Revenge of the SMBs; Plus Weekly SaaS News and Updates

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Hey SaaStr Community,

So many curious things have happened as Cloud and SaaS companies have exploded to $2T+ in market cap. One of them is a challenge to the rule that at some point, you have to go enterprise to really scale. Another is a related challenge to the idea that SMBs, since they don’t pay all that much, sort of “max out”. These rules are still true in many cases.

It’s just as Cloud has gotten so big, there are plenty of exceptions. Let’s take a look at two challenges to those rules — Zoom and Shopify. Both crossed a stunning $4B (!) in ARR during Covid. As Shopify crossed $4B ARR, it actually got a bit more SMB. And as Zoom crossed $4B in ARR, it actually got a lot more SMB. So much so, it’s almost counter-intuitive.

> Revenge of the SMB: Zoom & Shopify Got Even More SMB at $4B ARR, Not Less

New This Week

5 Interesting Learnings from Bill.com at $220M

Bill.com is one of the quiet SaaS success stories. They’ve scaled to $200m+ ARR growing 38% selling just to 100,000+ SMBs, solving a hard problem (i.e., automating the back office and payments and billing for SMBs), and doing it with 120%+ NRR.

Here are the five interesting learnings -->

This edition of the SaaStr weekly is sponsored in part by GuideCX

VCs or Founders: Who Makes More?

VCs have a much higher chance of making good money. Their own investors (“LPs” or Limited Partners) pay them for a decade more than fairly to manage their investments, no matter how well or poorly they perform. So who makes more in the end?

What's your guess? -->

Full Lineup and Agenda for SaaStr Enterprise is LIVE!

Join Qualtrics, Elastic, Okta, Snowflake, Salesforce, and more at SaaStr Enterprise: May 26-27. Core passes are free, or you can upgrade with code saastrweekly to grab a VIP networking pass for $299. (Prices increase to $499 on May 5.)

Sign up for SaaStr Enterprise -->

This edition of the SaaStr weekly is sponsored in part by Demostack

Gartner: SaaS Spending Will Grow Another 40% in Next 2 Years Alone

Just how fast is SaaS and Cloud growing? One thing we know — Fast. Still. Even now, at hundreds of billions in annual spending. Gartner’s latest report illustrates just that. Cloud software spending grew a stunning 23% in 2021, from $270 billion to $330 billion. But that’s just the start.

Enterprises are spending an additional $20B on SaaS each year -->