Box CEO says IPO is step on path to changing world
SAN FRANCISCO – Meeting the CEO of a 10-year-old tech company isn't remarkable. But it's something when that leader is only 29.
Despite the grey hair sprouting around his temples, Aaron Levie, co-founder and CEO of cloud-storage company Box, bounds into Paste BN's offices with the energy of a twentysomething amped up on the success of an idea that took wing in his college dorm room.
"You spend 12, 14 or 16 hours a day doing what you're doing because it's what you love," he says. "Sometimes it's required and other times you can't imagine doing anything more exciting with your time."
Levie's time has been well spent. Box took advantage of being an early leader in the enterprise cloud storage space and so far has amassed 27 million commercial and consumer users. Some 240,000 businesses – ranging from Toyota to General Electric to DreamWorks – store and access their proprietary data on Box's servers.
With nearly $300 million in investment to date, the company is valued north of $1 billion and has plans to go public.
For Levie, going public isn't an endgame but rather "one small event on the journey," he says. "What we're trying to build is a very long-term company that changes how the world works."
Levie expounds on everything from Silicon Valley's so-called brogrammer culture ("It's entirely avoidable") to his personal idea of a great way to get away from work ("I would say a 9 or 10 p.m. movie is a pretty good experience").
One of the hottest tech-world topics is also foremost on his mind: data security. In recent weeks, companies have fallen victim almost daily to hack attacks, the most recent being last week's devastating breach of Sony Pictures' digital fortress, which saw movies, e-mails and compensation leaked.
"We are in an environment where there's a heightened degree of risk and sensitivity around security," says Levie. "There are more devices than ever before, new applications. This is a massive concern and issue."
Levie says that with companies increasingly needing to share data across platforms and often with employees scattered around the globe, his priority is making sure that Box's services continue to guarantee security.
He uses the example of a hospital hoping to share brain scan data instantly and securely between doctors, without jeopardizing patient's rights laws.
"If you're a hospital, the cost of a breach is incredibly severe," he says. "So the question is, how do you access this data on mobile or tablets, how do you share it (safely) with researchers? They need simple technology that works or they won't be able to solve their own problems."
Levie seems to relish a challenge, including staying competitive in a market segment that includes big players such as Amazon Web Services and now Microsoft with Azure.
He says he once saw Microsoft "as the enemy," partly because every start-up needs one and because the Redmond legend "in mid-2000s it wasn't innovating at a pace necessary to deliver great value and experience for customers."
Today, the two companies have a partnership arrangement that gives Office365 users storage space on Box. Levie gives a lot of credit to new CEO Satya Nadella: "He is driving more openness within that organization, it's changing its DNA."
On the topic of changing corporate culture, Levie says that although his company was started by four teenage males, there's little excuse for letting that nucleus spawn a culture that is antagonistic to female employees.
"It's important to recognize that there are different stages of your company," he says. "When you first start, you'll be with very close friends. My three co-founders and I, we all grew up in middle and high school together and all dropped out of college (to start Box in 2004). But early on we had strong female executives in the business so we didn't develop that kind of (male-centric) culture."
Levie, who grew up in the Seattle area, never completed his degree in business at the University of Southern California. That seems like a Peter Thiel recipe for success; Thiel is the former PayPal exec and investor who controversially funded 20 entrepreneurs under 20 with $100,000 to start a company.
"There's a sequence if you're going to drop out of college that's important," Levie says. "I recommend to founders, build the idea within the college environment first. Because in my case I didn't spend a lot of time on school so it was basically four years of free time to do what I wanted."
He pauses and offers a wry smile. "So my advice would be, try and explore those ideas within college. And if it does work, then call Peter Thiel and ask for funding."