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Runscope acquisition falls through

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Re: Runscope acquisition falls through

#11

Post by simonw »

John: really sorry to hear what a tough time you've been having. I hope you're through the worst of it.

I recently started using Runscope as part of an R&D project and it's been a revelation: it makes debugging API-related issues SO MUCH easier than any other approach I've used. It's saved me many hours of work. I'm a very happy paying customer.

One example: are you using Elasticsearch? Proxy your requests through Runscope and you can see exactly what happened with every query - both the full request and the response. And... you can share individual requests with other developers to help with debugging complex issues.

Re: Runscope acquisition falls through

#12

Post by ludamad »

aresant wrote: post #6

I appreciate the absolute heart-on-sleeve but you're not in "post mortem" mode, you're in transition mode! Your message - from the first sentence to choosing "default dead" in telling the story reads negative. Same message, different delivery: "First the good news - Runscope is now cash flow positive and in it for the long-haul! In other words we're "Default Alive"* and even though the road getting there has been bum…

I found the tone refreshing, personally

Re: Runscope acquisition falls through

#13

Post by bb88 »

When I saw you guys at Pycon last year in Montreal, I thought you had a great product, and a catchy slogan that I kept repeating to myself, especially after I was laid off.

Everying is going to be 200 Ok.

And it will be.

Re: Runscope acquisition falls through

#14

Post by gkoberger »

I met John a few years ago, and he's one of my favorite founders. He's smart, on top of things, personable, and effective. He's been a huge inspiration to me, and I find myself constantly thinking "what would John do?" when in a tough spot.

I'm sad he won't be in SF (and sadder I didn't take advantage of it more when he was), but excited to see what happens. John doesn't give up... this is just another step in a long journey.

Like the adage goes, "This too shall pass".

Re: Runscope acquisition falls through

#15

Post by johns »

aresant wrote: post #6

I appreciate the absolute heart-on-sleeve but you're not in "post mortem" mode, you're in transition mode! Your message - from the first sentence to choosing "default dead" in telling the story reads negative. Same message, different delivery: "First the good news - Runscope is now cash flow positive and in it for the long-haul! In other words we're "Default Alive"* and even though the road getting there has been bum…

That's great advice on tone. I wrote this more for family and friends back home who were going to wonder why we were back. If I was writing it for HN it would have been very different :)

Re: Runscope acquisition falls through

#16

Post by zaroth »

How am I just learning about Runscope? This service is fantastic. I just signed up for free, they have a really smooth onboarding process, I now have a free API monitor pinging my API from multiple geographic locations and verifying correctness of the return value, they are generating some neat reports, and it looks like they even have a control I can publish/iframe with a nice graphical history.

I mean, this is almost better than StatusPage.io type solution just because it's so simple. The pricing is serious, and I think reasonable but it will be un-affordable for some. For now I'll play with the free option and will upgrade as soon as there's funding.

I really wish you luck with this product, it provides real value and is easy to use, that should be enough.

Edit: So I read that you raised $6m. I'm sure that helped create this software. What's great is the company can now take its time earn back that money, and if you can focus on the features that matter you can grow the feature-set in a controlled simple manor. The only problem I forsee is the investors may never see a return on the $6m, or rather, selling shares will never surpass the liquidation preference, so the challenge is paying yourself enough. If you have Board control you will be able to issue dividends, but otherwise getting cash out of the company will be hard.

Re: Runscope acquisition falls through

#17

Post by johns »

jsnell wrote: post #7
johns wrote: post #5

This post is getting more attention then intended but I'll be back later tonight after my hockey game to answer any questions. I do just want to state unequivocally that we do not intend to shut down, we're still growing and are as sustainable as ever. Customers don't need to worry about us disappearing.

"As sustainable as ever" might not be the best way to phrase things, given that the previous state was in your own words "a long way from self-sustaining".

Fair point. In retrospect it felt sustainable fresh off our last round given the market at the time and the amount of runway it gave us. Not saying that it was, just that it felt that way.

Re: Runscope acquisition falls through

#18

Post by hueving »

zaroth wrote: post #16

How am I just learning about Runscope? This service is fantastic. I just signed up for free, they have a really smooth onboarding process, I now have a free API monitor pinging my API from multiple geographic locations and verifying correctness of the return value, they are generating some neat reports, and it looks like they even have a control I can publish/iframe with a nice graphical history. I mean, this is almo…

>the feature-set in a controlled simple manor

I'm not sure using the $6 million to buy a manor is a good use of funds ;)

Re: Runscope acquisition falls through

#20

Post by johns »

stephenitis wrote: post #19

Was there a better way to line up a acquisition process that didn't endanger all the employees jobs?

This was a really tricky balance. We could have let some people go earlier to extend runway and maybe give us more time to optimize an exit, but at the cost of morale and perhaps a subsequent talent drain. We also knew the people were going to be a focal point for an acquisition so the more good people we could keep around, the better our value to an acquirer. All things considered we ultimately choose to hold on to as many of them as we could for as long as we could while trying to be transparent about our status so they could decide if it was worth it for them to hang around.
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