This is just called a small business...
The whole point of startups is that you take on massive investment to scale extremely quickly and outrun all potential imitators. It's not the only viable growth model, but that's the whole conceit of startups and what differentiates them for small businesses
It's a bit silly to try to redefine the term b/c you want to self identify as a startup. Just come to terms with that fact you're running a small business
Being “startup” just means you’re a business building something new or novel, it doesn’t mean you automatically have to follow the VC-model for startups.
if you start a bakery selling kimchi bagels, its not a startup
They're disrupting the bagel market, leveraging their unique vision. Think of them as a DoorDash for people who want to come into their bakery.
Wouldn't the key difference be the growth trajectory? I see a startup as a small business that aims to become a big one. Most small businesses are comfortable at their size, but a startup is not. It could achieve that growth by taking on lots of investment, but that's not the only way.
More money pretty much always helps with growth though. The argument is that they're hiring as fast as can be done (to maintain culture/quality/interview-pace) and they have nothing else they can spend money on. It's not impossible.. but it's a bit hard to imagine there is no way at all to increase your workforce productivity. But maybe they're all working 12 hours a day, making huge salaries and eating caviar while getting massages during their breaks
Maybe it does, but it's not the only way. Microsoft, famously, was bootstrapped.
"Linear raises $82M in series C funding at $1.25B valuation to challenge Atlassian"
interesting.. one wonders then why they raised funding if their income is covering all their expenses
unless they have some creative definition of profitable
Speed of growth.
Being profitable is one of the best times to raise. You don't need the money, but it'll accelerate the next phase of growth.
Retaining profitability after raising is probably harder as you're expected to spend that money to grow.
I'm sure it can be done if you've raised with the right people and you keep focus on ARR per FTE.
And if you raise after you’re already profitable, you have a lot more control / leverage over the terms and who is involved.
> Speed of growth
But the post we are discussing is literally about hiring slowly and only if really needed and only hiring the "next great engineer".
I understand that the post words are written deliberately in a way open to more interpretations, and the "only if needed" can apply to "we need to take on more Atlassian customers so we need this and that".
I think the point is there are many "startups" with similar revenue and growth to Linear that never become profitable. I don't think Linear qualifies as a small business and I don't think they're scaling less quickly than someone in same market with more funding and less profit.
To me a startup hasn't found a product-market fit yet. That's the whole point, they're trying to find a way to get profitable. As soon as you are profitable, then you are a normal company.