영국의 17세 고교생이 개발한 앱을 야후에 수천만달러에 넘기고 야후의 신입사원으로 채용돼 화제를 모으고 있다.
뉴욕타임스는 26일 94년 탄생한 야후의 나이보다 젊은 신입사원으로 영국출신의 닉 달로이시오를 소개했다. 96년생인 달로이시오는 자신이 개발한 ‘뉴스읽기 앱’ 섬리(Summly)를 25일 수천만달러에 넘긴 것으로 전해졌다.
www.en.wikipedia.org달로이시오가 개발한 앱은 수학적 알고리즘을 이용하여 장문의 기사를 스마트폰 독자들을 위해 짧게 줄여주는 것으로 야후는 달로이시오와 함께 이를 상품화 할 예정이다.
뉴욕타임스는 “달로이시오가 학교를 졸업하려면 아직 1년반은 있어야 한다”면서 수업을 일부 빠지고 런던의 야후 사무실에 출근하는 문제를 협의하고 있다고 전했다. 달로이시오는 야후가 자신에게 얼마를 지불했는지는 밝히지 않았지만 “섬리의 최대 주주가 되었다”고 밝혔다.
타임스는 섬리에 투자한 유명인사들로 루퍼트 머독의 부인 웬디 머독과 할리우드 스타 애쉬턴 커처, 오노 요코 등이 있으며 가장 중요한 투자자는 달로이시오의 아이디어를 일찌감치 알아본 홍콩의 억만장자 리카싱이라고 말했다.
달로이시오는 “그들은 내가 15살일때 종자돈을 대고 사무공간을 내주는 베팅을 했다”고 말했다. 달로이시오의 투자자들은 앱 개발 초기에 실리콘밸리의 뉴스사이트 테크크런치에 소개된 것이 계기가 된 것으로 알려졌다.
뉴욕=민병옥특파원
bomin@newsroh.com <꼬리뉴스>
He Has Millions and a New Job at Yahoo. Soon, He’ll Be 18
Nick D'Aloisio is a British-Australian entrepreneur, computer programmer and designer who has become known for the creation of Summly and its technology. D'Aloisio has been recognised as the youngest person to receive a round of venture capital in technology at just 15 years of age. D'Aloisio's business partners include Li Ka-Shing, Rupert Murdoch, Ashton Kutcher, Stephen Fry, Yoko Ono and Mark Pincus, among others.
D'Aloisio grew up in London, United Kingdom, attending King's College School, in Wimbledon where he received an Academic Scholarship. D'Aloisio received his first computer at 9 and used it to create movies with editing tools such as Final Cut Pro. D'Aloisio began writing apps at the age of 12 in 2008. He is still based in London. His mother Diana D'Aloisio is a lawyer and his father Lou Montilla is an executive at Morgan Stanley.
D'Aloisio was born in Australia in 1996, with his parents Diana and Lou. He lived in both Melbourne and Perth. D'Aloisio created the Trimit application for iOS in March 2011, which used an analytical tool to condense text content into 1000, 500, or 140-character summary text. The app caught the attention of Apple who featured Trimit as a new and noteworthy application on the App Store in July 2011. The potential of Trimit attracted the attention of Hong Kong based billionaire Li Ka-shing, who provided D'Alosio with US$300,000 in venture capital funding. D'Alosio used the feedback and criticism from Trimit to completely re-design the application, and re-launched it in December 2011, as Summly As of March, 2013 Summly was sold to Yahoo for a reported $30 million US dollars.
Summly aimed to solve perceived problems with the way news articles are presented on smartphones, with initial version of Summly being downloaded by over 200,000 users. As a result of the corporate support, in November, 2012, D'Alosio received US$1,000,000 in new venture funding for Summly from several international celebrities such as Yoko Ono, Ashton Kutcher and Stephen Fry, in addition to Hong Kong business mogul Li Ka-shing.
Summly's cover page images were created by world-renowned visual artist/photographer Kevin Abosch.
At the age of 15 he completed a first round of venture capital funding for Summly from Li Ka-Shing's investment firm, Horizons Ventures; he is the youngest person in the world to raise venture capital.
D'Aloisio has been covered by several major publications, including ReadWrite.com, BusinessInsider.com, Wired, Forbes, The Huffington Post[20] and TechCrunch. D'Aloisio has also made numerous television appearances on CNBC, Bloomberg, BBC, ITV, been written about in the British Metro newspaper, and been interviewed on BBC Radio Five Live.[citation needed] D'Aloisio also appeared on CBS This Morning in an interview with Charlie Rose, CNBC Squark Box, Bloomberg and appeared on CNN's Piers Morgan Tonight in December 2012. Summly has had critical acclaim in receiving Apple's Best Apps of 2012 award for "Intuitive Touch" and currently has a 4.5/5 star rating on the App Store.
D'Aloisio was named a Top 1000 Influential Londoner by Evening Standard 2012, appeared in the 30 under 30 list for Forbes Magazine, and the Mail on Sunday Top 100 things to watch in 2013. D'Aloisio also won a Spirit of London Award in December 2012 as Entrepreneur of the Year.
<출처=www.en.wikipedia.org>