Nick D’Aloisio hasn’t even turned 18, and is already a millionaire. At age 12, D’Aloisio taught himself to code after the release of Apple’s App Store. After making a series of apps such as Facemood and SongStumblr, he thought of the idea for an app that can revise and trim down full size articles and pages of text into less than 500 word summaries after studying for a history exam. It would distill down this text into more manageable summaries for use on smartphone screens as well. He called this app Trimit, and it quickly caught the eye of a Hong-Kong venture capital firm, which invested a quarter million in the idea. This attracted a number of other investors, and after improving the app and working with content publishers such as the Wall Street Journal, he released the Summly app which has now surpassed 1 million downloads. Shortly thereafter, he sold his smartphone news app to Yahoo for a reported $30-million.
Nick’s story is an inspiring one, because it shows that even a kid can be successful by learning the skills necessary to create an idea and then making an innovative product. When interviewed about advice for those thinking of starting a business or launching their own app, he said “just do it”. He created a successful business worth millions and is now working for Yahoo, all while still attending school during the day.
I like how this kid took a real life problem that affected himself and so many others, and created a solution for it just by testing it out.
It amazing that Nick was passionate about coding, and it caused him to be successful at a young age. His story will help to inspire a younger generation of entrepreneurs.
This is an impressive idea an attitude to have, clearly it has brought him success. I’m most impressed with the passion and desire to learn how to code, that foundation made his solutions for problems a reality. What an impressive entrepreneur.