Paul Lynch, CEO of Assembla, explains how Assembla differentiates itself from developer-focused tools like GitHub by targeting C-level executives concerned with enterprise compliance.
Insight
Mid-sized 10-year-old software companies are stranded between VC and PE
“You've got a business that's doing, say, you know, three to ten million. Private equity aren't interested in them, in that they're too small. Venture, venture capital aren't interested in them, in that, you know, if they're 10 years old, if they haven't hockey…”
Opinion
Lynch: Pay-per-click ads fail to drive new enterprise customer growth
“In, in, in terms of, like new logo growth, in terms of, you know, PPC, it doesn't work. I mean, there's so much noise out there in the market right now. The only people making money out of PPC are, or Google.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Lynch: Assembla increased monthly ARPA from two figures to $500–$1,500
“We bought the business and would have had an ARPA sort of a low, you know, two-figure kind of ARPA. Now we're up to, say, you know, between five, 515 hundred per month would be our sort of sweet spot.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Lynch: Assembla had 32 staff and was profitable when acquired
“I think we bought the business. There was 32 staff, and it was doing a couple of million bucks. It was making money.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Lynch: Assembla has 3,500 customers and is tracking 60% annual growth
“So we have about three and a half thousand customers. Month on month growth is about between three and five percent. We're tracking, we did 60% last year. We're tracking the same this year.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Lynch: Assembla has generated a profit every month since March 2016
“And since we took this business, which was March, 2016, we returned a profit every month. We've not lost money in a single month that we ran it.”