Automattic secures $29.5 million B round
Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com, just secured a $29.5 million B round of financing. Congrats to Matt, Toni, and everyone else at Automattic. $29.5 million is a monster round, considering that Automattic has so far grown by sipping daintily on a $1.2 million first round secured in 2006. I can’t wait to see what is next. Really interesting to me is that with this round the New York Times joins their investors. One word for that: adaptation. The line between old media and new media blurs further.
Wow, that’s fantastic! Can’t wait to see what continues to happen with WordPress! It’s already a fantastic blogging platform. With solid funding, the sky is the limit!!
WebGeek
January 23, 2008 at 1:08 am
Well..call it the “crunchy” effect – WP just won the Crunchie award and now they landed up with $29.5mn!
Fun aside, I am surprised with the amount of funding..this surely means something big is in making.
All the best to automattic chaps!
sinha
January 23, 2008 at 1:24 am
Cool, this should be a really good sign for things to come in the near future. WordPress will progress well.
Dhruva Sagar
January 23, 2008 at 1:50 am
Hows does the investment work? Does it mean they have a share in WordPress? Do they get a part of the revenue or something? Do they get a share when you go to sell it or something? It doesn’t really make sense that someone hands over just under 30mil, unless they are getting a big fat portion or somehting?
nuggetbro
January 23, 2008 at 2:10 am
nuggetbro, no one can buy a share in WordPress(.org), it’s a non-profit thing. Investors invested in Automattic, which is a company just like any company. Automattic runs WordPress.com, which is one of the many sites that offer a hosted version of WordPress using WordPress MU. Like George Foreman’s kids are all named George, all the children of WordPress are also named WordPress.
Matt Mullenweg
January 23, 2008 at 2:46 am
Please, please, please stay independent.
All that money is great and will finance some brilliant innovation, I’m sure. But I really hope this doesn’t lead to an acquisition by a big media company. That sort of consolidation inevitably ruins the free spirit and creativity of companies like WordPress.
With that caveat, best of luck to you.
News Corpse
January 23, 2008 at 7:35 am
Just came by from Om’s site,
The stats are truly frightening. Did not realise lil ol automattic is now a hydra, growing exponentially year on year.
Dodgypress
January 23, 2008 at 8:54 am
Congrats! I hope this will create more chances for more improvements to the platform and services like Akismet/stats to benefit us end users even more.
Peter
January 23, 2008 at 8:58 am
@News Corpse: I agree with that, but Matt already answered my fears a while ago … apparently the licensing pretty much says we have nothing to worry about. Though the paranoia in me shakes in fear!
Glad you guys have some financing behind all your efforts! I can’t wait to see how it will all work out!
Tadd
January 23, 2008 at 12:38 pm
Excellent. The influx of cash should help WP in areas that need it like standardized plugins, simple upgrade process and more solid admin area. Love the WP – and it’ll be nice to see things raise to that next level. Cheers!
GMO
January 23, 2008 at 1:07 pm
[...] Good for them: Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com, just secured a $29.5 million B round of financing. Congrats to Matt, Toni, and everyone else at Automattic. $29.5 million is a monster round, considering that Automattic has so far grown by sipping daintily on a $1.2 million first round secured in 2006. I can’t wait to see what is next. Really interesting to me is that with this round the New York Times joins their investors. One word for that: adaptation. The line between old media and new media blurs further. [...]
A Second Hand Conjecture » Wordpress News
January 23, 2008 at 1:52 pm
[...] A Automattic – empresa fundada pelo criador do WordPress, e que gerencia projetos como o próprio WordPress.com, o Akismet e o apoio ao desenvolvimento do WordPress – acaba de garantir uma nova rodada de capitalização no valor de US$ 29,5 milhões. [...]
Empresa do fundador do Wordpress recebe investimento de US$ 29,5 milhões
January 23, 2008 at 4:55 pm
Can you create, with all this new money, a REALLY easy way to upload a photo onto the blog site? Like, one easy press this button, bzong, there it is. this is not intuitive to me now ( geek-head minus a g-zillion)
oaxacaculture
January 23, 2008 at 6:57 pm
[...] Automattic secures $29.5 million B round « Mark on WordPress [...]
Automattic Nails $29 million in funding! The open-source model has legs
January 23, 2008 at 7:31 pm
Thanks Mark!
Lloyd Budd
January 23, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Thats good news for everyone! I wonder if Automattic has considered doing an IPO? Would being a publicly traded company be a bad thing?
don bohrer
January 24, 2008 at 3:42 am
The snowball is just getting bigger and bigger
Congrats to wordpress
DavidTan
January 24, 2008 at 5:26 am
[...] see a post pop up in my WordPress dashboard over on Mark Jaquith’s website announcing that WordPress has secured $29.5 million dollars in their second round of financing. Congratulations to Automattic! The investor this time is [...]
Automattic Secures Another Round of Financing
January 24, 2008 at 10:01 am
@Don – can a non-profit be publicly traded? I thought you had to be a corp or something … a for profit jingo.
lordthaddius
January 24, 2008 at 11:13 am
Well that sure is amazing – congrats!
Matt Ellsworth
January 24, 2008 at 11:31 am
[...] verjaardag! Hij heeft overigens nog een andere reden om een feestje te vieren, want gisteren bleek dat zijn computerbedrijf Auttomatic voor $29.5 miljoen aan investeerders heeft weten aan te boren. Bron: CMSwire en [...]
WP is jarigbijAstroblogs
January 24, 2008 at 4:26 pm
[...] Well I seen this note the other day and was amazed at just how much they just received with their last round of funds. $29.5 million! Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com, just secured a $29.5 million B round of financing. Congrats to Matt, Toni, and everyone else at Automattic. $29.5 million is a monster round, considering that Automattic has so far grown by sipping daintily on a $1.2 million first round secured in 2006. I can’t wait to see what is next. Really interesting to me is that with this round the New York Times joins their investors. One word for that: adaptation. The line between old media and new media blurs further. – jump [...]
Husar.us » Blog Archive » Automattic secures $29.5 million B round
January 24, 2008 at 5:57 pm
[...] My favorite open-source website software just got a booster shot [...]
rrhobbs.com » Blog Archive » Wordpress - $29Mil
January 26, 2008 at 8:55 pm
[...] Automattic, creators of WordPress, the blogging platform used here at Halfway To Concord, recently announced new B-Round funding of $29.5 million dollars, after initial venture funding of just over $1-million in 2006. Interestingly, one of the new investors on board this round is the New York Times. Can Dean Singleton, MediaNews chief executive, spell, “ADAPT?” addthis_url = ‘http%3A%2F%2Fhalfwaytoconcord.com%2F%3Fp%3D1147′; addthis_title = ‘Automattic+receives+%2429.5+million+in+B-Round+funding’; addthis_pub = ”; Tags: automattic, b-round, dean singleton, funding, new york times, wordpress [...]
HALFWAY TO CONCORD | Automattic receives $29.5 million in B-Round funding
January 28, 2008 at 6:43 pm
The only worry I have is the amount of influence that the money men might have on future directions. Such a large amount of money would suggest they have a lot to lose, and will want to protect their investment.
A to Z Blogs
February 12, 2008 at 10:38 am
Congrats Automattic
We are using WordPress for all our blogs. It’s a greate software. I hope they will add more features and keep it free!
USA Colleges
February 13, 2008 at 9:57 am
USA Colleges, even basic* .com services are not free long ago — Automattic Inc. serves google ads quietly placing it on the content generated by its userbase.
call it ‘ad-sponsored’ or whatever, just not “free”.
.
*) custom CSS or domain forwarding are the *paid* upgrade features.
options
February 16, 2008 at 3:37 am
That is quite impresive number, I also congrates to Automatic.
Marcin
March 3, 2008 at 5:18 pm
thank you Mark !
amazing number i think ..
www.smasra.com
March 17, 2008 at 8:34 am
[...] Automattic, creators of WordPress, the blogging platform used here at Halfway To Concord, recently announced new B-Round funding of $29.5 million dollars, after initial venture funding of just over $1-million in 2006. Interestingly, one of the new investors on board this round is the New York Times. Can Dean Singleton, MediaNews chief executive, spell, “ADAPT?” addthis_url = ‘http%3A%2F%2Fhalfwaytoconcord.com%2Fsandbox%2F%3Fp%3D22′; addthis_title = ‘Automattic+receives+%2429.5+million+in+B-Round+funding’; addthis_pub = ”; [...]
Automattic receives $29.5 million in B-Round funding : Halfway To Concord
March 21, 2008 at 6:18 pm
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387afbb69916
May 10, 2008 at 8:22 pm
WOW!!! well done everyone and keep up the good work!!! Im hoping to see more excellent software soon!!
bernie
June 30, 2008 at 4:16 pm