Jan Koum Biography (Founder of Whatsapp)

Jan Koum Biography (Founder of Whatsapp)

World Famous People - Jan Koum is a Ukrainian. He born American internet entrepreneur who co-founded the mobile messaging application WhatsApp with Brian Acton. The extremely popular mobile application was acquired by Facebook Inc. in 2014 for a whooping US$19 billion. A billionaire today, he is counted amongst the richest Americans but just a few years ago he was so poor that he had to live off food stamps. Born into a humble family in Ukraine, he migrated to the United States as a teenager with his mother and grandmother. His initial years in the new country were very difficult, the family struggled to make ends meet. Their situation worsened when his mother became ill with cancer and eventually passed away. A resilient soul, Jan Koum worked his way through high school, and found a job at Yahoo as an infrastructure engineer, while still attending college. He formed a rapport with Brian Acton, another Yahoo employee with who he would form a long-term collaboration in future. After working at Yahoo for several years, both Koum and Acton left the job to explore newer avenues in social media. Their love for social media ultimately led the two men to form WhatsApp as a mobile messaging application which went on to become the most popular messaging platform in the world.

 

 

 

Childhood & Early Life

 

Jan Koum was born on February 24, 1976, in Kyiv, Ukrainian SSR, Soviet Union, to Jewish parents as their only child. He lived a simple life in a small town that was disrupted by the chaotic political environment and anti-Semitism in the country.

 

To escape the unfavorable conditions in their native land, the family decided to migrate to the United States. Jan, along with his mother and grandmother moved to the US in 1992, and his father planned to join the family later. However, his father fell ill in Ukraine and could not make it to the US. He died in 1997.

 

Aged 16 at the time of the immigration, Jan faced considerable challenges in adjusting to the new country. His mother took up babysitting to earn money and Jan himself began working as a cleaner at a grocery store.

 

Jan Koum became interested in programming while at high school and discovered that he possessed an inherent knack for it. By the time he completed his schooling at 18, he was a skilled self-taught computer network engineer.

 

Jan enrolled at the San Jose State University. While still a student he took up a job with global accountants Ernst & Young as a security tester to help pay for his studies.