StdLib Raises $2 Million in Seed Funding to Connect Businesses via APIs

StdLib introduces the first dedicated Function as a Service (FaaS) Platform and Library, the easiest way to ship Business APIs, build Slack Apps, Twilio Messaging Hubs and more

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Jun 27, 2017, 17:34 ET

SAN FRANCISCO, June 27, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Polybit Inc., the company behind the Standard Library of the Internet (StdLib) has secured $2 million in seed funding. The funds will further StdLib's mission to connect the executive functions of businesses (APIs), by introducing the first dedicated Function as a Service (FaaS) platform and library. StdLib abstracts infrastructure away using "serverless" architecture, allowing developers to write anything from simple functions to complex business logic, then deploy their code as infinitely scalable, fully-documented web APIs.

"Google documented the world's information based on the contributions of others to the world wide web, Facebook connected the world's people based on contributions to their profile," said Keith Horwood, founder and CEO of Polybit and creator of StdLib. "We're connecting the world's executive functions, the actions of business and the backbone of the digital economy, by allowing businesses to build and deploy to the Standard Library of the Internet."

Delivering web services and APIs is a complex problem and many things can go wrong between conception of a business idea and production implementation of a web service. StdLib solves this with an instant deployment solution that is completely decoupled from your existing infrastructure and scales to any request load.

A Toronto-born Canadian, Keith Horwood would not have succeeded on the path to build StdLib without the help of others. A self-taught developer with a degree in Biochemistry from the University of Western Ontario, he gained national Canadian attention in 2012 when he changed the title on his alma mater's website via a software exploit. From that point, he focused his energy on being a productive software contributor - becoming a top open source developer, which landed him leadership roles in San Francisco technology companies. He met his cofounder, Jacob Lee, a Princeton Computer Science graduate, at a volunteer hackathon in early 2016.

"I was working at Google when Keith introduced me to the open source software that would become StdLib," Jacob said. "I knew right away that this could revolutionize the way developers build software. I joined shortly thereafter, and it's been one of the best decisions I've ever made."

After receiving its first $50,000 in funding from the top-ranked AngelPad accelerator, StdLib was market-ready in late 2016 where it launched at AWS Re:invent. It is used by companies like Segment to build "glue" functions that stick together third-party APIs and complex data pipelines. For example, StdLib can be used to quickly write, iterate and ship software that prospects and evaluate leads based on e-mail or IP address using third party APIs like Clearbit or Mattermark. Developers have deployed tens of thousands of services to date, and StdLib's ecosystem is growing at a rapid rate.

The investment was led by BlueYard Capital, a Berlin-based VC with a portfolio of investments focused around the democratization of software development. The StdLib investment was spearheaded Chad Fowler, formerly CTO of Wunderlist and creator of RubyGems. His colleague and General Partner Ciaran O'Leary agreed, "we believe in a world where developers should be able to build entirely new businesses in a radically simpler way. StdLib is empowering the next generation of applications - that's what we're rallying behind."

Other prominent investors include early Heroku engineering team members, Joe Montana's Liquid 2 Ventures, Aston Motes, engineer #1 at Dropbox, Michael Dabrowski, founder of the revolutionary biotechnology company Synthego, and the Nordic Makers Venture Group which includes David Helgason, founder of Unity.

"The serverless ecosystem is exploding and StdLib is perfectly positioned to create and capture the value of an emerging market we predict will be massive," said Joe Montana, General Partner of Liquid 2 Ventures. "We're enamored by Keith's vision and tenacity, and think he and Jacob are well suited to tackle this space."

To learn more about StdLib, visit:
StdLib - https://stdlib.com
StdLib on GitHub - https://github.com/stdlib/lib
StdLib Introductory Video -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HETSj7QByQk

About StdLib
Founded in 2016 by Keith Horwood and Jacob Lee in San Francisco, Polybit Inc. created StdLib, the Standard Library of the Internet. It is the first Function as a Service Platform and Library, and is available for developers to use worldwide. https://twitter.com/StdLibHQ