Jonathan Benassaya was born in 1980 in Montpellier and trained at ENSAM and ESSEC. After a start in an investment bank, he founded a video-game advertising agency in 2005 and took it to Shanghai and Beijing before selling it.
In 2006 he and Daniel Marhely built Blogmusik, a site for streaming music found on the web. It was shut down as illegal in 2007. The two negotiated with rights bodies, including SACEM, and relaunched the service as Deezer in 2007.
In October 2008 Deezer raised $8.4 million from AGF Private Equity and CM-CIC Capital Privé. In January 2010 Axel Dauchez replaced Benassaya as CEO. Fewer than 15,000 of about 12 million users were paying subscribers at the time.
Deezer later raised $130 million from Access Industries in October 2012 and listed on Euronext Paris on 5 July 2022, when shares fell 29% on the first day. In 2025 it reported its first full-year net profit, €8.5 million, on revenue of €534 million.