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OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

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Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#381

Post by [deleted] »

PantaloonFlames wrote: post #360
dhc02 wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am constantly surprised how seldom aider is mentioned in threads like this. I understand that it's not directly integrated into the editor, but the "editor + parallel CLI tool chain" paradigm feels so natural to me because we drop to terminal for so many other parts of building software. If you haven't tried it (particularly the architect/editor modality), it's worth a couple of hours of experimenting.

Aider doesn’t provide any interface that’s integrated into the editor tool, as you point out. That might be true for other similar side-by-side tools that I am not aware of. But, if you tell aider to watch your files, you can drop a specially formatted comment into your file, and aider will see that and use it as a prompt. So the integration is sort of “implicit”. Which sounds kinda like the cheap way to go, in compa…

[deleted]

Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#382

Post by ignoramous »

rpgbr wrote: post #268
bko wrote: post #29

Incredible timeline to a $3B exit > Windsurf began in 2021 as Exafunction, founded by MIT graduates Varun Mohan and Douglas Chen. The company initially focused on GPU optimization before pivoting to AI-assisted coding tools, launching Codeium, which later evolved into Windsurf. > Series B (January 2024): $65 million at a $500 million valuation. > Series C (September 2024): $150 million, led by General Catalyst, at a…

It's a bubble about to pop. That's where the value is coming from.

Bubble or not, given the exit, Windsurf's (Codeium) focus on enterprise sales motion has been rewarded rather handsomely: https://research.contrary.com/company/windsurf / mirror: https://archive.vn/ThWNz

Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#383

Post by apwell23 »

lnenad wrote: post #223
crsv wrote: post #219

Man why did these guys do that OpenAI couldn’t replicate for less than 3Bn on reasonable timeline? This seems insane.

They've got users (which I don't doubt that OpenAI's fork of VSC would have as well but I assume that's their thought process)

I would switch in heartbeat if openAI built something equivalent.

Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#384

Post by pclmulqdq »

dist-epoch wrote: post #73
bko wrote: post #29

Incredible timeline to a $3B exit > Windsurf began in 2021 as Exafunction, founded by MIT graduates Varun Mohan and Douglas Chen. The company initially focused on GPU optimization before pivoting to AI-assisted coding tools, launching Codeium, which later evolved into Windsurf. > Series B (January 2024): $65 million at a $500 million valuation. > Series C (September 2024): $150 million, led by General Catalyst, at a…

> I wonder how much of the value is really from the model > The other stuff could be more or less a VS Code plugin The other stuff would take a team 6 months to implement. This is where the valuation comes from. Time to market, they are there TODAY.

As usual, HN misses the point. The customer list was probably worth about $2.99 billion, and the engineering work about $10 million.

Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#385

Post by __loam »

retornam wrote: post #240

I'm skeptical about this VSCode fork commanding a $3 billion valuation when it depends on API services it doesn't own. What's their moat here? For comparison, JetBrains generates over $400 million in annual revenue and is valued around $7 billion. They've built proprietary technology and deep expertise in that market over decades. If AI (terminology aside) replaces many professional software engineers and programmers…

Well you see Jetbrains is a European company unlike the super special boys running an inherently more valuable American company.

Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#386

Post by mdaniel »

beardedwizard wrote: post #155
mdaniel wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it being open core (MIT) means spinning up a version to test something is incredibly easy. Not exactly resource cheap, as it's still a rails app with multiple servers "smuggled" in the docker image, but it is easy And I have long held that they are hungry , shipping like clockwork on or about the 20th of every month, showing up with actual improvements all the time https://about.gitlab.com/releases/ It seems this…

Why gitlab hasn't been able to capitalize on GitHub's many failures is almost as interesting as GitHub's fall. I think the GitHub brand is still stronger and people just don't "care" about gitlab.

Yeah, it's almost certainly the network effect. Although poor GitLab isn't doing themselves any favors by picking what seems to be the slowest web framework one can possibly imagine

But, anytime I am empowered to pick, I'm going to pick GitLab 100% of the time because it has every feature that I care about and "being popular" isn't a feature that I care about

Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#387

Post by haint_ »

noncoml wrote: post #369
blueblimp wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel it too: - Plenty of em-dashes - "you're absolutely right" - "They're X, not just Y"

Post history indicates that user likes em-dashes('--'). Probably written on a phone that converts -- to em-dash.

Or they are just a bot.

Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#388

Post by alexchantavy »

ignoramous wrote: post #382
rpgbr wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a bubble about to pop. That's where the value is coming from.

Bubble or not, given the exit, Windsurf's (Codeium) focus on enterprise sales motion has been rewarded rather handsomely: https://research.contrary.com/company/windsurf / mirror: https://archive.vn/ThWNz

Yeah, in the recent Lightcone Podcast episode, Varun was talking about how they have a lean eng team but large sales org. I thought that was super interesting for a dev tool since I was expecting a dev tool to involve bottom-up sales to the dev instead of top-down sales to a leader like a CTO or VP of Eng

Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#389

Post by __loam »

TiredOfLife wrote: post #252
retornam wrote: post #240

I'm skeptical about this VSCode fork commanding a $3 billion valuation when it depends on API services it doesn't own. What's their moat here? For comparison, JetBrains generates over $400 million in annual revenue and is valued around $7 billion. They've built proprietary technology and deep expertise in that market over decades. If AI (terminology aside) replaces many professional software engineers and programmers…

One example is that VS Code Copilot autocomplete is still behind what Codeium (now Windsurf) was 1.5 years ago.

Is there an actual measure for this besides contrived benchmarks and vibes?

Re: OpenAI reaches agreement to buy Windsurf for $3B

#390

Post by noncoml »

haint_ wrote: post #387
noncoml wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Post history indicates that user likes em-dashes('--'). Probably written on a phone that converts -- to em-dash.

Or they are just a bot.

Their post history doesn't seem suspicious to me
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