Conducto is one of the newest tools that’s being used by engineers to automate workflows and simplify complex CI/CD (continuous integration/continuous delivery) and data pipelines. Conducto’s pipeline toolkit allows engineers to define their pipeline in Python instead of a configuration language, is easy to visualize as a pipeline scale with more tasks with the use of a tree structure, and is also easy to debug. For companies, adopting CI/CD enables them to reduce costs, innovate faster, experiment more, and improve the quality, security, and deployment of their software. The company’s technology is battle-tested as it was used by hundreds of traders at the cofounders’ previous company.
AlleyWatch caught up with CEO and Cofounder Jonathan Marcus to learn about the technology, the company’s launch, and recent funding round.
Who were your investors and how much did you raise?
Jump Capital led a $3M Seed round.
Tell us about the product or service that Conducto offers.
Conducto simplifies complex CI/CD – building, testing, and deploying applications – and data pipelines.
What inspired the start of Conducto?
Our founding team worked for a decade at Jump Trading, a top quantitative trading firm, as early members of one of the world’s top trading teams. The Conducto technology was inspired by the automation tool that powered this team’s growth by making it easy to automate its data science, machine learning, and complex deployment tasks.
How is Conducto different?
Conducto defines its CI/CD and data pipelines as trees not DAGs (the graph format used by every other competitor). This allows tasks of incredible scale to be created and represented simply. This is combined with the best and fastest debugging experience of any workflow automation tool.
What market does Conducto target and how big is it?
The technology is applicable to the CI/CD, data science, and ETL markets. The TAM of those is at least in the hundreds of billions.
What’s your business model?
The underlying technology is loved by hundreds of users at Jump Trading. We want to put Conducto in the hands of developers everywhere for free. If they like it – and I am confident they will – then they’ll bring it into their employers who will pay for us to handle the scale that they need.
How has COVID-19 impacted the business?
We planned to demo Conducto at in-person meetups and build our core userbase that way. COVID obviously has ended those, so we’re pursuing an online content marketing strategy to grow our userbase.
What was the funding process like?
I have a very close relationship with the team at Jump Trading and Jump Capital, so they were a natural choice. They knew the technology, they helped me develop the idea, and were eager to invest in our future success.
I have a very close relationship with the team at Jump Trading and Jump Capital, so they were a natural choice. They knew the technology, they helped me develop the idea, and were eager to invest in our future success.
What factors about your business led your investors to write the check?
The technology was a known factor, they knew and trusted the team, and they saw the potential. It was an easy call.
What are the milestones you plan to achieve in the next six months?
We just launched the product, and we plan on sharing it with developers everywhere.
Where do you see the company going now over the near term?
We’re excited to put this tool in the hands of developers and data scientists everywhere.
What’s your favorite outdoor dining restaurant in NYC
I don’t want to say – my wife and I loved Via Carota when it opened a few years ago, then everyone learned of it and now it’s too popular for us to eat at. I’ll keep my current one to myself.
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