ALLEN Career Institute
Andrew D. Mason (born 1981) is an American businessman and entrepreneur. He is the founder and former CEO of Groupon, a Chicago-based website offering users discounts on local businesses and scholarships.
In February 2015, Mason released an iPhone app, Detour, selling unconventional audio tours of major cities. The initial release offered seven different San Francisco expeditions, each costing $5. In 2018, Detour was acquired by Bose, which was planning to use the app in an upcoming Augmented Reality platform.
Mason grew up in a Jewish family in Mount Lebanon, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Pittsburgh.He graduated from Mt. Lebanon High School in 1999 and started a Saturday morning delivery service called “Bagel Express” when he was aged 15.
After graduating from Northwestern University in 2003 with a degree in music,Mason worked in web design for Chicago entrepreneur Eric Lefkofsky.
Mason stopped working with Lefkofsky to attend the University of Chicago’s Harris School of Public Policy after he was awarded a scholarship. However, he dropped out of his master’s degree program several months after it started. Mason also interned and worked at prominent Chicago recording studio, Electrical Audio, under recording engineer Steve Albini, whom Mason cited as an inspiration on his subsequent work ethic.
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