The SaaS Weekly is a weekly newsletter covering major SaaS news from Canada and around the globe.
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Hootsuite appoints former Mailchimp exec as CPO (BETAKIT)
Vancouver-based Hootsuite has appointed Natalia Williams as chief product officer (CPO). Prior to joining Hootsuite, Williams worked at Mailchimp as the email marketing company’s CPO.
Elon Musk Makes $43 Billion Unsolicited Bid to Take Twitter Private (BLOOMBERG)
Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk offered to take Twitter Inc. private in a deal valued at $43 billion, lambasting company management and saying he’s the person who can unlock the “extraordinary potential” of a communication platform used daily by more than 200 million people.
Legible sees more execs depart in restructuring as company eyes private placement for liquidity (BETAKIT)
Less than two weeks after laying off a third of its 60-person team, Legible has announced two more executive departures.
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Inside the Longest Atlassian Outage of All Time (THE PRAGMATIC ENGINEER)
We are in the middle of the longest outage Atlassian has ever had. Close to 400 companies and anywhere from 50,000 to 800,000 users had no access to JIRA, Confluence, OpsGenie, JIRA Status page, and other Atlassian Cloud services.
What businesses are getting wrong about SR&ED tax credit claims (BETAKIT)
The Canadian Government Scientific Research and Experimental Design (SR&ED) program was created to support and reward investments by businesses in innovation. Yet many businesses aren’t utilizing the program to its full potential, and therefore they miss out on all that SR&ED can offer.
India’s TikTok Alternative Thrives After Ban on Chinese Apps (BLOOMBERG)
The immediate trigger for India’s ban on Chinese tech products was a bloody fight in June 2020 between the two countries’ military forces along their long-disputed border in the Himalayas. At least 20 Indian soldiers were killed, the deadliest clash with Chinese troops in more than four decades. With tensions high after the incident, Indian officials said they feared Chinese-made consumer internet products such as TikTok and WeChat could be used for espionage.
Hookdeck raises $2.65 million CAD to connect the information that “rules the web” (BETAKIT)
SaaS startup Hookdeck has raised $2.65 million CAD ($2.1 million USD) in seed financing as it continues to support its customers with its webhook infrastructure. Webhooks are used to communicate the occurrence of an event in one system to another system, and they often share data about the event.
The five things every Security Operations Centre manager needs to know (BETAKIT)
Security looks different for every startup. This is where the security operations centre (SOC) manager comes in. The focus of an SOC manager is broad risk mitigation: ensuring regulatory and legal compliance, controlling business-essential risks such as encryption or personally identifiable information (PII) protection, and balancing taking action to lower risk with both company risk tolerance and available resources.
Filevine Puts $108M Series D In Place As Investors Make Argument For Legal Tech (CRUNCHBASE)
Salt Lake City, Utah-based Filevine became the latest legal tech startup to close a large round this year when the legal work platform closed a $108 million Series D led by StepStone Group. Founded in 2014, the company—whose SaaS platform allows law firms to manage documents and collaborate—has now raised more than $225 million, according to Crunchbase data.
Wavy raises $2.5 million to combat remote work, burnout, talent churn (BETAKIT)
The startup just raised a $2.5 million CAD seed round to continue the ongoing development of its culture management platform. Wavy also plans to use the new funds to put together an engineering and product team, as well as hire on the sales and customer success side of the startup.
Substack’s Growth Spurt Brings Growing Pains (NEW YORK TIMES)
The publishing platform’s founders want Substack to be an “alternate universe on the internet.” But it faces copycat rivals, an exodus by writers and a need to move beyond newsletters.
MyComply closes $5.6 million CAD to sell construction tech platform to US companies (BETAKIT)
MyComply has secured $5.6 million CAD ($4.5 million USD) and the support of construction industry angel investors to expand the presence of its construction workforce compliance and management platform across the United States (US).