Tech entrepreneur Lucy Guo, 30, just lately dethroned Taylor Swift because the youngest self-made feminine billionaire on the planet. However don’t count on her to be popping Champagne bottles.
“I really feel just like the title modifications yearly,” Guo advised The Submit concerning the Forbes journal rating. “It means virtually nothing to me personally.”
Guo’s billion-dollar bounty comes from Scale AI, the synthetic intelligence data-labeling startup she launched in 2016 with Alexandr Wang, when she was simply 21. She left two years later however held onto an estimated 5% stake — a small slice that become a large windfall this April when insider shares valued Scale AI at $25 billion, making Guo’s lower price an estimated $1.2 billion.
So, yeah. She’s formally a billionaire, however doesn’t really feel like one.
Guo’s motto? “Act broke, keep wealthy.”
The coder-turned-founder nonetheless clocks 90-hour workweeks with a schedule that begins at 5:30 a.m. and ends at midnight — together with as much as 4 Barry’s Bootcamp lessons a day. Guo credit her “no sleep” DNA to her mother and father, Chinese language immigrants who labored as engineers within the San Francisco Bay space.
The fast-talking tech trailblazer doesn’t consider in losing time.
“I don’t watch TV or scroll TikTok,” Guo admitted. “So that provides me many further hours in a day. I’m continuously on the go, whereas lots of people construct in rest time. I do fill in my schedule with enjoyable stuff, like at 10 p.m. possibly I’ll go get dinner with buddies.”
Whereas she might not splurge on Bentleys or Birkins, Guo has no scarcity of pursuits — together with Barry’s, EDM music festivals, skateboarding, skydiving, amassing Pokémon plushies and constructing startups from scratch.
Her newest skilled ardour mission is Passes, the creator-driven platform she based in 2022 that’s already producing six-figure incomes for influencers, YouTubers, podcasters, astrologers and even golfers.
“Passes is a full-stack enterprise platform for creators,” Guo defined. “They will promote merch, subscriptions, unreleased YouTube movies, dwell streams and group chats to their superfans multi functional place.”
The concept for Passes got here to her in the course of the pandemic whereas operating a start-up incubator. Guo noticed creators like Logan Paul and Kylie Jenner constructing nine-figure manufacturers and realized the actual energy lay in possession.
“Creators are very distinctive. They will promote something, they usually don’t have the everyday buyer acquisition prices that standard folks have,” she mentioned. “They’re these small companies that may turn into bigger companies, however they’ve been mismanaged. Nobody was serving to them get fairness or construct generational wealth.”
With Passes, Guo goals to repair that. She’s launched a set of instruments to assist creators monetize their manufacturers, from in-house design to AI. Most importantly, creators preserve 90% of their income.
“We’ve turn into 80% to 100% of the creator’s revenue,” Guo mentioned with apparent satisfaction. “Even creators who’ve tens of millions of followers on different platforms inform us that we’re essentially the most constant revenue they’ve, and nearly all of their revenue as effectively.”
In contrast to Instagram or TikTok, Passes is concentrated on the connection between creators and their superfans, with monetization baked in. “Instagram builds for breadth,” Guo mentioned. “Passes builds for depth. We’re extra like Patreon.”
Nonetheless, comparisons to a different platform, OnlyFans, persist. She insist’s that not correct.
“Our characteristic set is vastly totally different from OF. And even in the event you’re not doing nudes on OF, the kind of creator we appeal to would by no means go on OF as a result of they don’t need that as a part of their model.”
The digital disruptor additionally factors out that Passes has a no-nudity coverage and stricter tips than OF. However, there’s been some controversy at Passes. A category-action lawsuit this yr alleged underage content material slipped by means of the cracks — claims Guo calls “a shakedown.”
“We filed a movement to dismiss,” she mentioned, denying the allegations. “Their claims don’t match the investigation that we discovered. Dangerous actors are at all times going to be unhealthy actors, and we simply do our greatest to attempt to forestall this.”
Passes presently has round 50 staff, 1000’s of creators and tens of millions of subscribers. The most important moneymakers embody golfer Charley Hull, YouTuber Sssniper Wolf and a shocking area of interest: astrologers who promote day by day horoscopes.
“Our creators are doing superb issues,” Guo mentioned. “And we’re simply getting began.”
Her profession has at all times been forward of the curve. She started coding in second grade, studied pc science and HCI at Carnegie Mellon — after which dropped out after incomes a $100,000 Thiel Fellowship. The California native interned at Fb, turned the primary feminine designer at Snapchat and met her Scale AI cofounder, Wang, at Quora. The remainder is billion-dollar historical past.
However regardless of her self-made standing, Guo remains to be typically underestimated.
“Folks don’t perceive how a lot work it takes to get right here,” she mentioned. “They see the headlines, however they don’t see the 18-hour days.”
And the billionaire has had her fair proportion of headlines, together with the time she hosted a wild rager at her $6.1 million luxurious condominium in Miami, replete with a lemur and snake. The celebration didn’t win over her neighbors like David Beckham, and he or she was reprimanded by the constructing’s HOA.
Quickly after, Guo moved again to the West Coast, and acquired a $4.2 million, five-bedroom mansion in Los Angeles that boasts a dipping pool and screening room.
Being in LA additionally permits her to personally work together with creators in Passes’ 25,000-square-foot state-of-the-art workplace.
“They arrive to our workplace to shoot content material and report podcasts,” she mentioned. “It’s a relationship-driven enterprise. We’re even constructing a music studio.”
Guo’s love of music, particularly EDM, runs deep. Her obsession started at age 20, when she noticed Main Lazer at Exterior Lands Music & Arts Competition at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco.
“Once I was dwelling in San Francisco, I used to be not as completely happy as an individual,” she admitted. “However I used to be blown away by my first EDM expertise. I believe it’s been confirmed that EDM makes you happier based mostly off the BPM. It’s all very constructive, completely happy vitality.”
Guo’s now studying to DJ and infrequently hops behind the decks when buddies carry out: “I performed for half-hour at a membership in LA just lately and other people had been like, ‘That set was so good!’”
She at all times retains a music-filled USB in her bag, and can fly to a music competition on a minute’s discover, particularly for her favourite DJs like Layton Giordani, Kygo, Gryffin, Mau P. and Zedd.
Already this summer time, she hit Europe for a month of VIP entry at varied music festivals. Guo additionally attended the A-list launch of the Ritz-Carlton Yacht Assortment in Barcelona, alongside Tom Brady, Sofía Vergara and Naomi Campbell. She’s subsequent planning to go to Kenya and witness firsthand the nice migration of wildlife throughout the Serengeti-Mara ecosystem.
“I choose locations based mostly on views or mountains,” she mentioned. “If it has a Barry’s Bootcamp, even higher.”
Guo can also be a low-key Swiftie — although she jokes that beating Taylor Swift on the billionaire listing hasn’t modified issues a lot for her.
“The one distinction is my DMs are popping,” she mentioned. “A number of celebrities attempting to hang around. However now I’m extra cautious. Do they assume I’m scorching? Do they need recommendation? Or are they simply hoping for a PJ experience? It’s made me put up my guard extra.”
Guo was even mistakenly linked to Orlando Bloom in a tabloid as a result of they had been noticed subsequent to one another at a celebration.
“I rotated and glanced at a wall, and the paparazzi snapped a photograph,” she mentioned, laughing. “I’m undoubtedly not courting Orlando Bloom.”
The 30-year-old insists she doesn’t have time so far, in truth.
“I’ve been on all sides — engineer, VC, founder — however what excites me essentially the most is product,” she mentioned. “Determining the subsequent characteristic, constructing instruments folks truly use, serving to creators go large. That’s what I really like.”
Simply don’t count on Guo to decelerate anytime quickly.
“I’ve an excessive amount of vitality to burn.”
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