What is your startup and what does it do?
Stackify is an innovative cloud based solution that gives developers insights and tools to their applications allowing them to monitor, detect, and resolve application issues before they affect the business to ensure a better end-user experience.
Stackify offers the only developer-friendly solution which fully integrates error and log management with application performance-monitoring and management in one platform. We allow users to easily isolate issues, identify what needs to be fixed, and focus their efforts.
At whom is your startup aimed?
Our target users are software developers that build web applications
How does your startup stand out against its competitors?
There are many tools in the market that provide some of the functionality that Stackify provides, such as log management, error tracking, application performance management, or application and server monitoring, but when an issue occurs, it can be very hard to pinpoint the problem across multiple tools, servers, and environments. With Stackify, developers get all the relevant information they need in one cohesive platform.
Having this additional integrated data gives developers using Stackify an edge over having to use multiple tools, allowing them to fix issues faster, be more efficient in their jobs, and save the company money.
Where did the idea for the startup come from?
I founded Stackify in January 2012 after I sold my previous start-up where I was the CTO of a rapidly growing enterprise software service (SaaS) provider. I’ve noticed that agile development had caused his developers to be much more involved in day-to-day IT operations, but my team lacked the tools and server access to do it efficiently. I founded Stackify to create a suite of tools to solve this problem – a problem that virtually every software development team has.
Did you have any concerns when starting your business, if so what were they?
The biggest concern was the complexity of the problem we were trying to solve. After three years of R&D I’m excited to say that we have solved the problem. We may have a few scars from along the way, but we have made it and it was worth it.
What is your business background, and what got you interested in startups?
I have always been interested in having my own business and I love to solve problems. Prior to founding Stackify, I was the founder and CTO of VinSolutions. VinSolutions’ innovative product offering led to rapid company growth and was even featured on the Inc. 500 (#447) in 2010.
How did you initially raise funding for your company?
Luckily we haven’t had to raise any outside capital. I have been able to fund the company out of the proceeds from the sale of my last company.
What has been your greatest achievement so far?
To date we have hundreds of users all around the world and paying customers in about 20 countries. We feel that this is a great achievement and we are excited for our future growth.
How have you kept your business relevant and engaged with your audience over the last three years?
We spend a lot of time working directly with our customers to understand their needs and how we can help make their lives easier. We believe that being good listeners is one of the most important keys to our long term success.
How long has your business been in making, and who is the team behind the business?
The management team all has considerable experience in IT management, marketing, and sales. The whole team was put together thanks to mutual friends who introduced us to each other.
What has been your biggest challenge so far?
Our biggest challenge is keeping up with customer demand. We have a lot of ideas but luckily our customers give us awesome new product ideas every day!
In the coming year, what would you like to achieve with your business?
We’ve just launched a new product, APM+ which is transforming the way developers optimize application performance. We think that this product will have tremendous effect on the market and on our company.
What has been your most valuable lesson so far since starting your business?
This is my second startup and you would think this would be easier the second time around, I can attest that it isn’t. Starting a new business is always a tough task.
Finally, if you could give one piece of advice to someone thinking about starting a business, what would it be?
If the problem you’re trying to solve is not something you’re passionate about, you may want to reconsider your idea. That passion is what will keep you going when times get tough.
