Kevin Systrom

Kevin Systrom
Systrom in 2018
Born	(1983-12-30) December 30, 1983 (age 40) Holliston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Alma mater	Stanford University
Occupation	Businessman
Known for	Co-founder and former CEO, Instagram
Board member of	Walmart (2014–2018)[1]
Spouse	Nicole Schuetz ​ (m. 2016)​

Kevin Systrom (born December 30, 1983) is an American computer programmer and entrepreneur. He co-founded Instagram, the world's largest photo sharing website, along with Mike Krieger.^[2]

Systrom was included on the list of America's Richest Entrepreneurs Under 40 2016.^[3] Under Systrom as CEO, Instagram became a fast growing app, with 800 million monthly users as of September 2017.^[4] He resigned as the CEO of Instagram on September 24, 2018.^[5]

Meta Platforms (then Facebook, Inc.) bought Instagram for $1 billion in 2012, a large sum at that time for a company that had 13 employees. Instagram today has over one billion users and contributes over $20 billion to Meta Platforms's annual revenue.

1. Early life and education

Systrom was born on December 30, 1983, in Holliston, Massachusetts.^[6] He is the son of Diane, a marketing executive at Zipcar, who also worked at Monster and Swapit during the first dotcom bubble,^[7] and Douglas Systrom, Vice President of Human Resources at TJX Companies.^[8][9]

Systrom attended Middlesex School in Concord, Massachusetts, where he was introduced to computer programming. His interest grew from playing Doom 2 and creating his own levels as a child.^[10]

He worked at Boston Beat, a vinyl record music store in Boston, while he was in high school.^[11]

Systrom attended Stanford University and graduated in 2006 with a bachelor's degree in management science and engineering.^[12][7] At Stanford, he was a member of the Sigma Nu fraternity. He turned down a recruitment offer from Mark Zuckerberg and instead spent the winter term of his third year in Florence, where he studied photography.^[13][14]

He got his first taste of the startup world when he was chosen as one of twelve students to participate in the Mayfield Fellows Program at Stanford University.^[15] The fellowship led to his internship at Odeo, the company that eventually became Twitter.^{[citation needed]}