation’s top schools
and go into business for herself. “What I did was just to start a little
earlier.”
At 30 years old, Holmes is worth a reported $4.5 billion.
Finally, Dustin Moskovitz is the man that Spiegel ultimately kicked aside
to take the title as the world’s youngest billionaire. Moskovitz was one of the
co-founders of Facebook, and now holds the title as CEO of Asana, an
organization application. Moskovitz barely held the title himself, as he is only
eight days younger than his Facebook cohort Mark Zuckerberg. While Zuckerberg is
worth roughly $34 billion, Moskovitz’s fortune is much less modest, coming in at
$8.1 billion.
Again, Spiegel is the relative new kid on the block when it comes to the
billionaires’ club, and even at a fortune totaling $1.5 billion, he still
doesn’t even make the cut into the Forbes 400. Given the fact that Snapchat is
still a very mysterious case as far as business goes (again, it doesn’t generate
any revenues, it simply has a monstrous user-base), whether or not Spiegel will
be able to hang onto his title, or even further strengthen his net worth, have
yet to be seen.
For now, Evan Spiegel holds the title as the planet’s youngest billionaire.
But who knows when the next bright-eyed and bushy-tailed entrepreneur will break
through with a new innovation or invention that completely turns the world on
its head? They’re out there, and new billionaires are likely gestating this very
minute. Spiegel should enjoy his stay at the top, because there are undoubtedly
a good number of young, talented people gunning for the belt.
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