In a recent TikTok, co-founder of Twitch Justin Kan responds to a question regarding whether or not he regrets selling Twitch. The service was bought out by Amazon, whose outgoing CEO Jeff Bezos is worth nearly $100 billion and is sometimes looked upon as a critique of "corporate greed," which makes Kan's response surprising in comparison.
Justin.tv launched in 2007 under co-founders Justin Kan and Emmett Shear, and after the gaming section of the site grew in popularity the team decided to separate the two entities, thereby creating Twitch. After several years of exponential growth company success, the closure of Justin.tv, and almost being bought out by Google, Amazon acquired Twitch Interactive for $970 million. Kan left the company, leaving only Shear still with Twitch from the original team, and on TikTok said the platform is now worth something like $15 to $20 billion.
Responding to the TikToker's question, Kan's short answer is that he doesn't regret selling Twitch: "Everything's as it's supposed to be." Today, the co-founder of Twitch is known for being an entrepreneur, having launched a number of other platforms, some more successful than others. In 2011, Kan launched Socialcam, which was later bought out for $60 million. More recently, Kan launched Atrium in 2017, but closed its operations in March 2020.
However, Kan partially attributes the Twitch acquisition by Amazon to the platform's success, as it has become a powerhouse and arguably Google's main competitor in the livestreaming industry. "It's not clear that without the capital infusion from Amazon Twitch would be anywhere near the success it is today," he says. Since being purchased by Amazon, Twitch has also acquired a number of other platforms and software, such as Curse. Twitch Prime was also created for users with an Amazon Prime subscription.
However, even though Twitch rose in value since the acquisition, Kan seems content with what he got through the deal. In the TikTok, Kan said "having the win from Twitch helped me realize that having more and more, more, more money in the bank is not necessarily going to make me any happier." In recent years, Kan has appeared on talk shows discussing how he feels success alone won't make a person truly happy.
"Things can always be bigger than you think," Kan said, putting into perspective the humble beginnings with Justin.tv, a 24/7 live video feed of Kan's life thanks to a webcam attached to his head. That idea has since turned into Twitch, a leading livestreaming and gaming platform, which is impressive in its own right.
Source: TikTok