Software analytics company New Relic is off to an impressive start as a publicly traded company, beating analysts’ estimates today. The stock was up more than 4 percent after markets closed.
Naturally, right after the company’s first earnings call, founder and chief executive Lew Cirne was jazzed.
“It’s great, it’s great,” Cirne told VentureBeat.
It is great. His company has a lot to boast about: It’s one of the latest cloud software companies to make it big, validating cloud software generally and, by extension, the markets New Relic occupies, monitoring application performance and giving businesspeople insights into how people are using their software.
What’s more, New Relic is picking up more and more business from companies with more than 1,000 employees. In the quarter that ended on Dec. 31, that “enterprise” category of customers brought New Relic more than half of its revenue, New Relic chief financial officer Mark Sachleben told analysts on the earnings call. The customer list now includes Capital One, E-Trade, Scholastic, and Walgreens.
That could and should make Cirne happy. But the company’s core application performance management tool has become quite popular among developers, particularly in the Bay Area, where New Relic is based. Cirne doesn’t want to give that up, he told VentureBeat. He doesn’t want to take developer love for granted. He wants the company to stay trendy.
“I know when a company kind of jumps the shark and starts delivering crappy stuff,” Cirne said. “My commitment is we don’t become that company.”
Cirne said he can’t help but remain focused on keeping everyone happy.
“I’m a people pleaser — I’m Canadian,” he said. “I don’t want anybody to dislike New Relic.”
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