Analytics startup Mixpanel gets $500K from Slide and Bebo founders

Mixpanel, a company that offers analytics tools that are particularly suited for applications that spread virally, announced today that it has raised a $500,000 seed round.

The money comes from Max Levchin, co-founder of PayPal and founder of media-sharing company Slide, and from Michael Birch, co-founder of social networking site Bebo. Mixpanel co-founder Suhail Doshi said he’s excited to have Levchin and Birch’s backing because, “These are metrics guys — entrepreneurs who used analytics to build the companies that they’ve really made successful.”

Doshi has a personal connection to Levchin as well, because he previously worked at Slide.

Doshi launched Mixpanel with his co-founder Tim Trefren back in July, and he said its customers now include Slide, Kiva, HotorNot, and UserVoice. It goes above-and-beyond the services offered by Google Analytics, Doshi said, offering detailed stats on “funnel analytics” (i.e., how many users follow each step of the funnel leading to a sign-up or payment) and on user retention rates over a time period of your choice. And unlike Google Analytics, Doshi said Mixpanel provides its data in real-time, rather than with a lag of several hours.

Mixpanel was incubated by Y Combinator.