Pre-IPO MuleSoft Makes SaaS Apps Talk to One Another

According to research firm IHS, worldwide enterprise spending on cloud-related technology is projected to triple over the period 2011 through 2017. The market is estimated to be worth $235.1 billion by the year 2017. In the current year, global business spending on infrastructure and services related to the cloud are projected to grow 20% over 2013 to $174.2 billion. As the adoption for cloud services increases, organizations are also looking for services that help with the integration of not only traditional legacy on-premise applications and software with the cloud, but also the integration of multiple upcoming technologies.

MuleSoft’s Offerings
San Francisco-based MuleSoft delivers an integration platform to connect SaaS and enterprise applications through either a cloud-based platform or through on-premise enterprise software. Using MuleSoft’s Anypoint Platform, organizations are able to connect to multiple applications, data sources, and APIs. In an internal audit conducted by MuleSoft, they found that a typical mid-size company uses, on an average, 75 different SaaS applications. MuleSoft’s offerings help these various apps talk to each other.

Last year, MuleSoft announced the acquisition of Programmable Web from Alcatel Lucent for an undisclosed sum. Programmable Web is best known for their Application Programming Interface (API) database. MuleSoft plans to leverage the acquisition by offering an end-to-end solution for APIs that will include creation, publishing, integration, management, and driving developer adoption and ecosystems. The acquisition will add to MuleSoft’s existing APIHub, which is a next generation publishing platform for APIs and is also among the world’s largest repository of APIs.

MuleSoft’s Financials
MuleSoft operates on a license-based model and by charging a subscription fee for their support, consulting, and training services. They do not disclose detailed financials. Revenue growth remains strong. In a press release last year, they had disclosed that revenues for the first half of the year had grown 116% over the year.

Mulesoft boasts of more than 150,000 developers working on their applications and they are used by more than 3,200 companies in production. Their customer list includes names like Walmart, MasterCard, Nokia, Nestlé, Honeywell, and DHL and cover 35% of the Fortune 500 listing.

Till date, MuleSoft has raised $131 million in venture funding from investors including Morgenthaler Ventures, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, Lightspeed Venture Partners, SAP Ventures, Bay Partners, New Enterprise Associates, Salesforce.com, Meritech Capital Partners, and Cisco. Their last round of funding was held earlier this month, when they raised $50 million and added Meritech Capital Partners, Cisco, and Salesforce.com to their investor base. The funding helped value them at more than $800 million. They plan to use the new funds towards marketing and to increase headcount to cater to growing demands.

The company is not yet ready for an IPO, but believes that it will get there soon. They are targeting the end of the year to reach a scale where they think an IPO would be feasible.