After weeks of rumors, Apple finally announced its plans to buy Beats Electronic for $3 billion Wednesday—making co-founders Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine a pretty penny. While Dr. Dre is a household name, soon-to-be billion Iovine, 61, is less known to those outside of the music world.
Here’s what you need to know about Apple’s latest music mogul:
First off: his last name is pronounced “eye-oh-veen.”
Iovine didn’t start at the top. Born to a longshoreman in Brooklyn, N.Y., the music mogul got his start cleaning a record studio as a teenager.
But today, Iovine is best known for co-founding Interscope Records in 1990 and acting as CEO of Interscope Geffen A&M (now to be succeeded by John Janick). He founded Beats Electronics with Dr. Dre in 2008.
In 2013, Iovine and Dr. Dre donated $70 million to the University of California to create the USC Jimmy Iovine and Andre Young Academy for Arts, Technology, and the Business of Innovation.
The record exec and producer has worked with artists ranging from Eminem to Bruce Springsteen.
In 2010, he became an in-house mentor for contestants on American Idol.
His relationship with Apple started years before Beats. Eddy Cue, Apple’s content chief, told the New York Timesthat Iovine was a friend to Jobs and tried to convince other record producers to sell individual songs on iTunes. “Jimmy was one of the first people we showed iTunes to,” Cue said.
Iovine will now become a senior exec at Apple and will report to Cue, counseling on how people will listen to music in the future.
