Jawed Karim

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<strong>Jawed Karim</strong> (born October 28, 1979) is a German-American computer scientist, software engineer, and internet entrepreneur of Bangladeshi descent. Best known as one of the three co-founders of <strong>YouTube</strong>, Karim made digital history by uploading the platform's inaugural video, <em>"Me at the zoo,"</em> on April 23, 2005, initiating the modern era of user-generated online video streaming.
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<h2>Heritage, Education & PayPal Roots</h2>
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Karim was born in Merseburg, East Germany, to Naimul Karim, a Bangladeshi researcher from the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), and Christine Karim, a German scientist. In 1992, the family emigrated to Saint Paul, Minnesota. Karim studied computer science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign before joining PayPal as an early engineer. While at PayPal, he collaborated closely with colleagues Chad Hurley and Steve Chen on real-time internet fraud detection algorithms.
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<h2>The Founding of YouTube & "Me at the Zoo"</h2>
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In early 2005, inspired by the difficulty of finding video clips online of major news and pop-culture events (such as the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami and Super Bowl halftime show), Karim, Hurley, and Chen founded YouTube. Karim conceived much of the initial architectural concept for video hosting and authored the platform's earliest user registration and video-uploading codebase.
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On April 23, 2005, standing in front of elephant enclosures at the San Diego Zoo, Karim filmed and uploaded the historic 19-second clip <em>"Me at the zoo,"</em> launching a digital communications revolution. When Google acquired YouTube in November 2006 for $1.65 billion in stock, Karim received approximately 137,443 shares valued at over $64 million.
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<h2>Venture Capital & University of Youniversity</h2>
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Following YouTube's acquisition, Karim pursued graduate studies, earning a Master of Science in computer science from Stanford University. In March 2008, he launched Youniversity Ventures (now YVentures) alongside partners Kevin Hartz and Keith Rabois, providing early-stage seed capital and technical mentorship to landmark startups including Airbnb and Reddit.
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