Zendesk

Zendesk
Type Public
Traded as NYSE: ZEN
Headquarters San Francisco, California
Key people
  • Mikkel Svane
  • Alexander Aghassipour
  • Morten Primdahl
Employees 800
Website www.zendesk.com
Launched 2007

Zendesk, Inc. is a software development company based in San Francisco, California. The company provides a cloud-based customer service platform, also called Zendesk, that includes ticketing, self-service options, and customer support features. Founded in 2007, the company now employs roughly 8–900 people[1] and serves more than 50,000 customers[2] in 140 countries.[3]

History

Zendesk was founded in 2007 by Mikkel Svane, Alexander Aghassipour, and Morten Primdahl, in Copenhagen, Denmark, where the trio bootstrapped the company from a small loft. Zendesk received $500,000 in seed funding in June 2008 from angel investor Christopher Janz.[4] In 2009, following $6 million in series B funding from Charles River Ventures and Benchmark Capital,[5] the company moved to San Francisco to establish their headquarters.[6] In 2012, Zendesk raised $60 million in a combination of $45 million in equity and a $15 million credit facility, bringing the total investment to $86 million.[7] Zendesk became a public company in May 2014 traded on the New York Stock Exchange.[8]

Products

Zendesk

Zendesk's software is written in Ruby on Rails, and is notable for its ability to integrate with dozens of content management systems, customer relationship management tools, and web apps.[9][10] The platform is optimized for mobile and the Zendesk iPad app, released in March 2013, puts particular focus on development native to the iOS platform.[11] In December 2013, Zendesk announced integrations with SurveyMonkey and MailChimp to support the launch of surveys and email campaigns from within Zendesk.[12]

Help Center

In August 2013, Zendesk released Help Center, an addition to the Zendesk customer service platform that allows customers to access self-service options including a knowledge base and community forum, searchable through a central customer portal. Help Center is built on Ruby on Rails and JavaScript, and notable features include custom themes, and a knowledge base that becomes more refined as content is added.[13]

Security

Zendesk announced a security breach in February 2013 that allowed hackers to download email addresses and email subject lines from users requesting support on Twitter, Pinterest, and Tumblr. No accounts were known to have been compromised.[14] In March 2014 the company announced SOC 2 Type 1 compliance, as well as membership in the Cloud Security Alliance, where the company is listed as a SaaS provider alongside companies such as Box and Google.[15]

Locations

Zendesk has offices in eight countries,[16] including the following:

Awards

References

  1. ↑ "In Candid Conversation with Mikkel Svane; Zendesk CEO". The Nordic Web. 2015-01-27. Retrieved 2015-03-29.
  2. ↑ Alex Wilhelm (2015-02-11). "Zendesk Beats In Q4, Predicts Sustained Losses In 2015 On 45-50% Revenue Growth". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2015-03-29.
  3. ↑ Jordan Novet (2014-02-04). "Zendesk shows off more growth, adds 3 women to board". Retrieved 2014-04-28.
  4. ↑ "Zendesk for Help Gets Seed Funding — Tech News and Analysis". Gigaom.com. 2008-06-18. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  5. ↑ Erick Schonfeld (2009-08-17). "Zendesk Raises $6 Million In B Round, Benchmark's Peter Fenton Joins Board". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  6. ↑ "About The Company | Zendesk | Love Your Help Desk!". Zendesk. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  7. ↑ Leena Rao (2012-09-12). "Preparing For An IPO, Online Customer Service Platform Zendesk Raises $60M From Redpoint, Goldman Sachs And Others". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  8. ↑ "ZENDESK, INC. (ZEN) IPO". nasdaq.com. Retrieved 2014-05-30.
  9. ↑ "Zendesk | Leanstack - Cloud services for developers". Leanstack.io. 2013-06-03. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  10. ↑ "Zendesk Apps & Integrations". Zendesk.com. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  11. ↑ Alex Williams (2013-03-26). "Zendesk’s New iPad App Is Made For Simple Customer Service Tasks, Built For Mountains And Enhanced For Couches". Retrieved 2014-04-28.
  12. ↑ "Zendesk Integrates with SurveyMonkey and MailChimp". 2013-10-23. Retrieved 2014-04-28.
  13. ↑ Alex Williams (2013-08-21). "Zendesk Launches A Help Center That Combines Self-Service With Design Themes Reminiscent Of Tumblr". Retrieved 2014-04-28.
  14. ↑ Honan, Mat (2013-02-21). "Zendesk Security Breach Affects Twitter, Tumblr and Pinterest | Threat Level". Wired.com. Retrieved 2013-08-15.
  15. ↑ Ryan Gurney (2014-03-27). "Zendesk Security – Announcing SOC 2 Type 1, and more". Retrieved 2014-04-28.
  16. ↑ "Contact Zendesk - Offices". Retrieved 2014-04-28.
  17. ↑ Rebecca Grant (2014-02-10). "And the winners are… Check out the victors from the Crunchies 2013!". Retrieved 2014-04-28.
  18. ↑ "2011 CODiE Awards Winners List". Retrieved 2014-04-28.

External links