We are currently living in the age of technology, and every year that passes, new products and services are invented that bring fame and massive wealth to the Creator. While the world is already familiar with technology pioneers like Mark Zuckerberg, one of the lesser-known names is Justin Kan, who is the brain behind the creation of the video streaming and chat platform Twitch.
His creation has now become the most important streaming video game platform in the world, and it’s not surprising that he sold the video game streaming platform to Amazon for nearly $1 billion.
His career as a software developer and creator has made him an interested party in the technology industry, and in this article, we will take a look at everything you need to know about him.
Justin Kan Biography
Justin Kan was born on July 16, 1983, in Seattle, Washington. Very little is known about his parents, but it is known that he was born of at least one Asian parent. He has a brother named Daniel Kan.
Since his school days, he has always displayed brilliance and a measure of creativity that eventually led him to Yale University, where he earned two bachelor’s degrees in philosophy and physics and graduated in 2005.
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Two years after graduating, he founded Justin.tv with his partners Emmett Shear, Michael Seibel, and Kyle Vogt. The project consisted of broadcasting Justin’s life via live video using a webcam attached to his head. The idea was the elementary stage of what would later become live streaming, but at that time it was a new concept, and the video feed project lasted eight months, during which time it attracted the attention of media organizations and brought Kan an interview on the Today show. He was interviewed by renowned journalist Ann Curry.
After receiving modest recognition for his work, Justin Kan and his team decided to expand their video streaming concept and create a platform where anyone can publish a video stream. The platform that would later become Twitch.tv was created and launched in 2007.
The Internet Entrepreneur’s Career Growth
The initial success of the webcam project led to a rapid increase in the popularity of Justin.tv, which within a short period of time had over 30 million unique users per month. Justin Kan and his team built the platform with several categories such as technology, sports, entertainment, social, and games, and although each category had significant users, it was the games category that led the pack and grew fast enough for Justin to create his own platform which became TwitchTV.
Justin Kan launched the public beta of the platform in June 2011 and it continued to grow to become the world’s leading streaming gaming platform. The platform was sold to Amazon in August 2014.
In addition to his Twitch project, Kan had other projects such as Socialcam, a mobile social video application designed to help users capture and share videos online. The project was a modest success and was sold to Autodesk in July 2012, one year after its launch in March 2011.
Justin Kan’s desire to continue to be innovative and creative has not stopped. In February 2012, he launched another, Exec, a service platform designed to help users outsource anything they want for a small fee per hour. Justin Kan worked alongside his brother Daniel Kan on this project. The company was later sold in January 2014. Justin Kan currently runs a legal start-up company, Atrium.
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Justin Kan Net Worth
After selling Twitch for $970 million and also buying another project, Socialcam, for $60 million, Justin Kan was able to raise the total net Worth of $100 million.
He has used his net assets to finance other projects, including as a member of Y Combinator, an equity fund that finances other start-ups, and he also owns his own incubator, Zero-F.
Other Facts About Justin Kan
He is the co-founder of a music discovery platform, The Drop. The platform was launched in 2015 and it was founded in partnership with one of his college friends, Ranidu Lankage.
Kan was a member of the first batch of recipients of Y Combinator. His project at the time in 2005, was for Kiko Calendar.
He is a regular contributor on the tech news website, TechCrunch.
Justin Kan has an active presence on social media, particularly on Instagram and Twitter via the handle, @Justinkan.
