Welcome to the 14th edition of GrowthDeck! If you enjoy reading deep dives like this, please share it with your friends or colleagues who would appreciate it. Now, let's dive in!

Today we are going to talk about a not so small 300 employee firm which generates close to $100M ARR, this article is going to be a little different we are going to deep dive into the journey and learn the growth drivers along the way!

So lets get into it, we are going to talk today about Plivo which is founded by Venky B and Michael Ricordeau. It all started as an open source project and went on to become one of the largest in their own space.

The company, Plivo specializes in providing communication solutions. When you sign up for something online and create a new account, you usually receive a verification code on your phone. This might seem like a small and familiar step, but have you ever wondered how it works behind the scenes?

Plivo's services are widely used by companies like zomato, Splunk, IBM for sending messages and phone call notifications to their customers.

Their journey began with an open-source GitHub project, a communication framework designed to make it easier for web developers to create voice-based applications. Little did they know that this humble beginning would lead to something big.

Now, picture this: Two guys, Venky in the Bay Area and Michael in France, decided to work together on this project. They faced a big challenge - the distance between them. They continued on like this for like 9 months and got a lot of media coverage, due to this they were invited to a conference!

The real magic happened at an open-source conference in August 2011. They showed off their communication framework, and the audience was wowed. They did something incredible - callers could see where they were in a call queue and get a callback when it was their turn. Imagine that, it's something we take for granted today, but back then, it was revolutionary.

Their presentation caught the eye of some potential customers who saw something amazing. They were ready to pay for even more features, especially if Plivo, could handle it all in the cloud, saving them from the headaches of dealing with telephony stuff.

And that's when everything changed. Venky and Michael realized they were tackling three big problems: technology, cloud hosting, and connecting people globally through phones. So, they decided to pivot from just being a little open-source project to becoming a full-fledged business. It was the start of something incredible.

The journey from this to currently having closer to 100M $ Revenue and 300 employees is not a easy one. They encountered several problems on the way, we will go through some of them below and how they overcame that! Here is a quick look into their journey!

Getting into Y Combinator (YC) was a pivotal moment for them. It all started when one of the founders had a friend going through YC and shared stories about the experience.

The curiosity to witness it firsthand led to a decision that would change the course of their company. They took the leap, registered their company in September 6, 2011, and applied to YC.

However, the journey to YC wasn't without its challenges. Their first attempt to join YC in October 2011 ended in rejection. Paul Graham, one of YC's founders, provided two clear reasons: they didn't fund companies with remote founders, and the startup lacked a track record of selling to enterprises.

Undeterred, the founders got to work. They secured their first paying customer in Chicago, who had specific requirements beyond their open-source offering. Meeting these demands not only brought in revenue but also gave them a track record of catering to enterprise needs.

Plivo was among the top companies in their batch, with maximum revenue by the end. They doubled their revenue from 1M ARR to 2M within 6 months.

Here is a photo of how their website looked in Dec 2011

Post Y Combinator, Plivo started getting a lot of traction, they even got featured in tech crunch:

Despite successfully raising some funds, Plivo was still managing everything with a small team of about five to seven people.

This limitation posed difficulties as their platform's usage increased, resulting in frequent issues such as bugs and service delays. Plivo was in constant firefighting mode, and it was clear that they needed to shift their focus.

Recognising the importance of maintaining existing customer satisfaction, Plivo made the strategic decision to reduce new feature development for the next two years.

During this time, they focused on stabilising and optimising their core platform in order to provide reliable and efficient service to their current customers.

This change necessitated a reorganisation of responsibilities within the organisation. Venky, one of the co-founders, began spending more time with customers and stepped away from the technical side, while Mike took on a leadership role in managing the tech side. They also expanded their customer-facing layer to effectively handle support and escalation.

As a result, the two-year journey was fraught with ups and downs. While revenue increased, Plivo faced challenges as some customers expressed dissatisfaction due to previous issues.

Their commitment to customer satisfaction, on the other hand, paid off in the long run, as they solidified their core platform and ensured customer retention.

In the journey of Plivo, one critical growth driver that played a pivotal role was the emphasis on honest team communication during cash flow problems.

This approach ensured that each hire made was not just incremental but exponential in terms of impact on the company's success. The company's transparency and dedication to addressing financial challenges led to significant insights and adaptations over time.

Plivo's founders realized that maintaining open and honest communication with their team during financial difficulties was essential. By sharing the company's financial position, challenges, and the urgency of the situation, they built trust among team members.

This transparency allowed everyone to understand the gravity of the problem and the need for immediate action.

During the challenging times, the team rallied together, and many team members stepped up to support the company's efforts to turn things around.

This experience highlighted the importance of having a team aligned with the company's values and goals. The commitment of team members to address the cash flow issue demonstrated their resilience and dedication to the company's success.

In summary, Plivo's journey from a modest open-source project to a thriving communication solutions provider with nearly $100 million in revenue and 300 employees showcases their resilience, customer-centric approach, and transparent team communication.

It reinforces the belief that ambitious dreams can come true with the right mindset and commitment to excellence. This are the most important lessons which we can learn from their journey.

Most of this deep dive was possible because of a great interview by Backstage with Millionaires with Venky. A lot is still left which I have not covered in this article. Here is the link if you want to watch the whole thing!

That’s all for today. This edition took us about 13 hours of effort, If you think your friends or colleagues would like this, please share this link. Also, please consider following us on Twitter (Keval Jagani, Meet Shukla) and sharing this newsletter.