“Product led growth” is the holy grail

Kinde - Ross Chaldecott, alongside co-founders David Berner and Evgeny Komarevtsev.

Atlassian - Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar 

Martian Logic - Anwar Khalil 

Atlassian was founded by two university graduates Scott and Mike in 2002 using credit card debt.

It’s only investment round was from US-fund Accel, which bought shares off existing holders 8 years later in 2010 before the company listed in the United States in 2015. 

For a brief period last year, they were the two richest people in Australia with a combined net worth of well over $70 billion (the duo have also made billions from a prescient investment in the US$55 billion Canva).

The secret sauce “Product led growth” being the holy grail 

Atlassian was able to grow so quickly and profitably during its first decade of existence while famously spent almost nothing on marketing, instead relying on ‘product-led growth’. 

That is, CTOs and CPOs loved Atlassian’s revolutionary Jira product so much, it was able to grow virally and organically without the business having to spend millions of dollars on an enterprise sales team.

Times have changed for Atlassian whose Jira is a bit clunky with minimal changes over 10 years - with users having a choice to move relatively painlessly of competitors such as Asana, Basecamp or Monday.com

What is the next Product Led Growth Company? 

That is the holy grail!!!

2 companies to watch 

Martian Logic 

Kinde