Eduardo Luiz Saverin (; ; born March 19, 1982)
is a Brazilian billionaire entrepreneur and
angel investor
An angel investor (also known as a business angel, informal investor, angel funder, private investor, or seed investor) is an individual who provides capital for a business or businesses start-up, usually in exchange for convertible debt or ownersh ...
based in
Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...
.
Saverin is one of the co-founders of
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dust ...
.
In 2012, he owned 53 million Facebook shares
(approximately 2% of all outstanding shares), valued at approximately $2 billion at the time. He also invested in early-stage startups such as
Qwiki and
Jumio.
Early life and education
Eduardo Luiz Saverin was born in the city of
São Paulo
São Paulo (, ; Portuguese for ' Saint Paul') is the most populous city in Brazil, and is the capital of the state of São Paulo, the most populous and wealthiest Brazilian state, located in the country's Southeast Region. Listed by the GaW ...
to a wealthy
Jewish-Brazilian family,
and his family later moved to Rio de Janeiro. Saverin's father, Roberto Saverin,
was a businessman working in clothing, shipping, energy, and real estate.
His mother, Sandra, was a psychologist. He has two siblings.
His Romanian-born grandfather, Eugenio Saverin (born Eugen Saverin), is the founder of Tip Top, a chain of children's clothing shops.
In 1993, the family emigrated to the U.S., settling in
Miami
Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...
,
Florida
Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...
.
Saverin attended
Gulliver Preparatory School
Gulliver Preparatory School or simply Gulliver Prep, is a private co-educational school. Its management offices are in Kendall, a census-designated place in Miami-Dade County, Florida. Its four campuses are across the county.
Previously the ad ...
in Miami. He then attended
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
, where he was a resident of
Eliot House
Eliot House is one of twelve undergraduate residential Houses at Harvard University. It is one of the seven original houses at the college. Opened in 1931, the house was named after Charles William Eliot, who served as president of the universit ...
, a member of the
Phoenix S.K. Club, and president of the Harvard Investment Association. While an undergraduate at Harvard, Saverin used his interest in meteorology to predict hurricane patterns and made $300,000 via investment in oil futures.
In 2006, Saverin graduated ''
magna cum laude
Latin honors are a system of Latin phrases used in some colleges and universities to indicate the level of distinction with which an academic degree has been earned. The system is primarily used in the United States. It is also used in some So ...
'' from Harvard University with a
Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...
in economics.
He is a member of the
Alpha Epsilon Pi
Alpha Epsilon Pi (), commonly known as AEPi, is a college fraternity founded at New York University in 1913 by Charles C. Moskowitz and ten other men. The fraternity has more than 150 active chapters across the United States, Canada, United Kingdo ...
fraternity (Eta Psi chapter of Harvard University).
Career
During his junior year at Harvard, Saverin met fellow Harvard undergraduate, sophomore
Mark Zuckerberg
Mark Elliot Zuckerberg (; born ) is an American business magnate, internet entrepreneur, and philanthropist. He is known for co-founding the social media website Facebook and its parent company Meta Platforms (formerly Facebook, Inc.), o ...
. Noting the lack of a dedicated social networking website for Harvard students, the two worked together to launch The Facebook in 2004. They each agreed to invest $1,000 in the site. Later, Zuckerberg and Saverin each agreed to invest another $18,000 in the operation. As co-founder, Saverin held the role of
chief financial officer
The chief financial officer (CFO) is an officer of a company or organization that is assigned the primary responsibility for managing the company's finances, including financial planning, management of financial risks, record-keeping, and financ ...
and business manager.
On May 15, 2012, ''
Business Insider
''Insider'', previously named ''Business Insider'' (''BI''), is an American financial and business news website founded in 2007. Since 2015, a majority stake in ''Business Insider''s parent company Insider Inc. has been owned by the German publ ...
'' obtained and released an exclusive email from Zuckerberg detailing how he cut Saverin from Facebook and
diluted his stake. Zuckerberg privately stated at the time, "Eduardo is refusing to co-operate at all ... We basically now need to sign over our intellectual property to a new company and just take the lawsuit ... I'm just going to cut him out and then settle with him. And he'll get something I'm sure, but he deserves something ... He has to sign stuff for investments and he's lagging and I can't take the lag." Zuckerberg's attorney warned Zuckerberg that the dilution might trigger a lawsuit for breach of
fiduciary duty
A fiduciary is a person who holds a legal or ethical relationship of trust with one or more other parties (person or group of persons). Typically, a fiduciary prudently takes care of money or other assets for another person. One party, for exampl ...
. Facebook filed a lawsuit against Saverin, arguing that the stock-purchase agreement Saverin signed in October 2005 was invalid. Saverin then filed a suit against Zuckerberg, alleging Zuckerberg spent Facebook's money (Saverin's money) on personal expenses over the summer. In 2009, both suits were settled out of court. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed and the company affirmed Saverin's title as co-founder of Facebook. Saverin signed a
non-disclosure contract after the settlement.
In 2010, Saverin co-founded Aporta, an online portal for charity.
In 2015, Saverin established his venture capital firm, B Capital, investing in
Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consistin ...
and India.
In 2016, Saverin's fund closed initial deals of over $140 million in Asia, including
Ninja Van
Ninja Van is a Singaporean logistics company. Founded in 2014, the company engages in last mile logistics and package delivery. Ninja Van has sorting warehouses across Southeast Asia, in Singapore, Myanmar, Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia, Thail ...
, a Singaporean logistics company that engages in
last mile parcel delivery in Southeast Asia.
In media
Saverin is played by
Andrew Garfield
Andrew Russell Garfield (born 20 August 1983) is an English and American actor. He has received various accolades, including a Tony Award, a BAFTA TV Award and a Golden Globe Award, in addition to nominations for two Academy Awards. ''Time'' ...
in the film ''
The Social Network
''The Social Network'' is a 2010 American biographical drama film directed by David Fincher and written by Aaron Sorkin, based on the 2009 book ''The Accidental Billionaires'' by Ben Mezrich. It portrays the founding of social networking web ...
'', which is based on
Ben Mezrich
Ben Mezrich ( ; born February 7, 1969) is an American author.
Early life and education
Mezrich was born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of Molli Newman, a lawyer, and Reuben Mezrich, a chairman of radiology at the University of Maryland Schoo ...
's ''
The Accidental Billionaires
''The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook, a Tale of Sex, Money, Genius, and Betrayal'' is a 2009 book by Ben Mezrich about the founding of Facebook, adapted by Aaron Sorkin for the 2010 film '' The Social Network''. Co-founder Edua ...
''.
Personal life
Saverin emigrated to Singapore in 2009.
Saverin and Elaine Andriejanssen, an
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
n national of
Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...
descent, became engaged on March 27, 2014, and were married on June 25, 2015. They met while they were both studying at their respective universities in
the U.S. state of Massachusetts, he at
Harvard
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
and she at
Tufts
Tufts University is a private research university on the border of Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1852 as Tufts College by Christian universalists who sought to provide a nonsectarian institution of higher learning. ...
.
Andriejanssen comes from a wealthy family that runs several businesses in Indonesia.
Saverin renounced his U.S. citizenship in September 2011,
thereby avoiding an estimated US$700 million in capital gains taxes. This generated media attention and controversy.
Saverin stated that he renounced his citizenship because of his "interest in working and living in Singapore",
and denied that he left the U.S. to avoid paying taxes.
References
Further reading
*
External links
*
Profileat ''
Forbes
''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also re ...
''
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saverin, Eduardo
1982 births
Living people
Businesspeople from São Paulo
Brazilian people of Romanian-Jewish descent
Brazilian businesspeople
Brazilian investors
Facebook employees
Brazilian emigrants to the United States
Brazilian emigrants to Singapore
Harvard University alumni
Former United States citizens
Brazilian billionaires
Brazilian Jews
Gulliver Preparatory School alumni
American businesspeople