Simons: Atlassian drew inspiration from Microsoft's platform ecosystem strategy
Jay Simons · 20VC: Why and How The Best Companies Build Economies Around Themselves, When, Why and How To Build Effective Partner/Channel Networks & The Power of Compounding Growth in SaaS with Jay Simons, General Partner @ Bond · Jun 10, 2021 · at 10:03
Jay Simons, General Partner at Bond and former President of Atlassian, discusses how software companies can intentionally design partner economies around their core platform.
0:00 / 0:04exact quote · 4.1s
720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“We drew a lot of inspiration from Microsoft, which I think is a textbook case here.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Jay Simons
Simons: Atlassian never followed the 'triple, triple, double, double' growth model
“And, you know, Atlassian, you know, was never a triple, triple, double, double, double company. It was this kind of methodical, reasonable grower.”
Simons: Founders should plan ecosystem economies from company formation
“I think in the earliest days of the company, in the formation of the company, you know, as you're building the product, I think you should be thinking, What are the economies, the extensions of our business that we can invest in that will have transitive prope…”
Simons: Partner ecosystems and certifications made Microsoft a generational business
“I think if you look back on time before they had the brand and direct reach that they have today, they had reached through this incredibly durable partner ecosystem and the customer economy built around getting Microsoft certified and having that sort of crede…”
Simons: Atlassian built a partner network instead of direct enterprise sales
“We invested at Atlassian, we invested early on, we had built this self-service online e-commerce flywheel for customers to buy the product. And as we moved into the enterprise, we had an opportunity to either invest directly in building an enterprise sales org…”
Simons: Software firms need established market demand before building partner networks
“You need market there. I mean, you need market for the partners to be able to grow their businesses, and then I think you need alignment around what they do, and what you do, and where you work together, and where some of the rubs will be.”
Simons: Ecosystem extensions drive higher core SaaS product retention
“If they do get access to that and it does solve a problem, it means that both the core product is more valuable to them. And the core product from a retention perspective is even stickier because you've got JIRA and then you have three or four things that are …”