Chris Barton

Early life

Chris Barton was born to a British father, John P. Barton, and a French mother, Claudia F. Barton. Both of his parents were university professors, with his father specializing in nuclear physics and his mother in computer science. Barton grew up in a household where intellectual curiosity and academic excellence were highly valued, although excellence in academics did not come easily to him. He later discovered that he had undiagnosed dyslexia, which made traditional methods of learning extremely challenging. However, he quickly came to terms with his condition, embracing dyslexia as a “superpower.” In retrospect, he believed that having to overcome it helped him to develop resilience and strong problem-solving abilities.

As a young man, Barton attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts in Economics. He furthered his education with two master’s degrees: one in Business Administration from UC Berkeley and another in Finance from the University of Cambridge.

Career

Chris Barton began his career as a strategy consultant at L.E.K. Consulting and the San Francisco Consulting Group, gaining experience in business strategy. He also interned at Microsoft’s offices in London, UK, which helped stoke his nascent interest in technology. In 2000, Barton co-founded Shazam, alongside Philip Inghelbrecht, Dhiraj Mukherjee, and Avery Wang. The company was built around Barton’s vision of creating a way for people to identify songs they heard but could not quite place by using their mobile phones. At the time, this was a highly ambitious idea, as the technology necessary to realize this vision did not yet exist.

Shazam’s journey was not easy. The company faced numerous challenges, including the difficulty of creating a pattern recognition algorithm for music and the need to build an enormous database of songs. But Barton and partners persevered, raising funding and building relationships with mobile operators, allowing Shazam to launch in 2002. However, it wasn’t until 2008, with the arrival of the App Store, that Shazam truly found its footing. The app’s popularity skyrocketed, and in 2018, Apple acquired Shazam for $400 million, making it one of the company’s largest acquisitions at the time.

In addition to his work with Shazam, Barton has also contributed to the growth of other major tech companies. He was one of the first members of Google’s Android Partnerships team, where he helped establish the mobile operator partnerships framework. Barton also worked at Dropbox, leading carrier partnerships during the early stages of the company’s development.

These days, Chris Barton continues to invest in emerging technologies, as well as offer his services as a professional public speaker. His latest entrepreneurial venture, Guard, aims to use AI to prevent drownings in swimming pools.

Net Worth

Chris Barton’s net worth is currently not available to the public.