It’s been a crazy, do-not-adjust-your-set kind of week. We experienced a rush of site visits and signups on 9 June following coverage in US tech press including TechCrunch, GigaOm, VentureBeat, ReadWriteWeb, and AllThingsD.
At the time we were getting ready to introduce new features and new pricing plans, and we barely had a chance to raise a hearty cheer about the news: 500Startups, arguably Silicon Valley’s coolest tech incubator, has joined our latest investment round.
It wasn’t news to us, since we’ve been talking to the 500Startups team since we pitched in their Mountain View offices with the Startmate crew back in April, but it was great to be free to talk about the deal finally, and especially gratifying to be mentioned alongside some other really promising startups.
(1. Matt and Alan rehearsing their Silicon Valley pitch in Casa Del Atlassian, SF. 2. Getting ready to pitch with the Startmate crew at 500Startups Mountain View. 3. Matt pitches a possible angel investor in Palo Alto. 4. Bento lunch in Castro with the other Startmate startups. 5. Celebrating a successful US trip with the Startmate crew, some bar in Palo Alto)
No, this doesn’t mean we’re relocating the company to the US (at least, it’s not on our current roadmap) but we will be over there in July and August, for demo days with the 500startups team and some other meetings.
500Startups’ decision to invest means they’re excited in the potential of our product and our company, particularly when it comes to delivering an essential service to all early-stage web startups: a great issue tracking tool. Interested enough that being on the other side of the Pacific isn’t too far away. Melbourne’s a lot like Mountain View… with better football and coffee…
We’ll have access to the 500Startups mentors and advisors, hope to leverage the incredible network of industry contacts fostered by Dave McClure and Christine Tsai, and if every now and again we get written up in the tech press, that’s all good too.
Funniest moment was when Alexia Tsotsis at TechCrunch mispelled us as “Bugheard.com” in both the text and the URL in her story, especially when the Washington Post’s reporter spelled us the same way — what a strange coincidence. Most amazing moment was when some good samaritan (possibly someone at @AYSMedia says WHOIS) setup and redirected “bugheard.com” to “bugherd.com”. Thanks!
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