Kevin Systrom (right) and Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger (left) made a shock departure from their leading roles at the social network on Monday
Insiders have claimed one Instagram co-founder was ‘super p***ed off’ with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg before his shock resignation on Monday.
Kevin Systrom and co-founder Mike Krieger announced their resignations as the CEO and CTO of the photo sharing social network, claiming they wanted to ‘explore their curiosity and creativity again’.
But sources close to the situation told NBC Systrom and Krieger had been furious with Zuckerberg for decisions that appeared to benefit Facebook and negatively impact Instagram.
One such issue was the choice to separate the social networks by removing the flow of traffic from Facebook to Instagram.
‘Kevin [Systrom] has been super p***ed off at Mark,’ a high-level Facebook employee told the network.
Facebook’s broken promise to allow Instagram to run independently of the social media behemoth was also a major factor in the founders’ departure.
When Zuckerberg purchased Instagram for $1billion in 2012, there was a clause in the acquisition that allowed the companies to remain separate, Tech Crunch reported.
But in May, a member of Zuckerberg’s inner circle who had previously worked as the VP of Facebook’s news feed, Adam Mosseri, was assigned to take the place of Instagram’s VP of product, Kevin Weil.
There was little explanation for the men’s departure, but high-level sources claimed Systrom was ‘super p***ed off with Zuckerberg’ shortly before he quit, with the pair coming to blows over Facebook’s intrusion into how Instagram was run, and Zuckerberg’s decision to stem traffic coming to Instagram from his own network
Weil moved to Facebook’s new blockchain team.
Mosseri’s proximity to Zuckerberg has widely been seen as the social tycoon ‘installing’ someone to take over from Systrom and Krieger.
A source told Tech Crunch Mosseri’s role change was: ‘succession planning for Kevin and Mike’.
‘Mark is a brilliant strategist and of course he’s going to want to install someone,’ they said.
Alexei Oreskovic, Business Insider’s tech editor, said the optics of both Systrom and Krieger departing the company at the same time, and the men failing to mention Mark Zuckerberg or Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg in their statement, suggests ‘bad blood’.
Systrom did mention Sandberg and Zuckerberg in an outgoing ‘thank you’ statement shared to Instagram.
Systrom did mention Sandberg and Zuckerberg in an outgoing ‘thank you’ statement shared to Instagram (pictured)
Instagram: The billion dollar app. How two Stanford graduates started photo sharing platform and sold it for a fortune just two years later
Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger met when they were students at Stanford University in the heart of Silicon Valley, San Francisco, California.
Systrom and Krieger worked separately in Silicon Valley, before founding Instagram in 2010.
After a brief testing period, the pair officially launched the app in October that year, and by December, Instagram had one million users.
The following year saw the app win several accolades and users downloaded Instagram in their droves.
Instagram co-founders Kevin Systrom, pictured, and Mike Krieger launched Instagram in 2010 after meeting at college
Facebook bought Instagram in 2012, just before going public, at a price that seemed inconceivable at the time – $1 billion – especially for a little-known startup with no profit.
At the time Instagram was ad-free, with a loyal following of 31 million users who were all on mobile devices – still a somewhat elusive bunch for the web-born Facebook back then.
Since then, the service has grown to more than 1 billion users and has of course added plenty of advertisements.
It became the fourth Facebook platform to eclipse the billion-user mark, including the namesake social network with more than two billion users, and the messaging applications WhatsApp and Messenger.
The app’s latest product, IGTV, has been slow to gain traction. Offered through Instagram and as a standalone app, IGTV serves up longer-length video content, mostly from popular Instagram users.
Video content has been a major emphasis for Facebook as it seeks to satisfy advertisers’ desire to stream more commercials online.
Despite any lingering issues between Systrom and Zuckerberg, the former CEO appears excited for some time off.
In recent months, Systrom moved the office out of Silicon Valley and further into San Francisco in order to grant himself a quicker commute home, where his wife and newborn daughter were waiting.
The 34-year-old and his wife, the CEO of a clean-energy firm, welcomed their first child, Freya, in January.
Systrom has taken to what he calls ‘dad-life’ with zeal, and was on paternity leave when he spoke with the Wall Street Journal earlier this year.
He joked about using Instagram’s new ‘IGTV’ feature to launch his own cooking show in a bid to have more of a presence on social media.
Joking to a PR handler who was sitting in the room with them, he said: ‘We’re going to start a Cooking With Kevin series. With Freya in the BabyBjörn, and I’ll be scrambled eggs–ing. Dad life.’
Zuckerberg was mentioned in a ‘thank you’ post shared to Systrom’s Instagram account on Tuesday
Systrom will likely use his newfound freedom to spend more time with his infant daughter, Freya (pictured) after moving the Instagram office in May to lessen his commute home
And while it’s not clear what the future will bring for Systrom, he doesn’t appear concerned with money.
In 2012, Systrom and Krieger sold Instagram to Zuckerberg for $1billion. Comparatively, the Facebook founder bought WhatsApp for $22billion, and offered Snapchat $3billion – though the offer was declined.
Six years on, Systrom is worth $1.4 billion, while 32-year-old Krieger’s wealth is estimated at about $500 million, according to Forbes.
Discussing the sale with WSJ, Systrom said the decision to sell was about growth, not money, and he has no regrets.
‘I think for where we were, we made an awesome decision,’ he said.
‘The whole idea of joining Facebook was that we could scale way more quickly than we would independently. So if that is your goal, I think we’ve fulfilled that, and then some.
‘If your goal, on the other hand, is not to have a billion dollars but two, or three, or four or whatever, well, good luck spending it. That’s not what makes you happy in life.’
Systrom (left) says he has no regrets about selling the company to Facebook for $1billion dollars, noting he could not spend more than that anyway