Episode
Founders: Duolingo's billionaire boss on rejecting Bill Gates
- Podcast
- Business Daily
- Published
- Jun 23, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 1285
- Processing state
not_requested- Canonical source
- http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3ct98s2
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Summary
We hear how a childhood in Guatemala, a fascination with computers and a belief that education should be accessible to everyone helped inspire the world's most popular learning apps. Luis von Ahn tells us how he went from creating CAPTCHA and selling reCAPTCHA to Google, to building Duolingo into a multi-billion-dollar education technology company used by millions around the world. He reflects on his mother's sacrifices to fund his education, the lessons he learned as an entrepreneur, and why he struggles with conflict in his life as a tech CEO. Presenter: Leanna Byrne Producer: Amber Mehmood If you'd like to get in touch with the team, our email address is [email protected]