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Github Raises $100 Million

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Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#131

I'm a little surprised by all of the anti-VC sentiment in this thread so far, especially from this community. I'm perhaps even more surprised by the "what do they need 100 million dollars" sentiment that is being floated around. Github is an impressive company that has, so far, blown away its competition in many aspects. The fact that they have been self-bootstrapped up until this point and that they are profitable t…

> With 0 dollars, a couple of guys built something amazing. I can't wait to see what they can do with 100 million.

Since substantial funding wasn't a contribution to their first success, nor apparently even their goal, there's no reason to expect that throwing money at them would lead to something even more amazing.

Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#132

Many people do not realize that Github has an enterprise product called github:enterprise. Aside the money they raised for this round, there are also help comes together from the VC, Andreessen Horowitz in this case. I don't have any experience in enterprise sales. But, from what I know, enterprise isn't a market that the best product always wins. Yes, Github definitely has one of the best products out there. But, th…

Yes, github:fi (renamed to github:enterprise) has really been an afterthought to github. I hope they build up a real support team and market it well, because it's technically superior to the alternatives.

Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#133
post #99

Why can't a company worth nearly a billion dollars just go public? There are thousands of public companies worth less than a billion. So why sell your soul to a VC who could push you into a situation that could make you implode, rather than raise money on an open market and give up less control?

regulatory issues

The implication of VC is that you'll have to sell or go public eventually anyway, so you might as well take the pain and go directly to public if your revenues support it. The general rule being 5 years of $100mm/yr.

Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#134
post #31

Okay, a question: I have a github ( http://github.com/blhack -- nothing too interesting there), but only use it in the "free" way; saving my javascript stuff, and keeping track of some arduino projects. "Github" and "money" in the same thought here triggered me wondering about maybe buying a monthly plan from them, and letting them host all of my code for work, play, etc. (stuff I'm too embarrassed to release, ha) Ma…

Nobody should pay for GitHub just because they need a place to dump their code. If you want free, unlimited, private git repos, just sign up for https://bitbucket.org/

GitHub is what you might choose if you need to work on projects with a team, and want best-of-breed collaboration and code review.

I use BitBucket to host all my solo side projects, and Github for all my open source code. I work with a startup, and we use GitHub for all of our private repos. I love using Github, it's awesome.

If I was starting my own startup, I would definitely choose Github. Bitbucket might provide all the important features, and you can host unlimited private code, for a team of up to 5 users, for free... But in the end, $7 or $12 a month is worth it for the beautiful service that Github provides.

Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#135
post #94

Many people do not realize that Github has an enterprise product called github:enterprise. Aside the money they raised for this round, there are also help comes together from the VC, Andreessen Horowitz in this case. I don't have any experience in enterprise sales. But, from what I know, enterprise isn't a market that the best product always wins. Yes, Github definitely has one of the best products out there. But, th…

enterprise sales are radically different than open source evangelism, b2c sales, and small biz sales. The difference is (literally and metaphorically) there is are suits involved. A few key thoughts which are likely to apply: - Per-customer customizations - $100K+ per sale per customer - 3 month to 3 year sales cycles - Usable on Windows XP and IE6 (most likely). - Certifications/audits (e.g., ISO9001). I can easily…

> - Usable on Windows XP and IE6 (most likely).

I'd imagine a company that needs VCS can handle multiple installed browsers or even virtualized OS:s.

Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#136
post #36
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What better way to pitch?

Yep. I was involved in a local 'pitch your startup to a room full of investors' conference. Guess who 'won' the contest and had everyone talking about it? The three college kids with a mobile app that flat out said, we don't need your money, we're profitable, we have big deals with major corporations and we're growing fast. We're here to work on our product pitch to people outside our niche for continued growth.

Was that the demo day in Santa Monica in April/May?

Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#137

I'm a little surprised by all of the anti-VC sentiment in this thread so far, especially from this community. I'm perhaps even more surprised by the "what do they need 100 million dollars" sentiment that is being floated around. Github is an impressive company that has, so far, blown away its competition in many aspects. The fact that they have been self-bootstrapped up until this point and that they are profitable t…

> With 0 dollars, a couple of guys built something amazing. I can't wait to see what they can do with 100 million. Since substantial funding wasn't a contribution to their first success, nor apparently even their goal, there's no reason to expect that throwing money at them would lead to something even more amazing.

I do not follow this logic. They have enormously succeeded from the moment of Github's inception to this point. Does it not make sense to invest in them if they believe they can utilize new capital to expand their platform?

In any case the money believes in them. And they are already vetted.

Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#138
post #31

Okay, a question: I have a github ( http://github.com/blhack -- nothing too interesting there), but only use it in the "free" way; saving my javascript stuff, and keeping track of some arduino projects. "Github" and "money" in the same thought here triggered me wondering about maybe buying a monthly plan from them, and letting them host all of my code for work, play, etc. (stuff I'm too embarrassed to release, ha) Ma…

I derive value from GitHub's services and want to support them (and I do have a $12/month plan), but I wish it scaled a little better for smaller developers who want a tiny number of collaborators (ie, 2 or less) on a large number of small projects.

I have lots of private projects I'd like to host there, but the cost per repo is just too high - especially when they are all pretty small repos. $50/month is a lot to be paying for source control, so I'll probably be looking into bit bucket instead - that is probably a decent option for you to look into also.

Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#139
post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see any inconsistency whatsoever between the post you link to and what just happened. Tom was clearly talking about early funding, essentially when you just started, and how that can affect your product and its future. The fact that they raised that much actually proves Tom's point: That you should approach VC money from a strong position, which you can't reach if you start off with VCs watching over you. Upd…

Perhaps you misread my comment? I specifically say, "I don't see any inconsistency."

yes I indeed did misread your comment. Sorry about that! I read a couple of threads here and there and the number of comments raising this issue was increasing, so my eye only caught the inconsistency part of it. Sorry again.

Re: Github Raises $100 Million

#140
post #21

I hate to crash the party, but this is a very odd move for an awesome company and a service that I use and Github has always been against taking money. Actually, TPW has used some very harsh words criticizing startups that choose to take VC money. Now, Github raises 100 gazillion dollars? How the f*ck do they plan on spending that wisely? Sure, it's nice to have that sum in the bank. But, in all honesty, someone has…

The person who figures out how to get movie/music studios and the like to use version control is going to be very, very rich.

thingverse is a pretty popular free distribution channel for 3d-printable objects - but there's no way to integrate forks. So people copy an object & improve it, but there's no way to put that fix back into the main line.

Getting these people to use github would be awesome!

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