ADVERTISEMENT

The fabulous life of Snap CEO Evan Spiegel, who just took his company public at a $33 billion valuation (SNAP)

His company, Snap Inc., is preparing for one of the most hotly anticipated initial public offerings of 2017 at a valuation of about $25 billion.

Snap CEO Evan Spiegel.

Life is good for Evan Spiegel.

ADVERTISEMENT

His company, Snap Inc., went public on Thursday at a $33 billion valuation. And with a net worth of at least $5 billion, 26-year-old Spiegel is one of the youngest billionaires in the world.

He lives a charmed life and he knows it.

"I am a young, white, educated male," the Snapchat creator once said at a Stanford business conference. "I got really, really lucky. And life isn't fair."

ADVERTISEMENT

We've pulled the highlights of Spiegel's spectacular life and career from profiles by LA Weekly, Forbes, Business Insider, court documents, and more.

Spiegel grew up in the Pacific Palisades, a ritzy Los Angeles enclave just east of Malibu. He is the older son of two Ivy League-educated lawyers. His parents divorced when he was in high school.

When Spiegel turned 16 and got his driver's license, he was given a Cadillac Escalade, which he parked in the gated Southern California Edison parking lot next to his school. Spiegel's father represented Edison during the energy crisis.

Source: LA Weekly

Spiegel spent his early years at an ultra-exclusive school called Crossroads in Santa Monica, which costs tens of thousands per academic year. Other notable alumni include Tinder cofounder Sean Rad, Kate Hudson, Jonah Hill, Jack Black, and Gwyneth Paltrow.

ADVERTISEMENT

Around the time that he landed a marketing internship with Red Bull, Spiegel decided that he wanted a more fuel-efficient car to drive around the city in. In a letter from 2008, Spiegel asked his parents to lease him a BMW 550i, which retails for about $75,000. "Cars bring me sheer joy," he wrote. "I would really appreciate you validating me and all of my hard work by leasing the BMW."

The Spiegels were members of a number of exclusive clubs, including the Jonathan Club in Santa Monica and the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club. They often went on trips to Europe, employed a full-time housekeeper, and even went snowboarding by helicopter in Canada. "We live in a bubble," Evan wrote in the letter asking for the BMW.

Source: LA Weekly

Spiegel went on to study product design at Stanford (his father's alma mater), where he met future Snapchat cofounders Reggie Brown and Bobby Murphy.

"We weren't cool," Murphy later told Forbes, "so we tried to build things to be cool."

ADVERTISEMENT

Source: Forbes

The three were members of the Kappa Sigma fraternity. Spiegel was social chair, and judging from leaked emails, he was quite the partier.

In 2014, emails from Spiegel's days at Stanford were leaked. In expletive-laden messages to members of his fraternity, Spiegel made offensive jokes about having sex with women.

Once the emails were publicized, Spiegel issued an apology.

"I'm sorry I wrote them at the time and I was jerk to have written them," he said in 2014. "They in no way reflect who I am today or my views towards women."

ADVERTISEMENT

While at Stanford, a friend of the family let Spiegel sit in on a graduate-level class on entrepreneurship and venture capital. In that class he heard talks from tech luminaries like Google CEO Eric Schmidt and YouTube cofounder Chad Hurley.

Source: LA Weekly

Spiegel befriended Intuit founder Scott Cook after he gave a talk at one class. Cook ended up letting Spiegel work on a product Intuit planned to release in India while he worked on his undergrad.

Spiegel dropped out of Stanford just a few credits short of graduation to work on Snapchat full time. The team developed the bulk of the disappearing messages app, which was first called Picaboo, in 2012 while headquartered at Spiegel's dad's house in the Palisades.

Though Snapchat eventually moved to offices on the Venice boardwalk, Spiegel lived at his dad's house for years, in part because "the rent is cheap."

ADVERTISEMENT

Reggie Brown filed a lawsuit against Spiegel and Murphy in 2013 after he was forced out of the company and not given equity. The lawsuit was eventually settled, and Snapchat paid Brown $157.5 million to disappear.

Source: The alleged betrayal in these photos, texts, and emails cost Snapchat $158 million (Business Insider)

Spiegel moved out of his dad's house in November 2014 and bought his own three-bedroom house in Brentwood for $3.3 million.

It wasn't long before would-be acquirers came knocking on Spiegel's door to buy Snapchat. He famously rebuffed a $3 billion offer from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in 2013.

Shortly after Spiegel turned down the offer from Zuckerberg, Facebook tried to clone Snapchat with a failed app called Poke.

ADVERTISEMENT

Source: Forbes

As Snapchat's user base and valuation continued to swell, Spiegel quickly became a bona fide celebrity in the worlds of tech and media. Here he is hanging out with George Lucas and Vice CEO Shane Smith during the Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit in October 2014.

In 2014, Spiegel's startup loaned he and cofounder Bobby Murphy $5 million each.

Source: SEC filing

After Snapchat completed a big funding round in June 2015, Spiegel bought himself a Ferrari.

ADVERTISEMENT

Spiegel was romantically linked with pop superstar Taylor Swift for a brief time. The two reportedly met in December 2013 at a New Year's Eve party.

Source: LaineyGossip

Spiegel has been fascinated with the music industry for years, and Sony Entertainment CEO Michael Lynton is Snap's board chairman. Spiegel was reportedly interested in buying Big Machine, the record label that represents Swift, though the deal never went through.

Source: New York Post

Spiegel started dating supermodel Miranda Kerr during the summer of 2015. They first met at a 2014 dinner for Louis Vuitton.

ADVERTISEMENT

In May 2016, the couple purchased a 7,164-square-foot house that had been owned by Harrison Ford for $12 million.

Things moved quickly after that: the power couple announced that they were engaged in July 2016.

Spiegel cares about fashion more than most tech CEOs. He made headlines in October 2015 for appearing on the cover of Vogue Italy.

Source: Vogue Italy

He's a licensed helicopter pilot who also enjoys flower arranging. His signature shirt is a James Perse white v-neck, which retails for $60.

ADVERTISEMENT

He once told GQ that the shirt has been a "staple since high school."

Source: GQ

Spiegel highly values secrecy in his business dealings as well as his personal life. Snap employees often don't know about products the company is working on until they're announced publicly.

Source: What it’s like to work at Snapchat, one of the most secretive companies in tech (Business Insider)

ADVERTISEMENT

He often moves across the company’s network of Venice Beach outposts in a black car flanked by his security detail. His security cost $890,399 in 2016.

Source: What it’s like to work at Snapchat, one of the most secretive companies in tech (Business Insider)

Source: SEC filings

In February 2016, Snapchat loaned Spiegel $15 million. Snapchat raised $175 million the following month at a $16 billion valuation, and Spiegel repaid his outstanding loans in full later that year.

Source: SEC filings

ADVERTISEMENT

In September 2016, Spiegel renamed Snapchat to Snap Inc. and called it a "camera company." He also unveiled camera-equipped sunglasses called Spectacles.

Source: WSJ Magazine

The 26-year-old has been named the youngest self-made billionaire in the world by Forbes for the past two years. He has an estimated net worth of about $5.6 billion based on Snap's public offering.

Source: Forbes

Snap went public on Thursday, March 2 at a roughly $33 billion valuation. Spiegel instantly added about $1.6 billion to his net worth based on Snap's 44% jump in share price.

ADVERTISEMENT

He earned a $503,205 salary in 2016, plus a $1 million bonus. His base salary has been reduced to $1 now that Snap has gone public, but his ownership of the company makes his worth at least $5 billion on paper.

Source: SEC filings

Going forward, Spiegel's mission at Snap is to "reinvent the camera." He's positioned his company as the anti-Facebook for communicating with only your closest friends, and he recently told the LA Times that he wants to "inspire creation."

FOLLOW BUSINESS INSIDER AFRICA

Unblock notifications in browser settings.
ADVERTISEMENT

Recommended articles

Egypt, Nigeria, and South Africa ranked as Africa's most polluted countries in new report

Egypt, Nigeria, and South Africa ranked as Africa's most polluted countries in new report

10 African countries with the lowest life expectancy according to the World Bank

10 African countries with the lowest life expectancy according to the World Bank

Kenyan women are more obese than their men - here’s why

Kenyan women are more obese than their men - here’s why

Africa’s richest man Dangote stands between Europe and $17 billion in revenue

Africa’s richest man Dangote stands between Europe and $17 billion in revenue

After months of exchanging blows, Kenya and Uganda takes steps towards resolution

After months of exchanging blows, Kenya and Uganda takes steps towards resolution

Africa's first black billionaire could join $2.9 billion Vivendi bid for MultiChoice

Africa's first black billionaire could join $2.9 billion Vivendi bid for MultiChoice

10 most dangerous African countries in 2024

10 most dangerous African countries in 2024

Russia’s nuclear influence expands further north of Africa

Russia’s nuclear influence expands further north of Africa

Navigating the future: How AI transforms selling on Amazon

Navigating the future: How AI transforms selling on Amazon

ADVERTISEMENT