Snapchat: Founding Story

How this company changed digital footprints forever. Let’s look into the founding story of Snapchat.

In 2011, three Stanford students hated how permanent social media felt.

So, Evan Spiegel, Reggie Brown, and Bobby Murphy launched “Picaboo.”

Soon, Spiegel and Murphy forced Brown out of the company and relaunched as Snapchat.

Spiegel first wrote that Snapchat wouldn’t “conform to unrealistic notions of beauty or perfection,” unlike other social media apps.

One year in, Snapchat was transferring 25 snaps per second, which is 20 million snaps per day.

In 2015, Snapchat added lenses, and the platform boomed to 75 million users.

Today, Snapchat has over 332 million daily active users.

They’ve also captured over 75% of 13-34-year-olds in 20+ countries.

Fast forward to 2017, and Snapchat boomed with $1b in advertising revenue.

That November, they filed for a $25b IPO.

Test your knowledge

What was the company’s name before Snapchat?

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Snapchat IPO’d at a valuation of

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The third founder of Snapchat was. . .

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What's next?

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