Travis Kalanick, CEO and cofounder of the San Francisco based car service app ‘Uber,’ raised $1.2 billion from BlackRock, Fidelity Investments, Wellington Management, Google Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Menlo Ventures, and Summit Partners to amass a valuation of $18.2 billion according to Forbes. This number makes Kalanick the newest tech billionaire and puts the company in the lead for Internet startup companies.
With a valuation of $18.2 billion, the Uber founder would only need to own about 5.5% of Uber’s shares to be worth $1 billion—or to be a billionaire. Yet, according to Forbes, odds are, Kalanick is worth about double that. According to their calculations, common shares, or stocks held by founders and angel investors, account for 38% of Uber’s total shares, or 109 million common shares out of 289 million total shares. Yet because Kalanick reportedly shared with the Wall Street Journal that he never sold a single share, he is expected to own at least 10% of the total shares, putting his net worth at about $2 billion.
The company that started out in San Francisico in June 2010 as a small, easy, and reliable car service operated via an iPhone app has exploded, expanding to 128 cities and 40 countries, raising its valuation higher than rental car companies like Hertz Global Holdings and Avis Budget, and making a billionaire out of its CEO.
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