Here is a quick roundup of some news from Colorado startups and tech companies, featuring SendGrid, Zayo Group, and JumpCloud.
SendGrid’s New Partners: One of Colorado’s fastest-growing startups recently formed a new partnership to help other startups step on the accelerator.
SendGrid announced this week it is partnering with startup accelerators Techstars, 500 Startups, and the Global Accelerator Network to provide its e-mail delivery software free to each company in the programs. The Boulder, CO-based company also will provide mentorship and support to the companies and will admit them into its own startup outreach program.
SendGrid specializes in managing e-mails such as registration and purchase confirmations, friend requests, activity updates, and notifications. Its pitch is it can get the e-mails delivered, opened, and read while sparing the companies the hassle and cost of trying it themselves.
The company is a Techstars graduate and since leaving the program in 2009 it has expanded rapidly. It recently announced its 200th employee, and this month it is opening a new, 19,692-square-foot office in Boulder that will allow it to double its staff in the city.
SendGrid reportedly is approaching $50 million in annual revenue, and the company said in March it has delivered more than 200 billion e-mails for more than 150,000 customers. Clients include Pinterest, Snapchat, Uber, and Foursquare.
Investors including the Foundry Group, Bessemer Ventures, 500 Startups, and Bullet Time Ventures (Techstars CEO David Cohen’s fund) have put nearly $27.4 million into the company.
Zayo Goes to Paris: Zayo Group, the Boulder-based broadband infrastructure provider, has struck again, announcing it has signed an agreement to acquire Neo Telecoms, a French company. The acquisition will expand Zayo’s footprint around Paris and will add to its European network.
Zayo now has a fiber-optic network that spans 77,000 route miles across 300 markets in Europe and North America. Its assets include long-haul, undersea, and metropolitan fiber optic networks. Founded in 2007, Zayo created its network both through building on its own and by spending $3.3 billion to acquire 25 other broadband infrastructure providers. Zayo founder and CEO Dan Caruso wrote about the company’s early history in this guest post.
The price Zayo paid for Neo was not announced, but Zayo said it will use cash on hand. The deal is expected to close in the end of the second quarter.
Neo’s 2013 revenue was more than 30 million euros. The deal adds 350 route miles, 500 on-network buildings, and nine co-location centers across France to Zayo’s network. Neo’s CEO will become the chief of Zayo France, a newly formed division.
JumpCloud Orchestrates: Finally, JumpCloud took the wraps off a new feature that co-founder and CEO Rajat Bhargava said provides “some of our most significant functionality since the inception of the company.”
JumpCloud is developing cloud-based software that automates server management for DevOps and IT. Its latest feature automates the server orchestration process across a company’s server infrastructure, meaning users will not have to manually execute tasks or write scripts when they run their servers. JumpCloud says the feature will cut back on errors and time spent on server management while increasing uptime.
JumpCloud was publicly launched in 2013. Bhargava, co-founder of several startups including MobileDay and Yesware, became CEO late that year. In January it announced it raised a $3.1 million Series A round with Foundry Group and David Cohen’s Bullet Time Ventures as investors.
