Sacha Labourey grew up in Neuchâtel. After studying computer science at EPFL, he co-founded JBoss, a company dedicated to developing an open-source application server.
Since then, he has founded CloudBees. An interview with an entrepreneurship enthusiast.
What is an application server?
An application server allows a company to develop an application without starting from scratch, by taking advantage of basic functionality. By way of analogy, when you use a computer, you already have an operating system that provides you with file storage, printing, networking, and other functions. When we launched JBoss, the world of application servers was limited to very expensive enterprise solutions. Our proposal for a free, open-source solution was completely unprecedented. Our business model was based on selling support subscriptions. Five years after the company was founded, we were acquired by Red Hat, which is now owned by IBM.
How do business models based on open-source solutions currently work?
These days, the core of the software is typically open source, while certain advanced features are not—particularly for enterprise solutions. For developers, however, open source prevails. This approach enables distribution. Monetization then takes place in parallel, once the software has already been adopted internally. HashiCorp, Red Hat, and Cloudera—giants in the infrastructure software sector—operate on this business model. Despite their market capitalizations in the tens of billions, these companies are largely unknown to the general public.
How did CloudBees get started?
I needed a personal challenge. At JBoss, I wasn’t the CEO. I was involved in key decisions, but being involved doesn’t mean making the final decision. I wanted to prove to myself that I was capable of it.
In 2010, enterprise IT was cumbersome and complicated—and it still is for many companies. Indeed, the path from an initial software idea—which developers create—to its actual deployment is very long. It involves a lot of friction, most of which is unnecessary. All of this slows down companies’ ability to make a rapid impact through software.
To simplify this, we created a “Platform as a Service” (PaaS) product, which is a cloud computing solution. The goal was to make software development much simpler using the cloud. Indeed, the level of agility required in 2021 is immense. Updates are microscopic but constant. We practice continuous integration. Amazon, for example, releases an update on average every twelve seconds. To achieve this, the entire lifecycle must be automated—from selecting the update to deployment—using rules codified by the company. CloudBees offers a solution that enables companies to formalize and manage their software delivery.
Can we say that the IT world has entered the age of Fordism?
That’s right. In computer science, it took nearly a century to mimic this way of operating. We’re the spoiled children of the industry because a software process can be launched with a single click and, conversely, delayed for a very long time. To make processes more autonomous and resilient, we need to extract knowledge from employees and codify it into rules. Instead of spending time on processes, people can devote their time to more valuable and interesting tasks.
At one point at HP, less than one percent of the time spent by engineers working on printer software was dedicated to new features. Ninety-nine percent was spent on maintenance and bug fixes—everything but what customers actually wanted. For example, today, two HP printers run the same software because everything has been simplified, allowing engineers to devote much more time to new features. Nokia had the same problem, with multiple families of phones. Each had its own dedicated operating system; the teams’ work was incompatible, and there was no single ecosystem. The counterexample is Apple, with the iOS ecosystem.
What are your challenges for 2021 as a co-founder of CloudBees?
CloudBees has surpassed $100 million in recurring revenue. Going from 0 to 100 is not the same as going from 100 to 300. It requires redefining quite a few roles—including my own—and processes to reach a new level of maturity. When you’re smaller, you talk a lot about the product—what you’re selling. As you grow, there’s a lot of work to be done on the company itself: the brand, the way you operate as an organization. We need to put processes in place to free up people’s minds without stifling their creativity. Today, CloudBees employs 500 people, two-thirds of whom are in the U.S., one-third in Europe, and less than 5% in Asia. I’ve also recently changed roles within the company to focus more on its strategy.