First-ever blogging platform created for software developers to fuel knowledge-sharing – without compromising on brand SEO
- Hashnode has grown from 100,000 monthly active users to 1 million in a year, hosting 60,000 active blogs
- Investors include: Salesforce Ventures; Sierra Ventures; Sequoia Capital India’s Surge; Accel Partners; Naval Ravikant, co-founder of Angellist; Des Traynor, co-founder of Intercom; Guillermo Rauch, co-founder of Vercel; Salil Deshpande, general partner at Uncorrelated; and Ed Roman, managing director of HackVC
Bengaluru, August 19, 2021 – Hashnode, a blogging platform built for and dedicated to the global software development community, announces today it has received $6.7 million in a Series A fundraise led by Salesforce Ventures, following a $2.1 million seed funding round in December 2020. Salesforce Ventures is joined by fellow venture capital investors Sierra Ventures, Sequoia Capital India’s Surge and Accel Partners, as well as angel investors Naval Ravikant (co-founder, Angellist), Des Traynor (co-founder, Intercom), Guillermo Rauch (co-founder, Vercel), Salil Deshpande (general partner, Uncorrelated) and Ed Roman (managing director, HackVC).
The funding will be used to continue to grow the platform’s user base, accelerating its mission of becoming the number one platform for software development, engineering and technology content – in turn, powering the creator economy for the rapidly expanding developer community. There are now nearly 25 million developers working worldwide, so there’s a huge market opportunity for Hashnode to help plug knowledge gaps – particularly important as remote working remains popular among developers.
Specific initiatives underway at Hashnode include recruiting new talent, expanding global operations and rolling out new features, including Team Publication – a service allowing entire businesses to leverage the Hashnode platform to power engineering and tech blogs and reach the global developer community – as well as an iOS- and Android-compatible mobile app.
Hashnode is the first blogging platform built and optimized specifically for the software developer community to support the knowledge sharing economy. Unlike existing sites and blogging platforms, Hashnode does not employ paywalls – content is freely available to readers worldwide – and authors fully own their Hashnode blogs and can map them to their own domains. This ensures that users never lose access to their content and can continue to reap the SEO benefits, while maintaining connections with Hashnode’s large, global developer community. Hashnode also allows readers to tip authors, ensuring software developers can monetize their work.
Additional developer centric Hashnode features include:
- Custom CSS to enable unlimited blog customization – essential for maintaining and communicating key branding elements, such as colors and fonts
- Detailed, out-of-the-box analytics for all blogs
- Rich embeds support and code highlighting
- Bulk imports of content from other blogging platforms, including Medium and WordPress
- Powerful integrations with a variety of developer tools and resources, including GitHub, Google Analytics, Hotjar, Fathom Analytics and Plausible
Commenting on their investment, Alex Kayyal, managing partner, Salesforce Ventures says, “Hashnode’s rapid growth since its launch points to just how important a platform like this is for developers. We’re proud to back innovators like Hashnode as they work to build a global knowledge-sharing community to empower and connect developers, and in time, all technical creators across the globe.”
Founded by Fazle Rahman (co-founder and CEO) and Sandeep Panda (co-founder and CTO), Hashnode was launched in June 2020 with the mission of connecting the world’s developers, helping them to share knowledge, grow and build a global community. In its early days, the platform had 100,000 monthly active users; over the past year, that number has grown to over 1 million, and the platform currently hosts 60,000 active blogs. Notable bloggers include Quincy Larson (founder, FreeCodeCamp); Peter Friese (developer advocate, Google Firebase); Victoria Lo (engineer, PayPal), Jenna Pederson (senior developer advocate, AWS Cloud); Nader Dabit (developer relations, Edge & Node); and Katherine Peterson (engineer, GitHub).
“Software developers are valuable members of the creator economy, fueling today’s most innovative technologies,” says Fazle Rahman, CEO and co-founder of Hashnode. “We launched Hashnode because this group deserves a blogging platform built just for them – one where they can easily find each other, share ideas with like-minded professionals, and collaborate to build game-changing technology. With this new funding, we expect we’ll be able to reach even more users across the globe, helping to create a thriving, rich network that elevates the entire profession.”
Des Traynor, co-founder of Intercom and angel investor, comments, “What Hashnode is doing for the developer community is transformative. Developers want to connect with each other, share ideas and code, but still own their creations and have them easily accessible, no sign-ins or paywalls. Hashnode is the solution. I’m thrilled to support Hashnode. I’m impressed by their progress to date, and I look forward to their continued growth and evolution.”
