SaaStr

MAY 23, 2025

The Acceleration: Why RevenueCat Won (2019-2022) Product Velocity: While competitors focused on single features, RevenueCat built a complete monetization platform. Market Timing: Sometimes the best companies are built during inflection points (mobile subscriptions, AI boom, app store policy changes). The Bottom Line From a $1.5M

Payments 265

Payments Payment Solutions Underperforming Technical Team Payment Methods 265

SaaStr

MARCH 17, 2025

So we’ve all watched the mega VC rounds for OpenAI, Databricks, Anthropic etc as VCs deploy billions into the AI winners at scale. From 2020-2022, the top 20 deals were just 6%-8% of all VC capital. Massive investments, at massive valuations, into the biggest leaders of AI. At a scale we haven’t seen before.

Venture Capital 298

Venture Capital AI Scaling Investment 298

SaaStr

JANUARY 17, 2025

But that was down from the original target of $20 Billion, the size of their 2022 fund (raised at the peak in 2021). Theyre still in, just not at the level of 2022. Funding is back, fast and furious, fueled by AI. Some LPs re-upped (good) but at lower levels (stress). They returned a stunning $8 Billion last year to their LPs.

B2B 246

B2B Investment SaaS AI 246

SaaStr

MAY 27, 2025

But the past few years, since the 2022 slowdown, we’ve grown concerned. Just disguised upsells, with no one on the call to actually help us: Customer Success Has Gone from The Customers Ally To Its Nemesis But AI is changing everything. Especially as AI takes over more and more of the sales process.

AI 159

AI Onboarding Customer Success Scale 159

SaaStr

JUNE 6, 2025

G2 has its latest Buyer Behavior report out and while most of its take-aways are things we know or should know, it’s a wake-up call for anyone thinking AI isn’t important in their category: 🚀 Top 5 SaaStr Learnings from G2’s 2025 Buyer Behavior Report 1. Align sales comp with net revenue retention, not initial ACV 3.

AI Search 137

AI Search AI Technical Review Software Review 137

SaaStr

MARCH 27, 2025

And 2024 was really good in B2B AI. You can’t cut your way to growth, and many SaaS buyers already cut back plenty of vendors in 2022-2024. And clearly, CFOs are still allocating budget to AI. Even with the tremendous growth in AI, the average number of apps per customer is flat. So 2025 is Good Times Again.

Technical Review 255

Technical Review SaaS AI B2B 255

SaaStr

DECEMBER 19, 2024

And yet, many are still struggling to get over the Crash of 2022. AI is remaking so many categories, but it’s often murky exactly … how. Venture Capital is out in force for the hottest AI companies — but in many cases, it’s checked out in other categories. Over the years, so much has changed in SaaS.

Sales Hiring 268

Sales Hiring SaaS Venture Capital Healthcare 268

SaaStr

MARCH 18, 2025

Joselyn Goldfein , Managing Director at Zeta Venture Partners, which invests in AI and data infrastructure-focused startups from inception through seed stage And see everyone at 2025 SaaStr Annual, May 13-15 in SF Bay!! What VCs Are Funding in AI Today The AI funding landscape has evolved rapidly in 2023-2024.

Technical Review 167

Technical Review Artificial Intelligence AI Marketplace as a Service 167

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 7, 2025

In 2022, you could blame the markets In 2023, you could blame "macro" impacts In 2024, you could still claim we were in a "downturn" In 2025 — you've run out of excuses — Jason SaaStr 2025 is May 13-15 Lemkin (@jasonlk) February 4, 2025 The downturn is over in SaaS and B2B. Venture Capital is Back. But so what?

Software Review 219

Software Review AI Search Venture Capital AI 219

Tom Tunguz

FEBRUARY 26, 2025

There are a few alternatives for AI-driven products: Triple the per seat price : If the AI agent is 3x as productive as a human, the software company could charge 3x as much per seat. Move to usage-based pricing : AI software might be priced like databases, charging for compute. across major SaaS vendors.

SaaS Payments 283

SaaS Payments Pricing Strategy Scale 283

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 30, 2024

So is AI taking over everything? Across the SaaStr Fund portfolio, I’ve seen multiple portfolio companies lost $1m customers to new, in-house AI initiatives. But I’ve also seen others grow even faster as AI rebooted and enhanced their products. AI is part of it, platforms are part of it. I mean … maybe.

AI Search 293

AI Search SaaS Headcount AI 293

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 21, 2025

Look at: Logistics & Transportation Supply Chain Cybersecurity (outperforming AI since Q1 2022!) Even AI companies aren’t growing as fast as cybersecurity right now. It’s not where you might think.

B2B 229

B2B Cybersecurity Scale Data 229

SaaStr

MAY 26, 2022

And make sure you have your team’s tickets to SaaStr Europa 2022 — you can’t meet the VCs if you’re not attending. Slimmer AI. We’ll see you soon at SaaStr Europa 2022! The post More Than 150 VCs Are Coming to SaaStr Europa 2022 appeared first on SaaStr. Then get ready to network!

Venture Capital 278

Venture Capital Investment AI SaaS 278

SaaStr

DECEMBER 22, 2022

With three live events, two digital events, and our two special series, Workshop Wednesdays and CRO Confidential, we have 200+ videos just from 2022 for you! Today, we’re giving you #12-#1 of our top videos of 2022! The Future of AI, Open Source, and Enterprise SaaS with Databricks CEO Ali Ghodsi. #5.

Scale 55

Scale Innovation AI Scaling 55

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 3, 2022

We wanted to give a special shout-out to some of our newest sponsors for SaaStr Annual 2022. Avoma is an AI Meeting Assistant, Collaboration and Intelligence platform for Sales, Implementation, and Customer Success teams. The post Thanks to Skyflow, Expensify, Avoma, and Snyk for Sponsoring SaaStr Annual 2022!

Payments 268

Payments Payment Services AI Search Payment Solutions 268

SaaStr

JUNE 4, 2025

Referrals are Chime’s largest acquisition driver since 2022 , helping bring sales & marketing spend down to 26% of revenue in Q1 2025, from 42% in 2022. And a good comp for Ramp, Brex, and others. 5 Interesting Leanings: #1. Word-of-Mouth is Their #1 Source of New Customers. In a business serving 8.6

Outsourcing Services 185

Outsourcing Services Scale Banking Customer Lifetime Value 185

SaaStr

JUNE 13, 2024

Earlier this month, Gong’s CEO and Co-Founder Amit Bendov sat down with SaaStr Founder and CEO Jason Lemkin at SaaStr Europa 2024 to talk about all things AI and the lessons learned while scaling to billions. Back in 2015, Google AI beat the world chess champion easily. AI was starting to diagnose diseases better than doctors.

Scale 299

Scale AI Sales Underperforming Technical Team 299

SaaStr

APRIL 28, 2022

We wanted to give a special shout-out to some of our newest sponsors for SaaStr Europa 2022. 6sense Revenue AI captures anonymous buying signals, targets the right accounts at the ideal time, and recommends the channels and messages to boost revenue performance. Join these incredible companies to experience all the value of SaaStr!

Forecasting 268

Forecasting compliance Finance Cloud 268

Tom Tunguz

DECEMBER 28, 2021

Here are my predictions for 2022: Web3 consumer products go fully mainstream with more than 35% of Americans, about 100m people, engaging with them by 2023. Engineers' productivity will skyrocket as AI pair programming increases code authoring speed and reduces errors simultaneously. Metamask counts 10m MAU and Phantom is at 1.5m

Scale 275

Scale Blockchain Banking Artificial Intelligence 275

SaaStr

JULY 22, 2022

The last few years have certainly tested marketers, but 2022 serves up a brand new array of challenges. The Future of Marketing in 2022. Key Takeaways: What’s New in 2022? Box: Conversational AI technology. The post The State of SaaS Marketing in 2022: Mutiny & SaaStr CMO Panel (Pod 575) appeared first on SaaStr.

B2C 277

B2C Scale Marketing Sales Hiring 277

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 1, 2022

We wanted to give a special shout-out to some of our newest sponsors for SaaStr Annual 2022. Orum leverages AI to detect voicemails, filter out bad numbers, and navigate phone directories to get your reps into live conversations quickly. Join these incredible companies to experience all the value of SaaStr!

compliance 269

compliance Forecasting AI Onboarding 269

SaaStr

JUNE 4, 2024

Everyone’s trying to make sense of AI, what’s happening in the ecosystem, and how to incorporate AI into your demand generation and marketing. Today, AI is heavily taking over sales roles, so this information is geared toward outbound, and how do you make the most of this switch. Where do SDRs end up in this AI world?

Scale 285

Scale AI Marketing Advertising 285

SaaStr

JULY 19, 2022

We wanted to give a special shout-out to some of our newest sponsors for SaaStr Annual 2022. The post Thanks to Calendly, Drift, Reprise, Secureframe, and Shift Paradigm for Sponsoring SaaStr Annual 2022! At the 8th ever SaaStr Annual, ~200 of the best and hottest companies on earth will go BIG as partners/sponsors.

GCP(Google Cloud Platform) 258

GCP(Google Cloud Platform) Artificial Intelligence Enterprise readiness Azure 258

SaaStr

JANUARY 20, 2022

We wanted to give a special shout-out to some of our newest sponsors for SaaStr Annual 2022. Using patented AI technology, it transforms business activity such as email, meetings, and contacts, into account and opportunity management solutions that increase sales rep productivity, accelerate revenue growth, and maximize marketing ROI.

DevOps as a Service 246

DevOps as a Service AI Search Cloud compliance 246

SaaStr

JULY 8, 2022

We wanted to give a special shout-out to some of our newest sponsors for SaaStr Annual 2022. 6sense Revenue AI captures anonymous buying signals, targets the right accounts at the ideal time, and recommends the channels and messages to boost revenue performance. Join these incredible companies to experience all the value of SaaStr!

Banking 239

Banking Consulting AI Revenue 239

SaaStr

JULY 2, 2024

The most encouraging data was in Q3 and Q4 of 2022. It was a small sign that we might be bottoming out, and software selling might be getting incrementally easier than it was throughout 2022 or 2023. In Q4 of 2022, that number decreased to 23%, less than 1 in 4 reps making their numbers. AI businesses are seeing a 3x premium.

Venture Capital 293

Venture Capital Management Scale AI 293

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 20, 2023

SVB collapsed, market multiples are down, yet the IPO window is re-opening, and we have a platform shift to AI that’s exciting everybody. The Macro Impact On Public Cloud Software Over The Past Year Cloud stocks dropped in 2022 in a severe market pullback event that Bessemer Venture Partners call The SaaSacre. Let’s find out.

Cloud 299

Cloud Payments Software Review Payment Solutions 299

Tom Tunguz

JUNE 20, 2024

AI startups, the darlings of the current era, are a notable exception. In this category, the heady multiples of 2021 & 2022 still apply. With excess seed supply & in an era where forward public software multiples have reverted to the mean from their stratospheric levels, Series A rounds are harder to raise.

AI 332

AI Investment Startup Software 332

SaaStr

JANUARY 25, 2024

In 2022, we were in free fall, with public market caps falling like a knife, and the IPO markets frozen. . #2. The Chase for AI Unicorns and Decacorns is All-consuming. The one place where paper money seems easy to come by is Hot AI Startups. In AI, 2021 never went away. In AI, 2021 never went away.

Venture Capital 292

Venture Capital AI Startup Investment 292

Tom Tunguz

APRIL 2, 2025

Investments into new areas may be challenged, slowing sales cycles, resulting in pipeline shocks , a phenomenon we witnessed in 2022. Assuming this trend is broadly true across US companies, we should expect at least uncertainty if not slowing growth or contraction in about one-third or one-half of their businesses.

AI 179

AI Forecasting Startup Trends 179

Tom Tunguz

AUGUST 28, 2024

With the rise of AI, web3 has become a quieter part of the venture ecosystem. Token / Index YTD Performance, % BTC 37 SOL 36 QQQ 19 DOGE 11 ETH 9 Series A valuations have increased through 2022 and since have seen a much higher variance, with both meaningfully higher & lower prices than the trend line.

Marketing 286

Marketing Finance AI Trends 286

Tom Tunguz

DECEMBER 31, 2023

In the last two years, M&A has totaled about $49b & it surges to above $60b driven by AI acquisitions. AI & data continue to dominate the funding landscape as founders & investors seek novel applications of the technology. SaaS did see a second wave fueled by AI, but the productivity gains remain to be seen.

AI Search 240

AI Search Headcount Scale AI 240

SaaStr

JANUARY 12, 2024

SaaStr CEO Jason Lemkin also wrote how Customer Success has now morphed into part of the sales team and that the 2024 trends in CS include everyone wanting to eliminate humans from support to replace that headcount with AI and bots. People did invest a lot in CSM, and in 2021 and 2022, the CSM population grew roughly 20%.

Sales Hiring 314

Sales Hiring Customer Success Scale AI 314

Unbounce

JANUARY 13, 2022

Here’s how we’ll use ‘em in 2022. 7 Marketing Trends You Gotta Know About For Your 2022 Strategy. Here’s what you need to avoid in 2022. Businesses are beginning to leverage AI copywriter tools to save time and pump out more content. Give our free AI copywriter a try to see it in action.). One CTA, got it. )

Marketing 144

Marketing AI Artificial Intelligence Machine Learning 144

Tom Tunguz

SEPTEMBER 16, 2023

In Q2 2022, Snowflake generated roughly the same amount of revenue. For now, Databricks’ growth, despite the environment, fueled by the demand for AI is a promising sign for startups. Snowflake was growing at 85% y/y compared to 51% for Databricks. Notably, the macroeconomic environments couldn’t have differed more.

Business 316

Business Cloud Finance Innovation 316

Buffer Resources

JUNE 19, 2023

There’s been much ado about AI lately, especially since ChatGPT was released to the public in November 2022. Since then, we’ve seen an influx of thoughts and tools around the topic and the use of AI. Spending time with the different tools powered by AI has allowed us to define our boundaries better.

AI 143

AI Social Media ChatGPT Interviewing 143

Tom Tunguz

APRIL 16, 2023

In 2022, startups raised about $75b from VCs. But it might be a bit less since the most competitive financings particularly in AI have been clearing at 2021 valuations, & the mountain of dry powder (more than $500b raised for early venture in the last 3 years) will buoy valuations through competition.

Venture Capital 306

Venture Capital Government Marketing Banking 306