Imran Khan Messaging Is the Medium

摘要

Imran Khan was among the most successful investment bankers in New York when he quit the profession last December to become chief strategy officer at Snapchat. The social media startup has built a massive user base of mostly . teens, who use it to exchange millions of disappearing pictures and videos and compile strings of images and videos called Stories. You can think of Snapchat as the future of both messaging and video, posing a significant threat to Facebook and Google. Khan's hiring suggests that Snapchat-valued at $15 billion-may be expanding its business with an eye toward going public before long. Khan is a data cruncher with a knack for identifying big trends. When he arrived at Credit Suisse in 2011, he brought relationships with Asian contacts, including Alibaba's CFO. He has advised on more than $45 billion in financial transactions, including IPOs for Weibo, King (Candy Crush!), and Groupon. Before decamping to Snapchat, he took the lead on Alibaba's $25 billion initial public offering last September. It was the biggest IPO of all time and marked the arrival of a global rival for American Internet behemoths like Amazon and Google. At Snapchat, where Khan reports directly to founder Evan Spiegel, the pair recently secured $200 million in new funding. The investor? Alibaba.