Dropbox in Forbes

via Forbes.com

As a happy customer (50GB plan) of Dropbox since years now, I was very interested by this article in Forbes. Some insights (even if I encourage you to read the full article):

  • Dropbox has today 50 million users, one new user per second joining
  • 96% of the users pay nothing
  • 325 million files saved per day
  • Steve Jobs/Apple wanted to acquire Dropbox in 2009 for a nine-digit price
  • 2008: 9 employees. 200k customers
  • 2010: 14 employees, 2 million customers
  • Revenue 2011: $240 million, already profitable, 70 employees
  • Revenue 2012: even if they would not sign one single new customer, their sales will double
  • Dropbox started with $15k from Y Combinator
  • 1st VC round from Sequoia of $1.2 million
  • VC round in 2008, $7.2 million raised
  • VC round in August 2011, $250 million raised with a valuation of around $4 billion, VCs participating: Index Ventures (lead), Sequoia, Greylock, Benchmark, Accel, Goldman Sachs and RIT Capital Partners
  • Competitors perceived: Apple iCloud, Google Drive

Impressive story, wow…

Some notes for future install

Note for me: here the list of Software to install for new setup

  • Microsoft Office (Outlook, Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Access, OneNote)
  • Microsoft Security Essentials
  • Dropbox
  • Virtual CloneDrive
  • K-Lite Codec Pack
  • Windows Live Writer 2011
  • Windows Live Messenger
  • DxO Optics Pro
  • Adobe Premiere Pro
  • Babylon
  • Paint.NET
  • FastStone Image Viewer
  • FileZilla
  • iTunes
  • Chrome, Firefox, Safari, IE
  • TextPad
  • Skype
  • X-Lite
  • Seesmic Desktop
  • OpenVPN GUI
  • doPDF
  • 7-zip
  • Stardock Fences
  • PerfectDisk
  • WebLog Expert
  • Foxit Reader
  • UltraMon
  • Send to SmugMug
  • xmarks.com

Lessons Learned from Dropbox

I am a “happy user” of Dropbox as early adopter since 2008. We are also using Dropbox intensively at Innoveo since 2009. A really cool service and tool when you have to deal with different computers (notebook, netbook, iPhone for me). If you don’t know Dropbox, you should have a try!

Dropbox is a very young company and tool. Drew Houston, co-founder and CEO of Dropbox, has published a “worth-a-read” presentation about some Lessons Learnt they have done. No rocket science, a lot of common sense, but as usual, “everything is in the implementation” ;-)

Some data about Dropbox /

  • founded in 2007, launched in 2008
  • 1 million users 7 months after launch
  • Sept 2008: 100’000 registered users, Jan 2010 (15 months): 4 million users
  • Monthly growth: 15-20%

Some slides

Cross-posted on the Innoveo Blog