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Techdropbox

The Founder of Dropbox Reveals How He Got the Idea and It Involves a Chinatown Bus

By
Lisa Marie Segarra
Lisa Marie Segarra
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By
Lisa Marie Segarra
Lisa Marie Segarra
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June 14, 2017, 7:40 AM ET

Dropbox founder Drew Houston explained that the idea for his file sharing company came out of a mistake he made and a ride on a Chinatown bus.

Houston spoke to Business Insider about his life before Dropbox, which involved using a thumb drive for storage and emailing himself files.

“I was going from Boston to New York on the Chinatown bus, forgot my thumb drive, and I was so frustrated—really with myself, because this kept happening,” Houston told Business Insider. “And I’m like, my God, I never want to have this problem again. And I opened up the editor and started writing some code. I had no idea what it would become. But those were the beginnings.”

Houston went on to found Dropbox with fellow MIT student Arash Ferdowsi in 2007.

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