Open Sources | Rodrigues & Urlocker » Matrix funds Digium (Asterisk)

August 09, 2006 | Comments: (0)

Matrix funds Digium (Asterisk)

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I actually thought Digium would never take venture funding. The company doesn't need it ($10M+ in sales and profitable), but apparently David Skok of Matrix Partners gave Mark Spencer (founder and CEO of Digium) an offer he couldn't refuse:

Make that $13.8 million of them.

Matrix is one of my very favorite venture firms: great people to work with (David Skok and Bob Lisbonne both count as two of the first three to five people I'd talk to if I were to start a company) and very intelligent about what they invest in. They're choosy.

Why Digium? Well, David puts it best:

"This company has an incredible power to disrupt the dynamics of what has been a very staid and closed industry," he said. Even with its free software base, he said, Digium is "one of the most profitable businesses I've come across anywhere in the venture world."

That's saying something. And it cuts against the arguments Dan Farber was raising in his latest post on open source businesses. (He has a nice response to mine here.)

This is a great investment - one that should pay off even better than JBoss did for Matrix, if only because JBoss has set the stage for many profitable exits to come.

Btw, here's a picture of David and Mark Spencer at OSCON. Anyone watching the two at the conference knew that an investment was afoot:

Good luck to Mark as he continues to build a killer business!

Posted by Matt Asay on August 9, 2006 07:49 AM

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