Box (company)

Box Inc.
Type of site
 Public
Traded as NYSE: BOX
Headquarters Redwood City, California
Founder(s) Aaron Levie, Dylan Smith, Sam Ghods, Jeff Queisser[1]
Key people Aaron Levie (CEO)
Stephanie Carullo (COO, President)
Dylan Smith (CFO)
Industry Cloud storage, File hosting
Employees 1400 (as of 2017)[2]
Website www.box.com
Alexa rank Positive decrease 559 (December 2015)[3]
Launched 2005[4][5] in Mercer Island, Washington

Box (formerly Box.net), based in Redwood City, California, is a cloud content management and file sharing service for businesses. The company uses a freemium business model to provide cloud storage and file hosting for personal accounts and businesses.[6] Official clients and apps are available for Windows, macOS, and several mobile platforms. Box was founded in 2005.

History

Box was originally developed as a college project of Aaron Levie while he was a student of the University of Southern California in 2004. Levie left school to pursue the company full-time in 2005. Levie became CEO, while his childhood friend Dylan Smith became CFO.

In October 2009, Box made its first acquisition, buying Increo Solutions for its document collaboration and preview technology.[7]

In July 2012, Box secured $125 million in a funding round led by growth equity firm General Atlantic, joined by investors Bessemer Venture Partners, DFJ Growth, New Enterprise Associates, SAP Ventures, Scale Venture Partners, and Social + Capital Partnership.[8][9]

In December 2013, eight investors participated in a $100 million series F funding round. Investors included Coatue Management, DFJ Growth, Itochu Technology Ventures, Macnica Networks Corp., Mitsui & Co, Telefónica Digital, Telstra, and Telstra Ventures.[10]

In July 2014, Box received $150 million from Coatue Management and TPG Capital in a series G funding round.[11]

In November 2014, Box acquired two-man medical-imaging software startup MedXT for $3.84 million.[12]

On January 23, 2015 Box held its initial public offering on the NYSE. The IPO price was $14.00. It opened at $20.20 and closed at $23.23. The IPO raised $175 million and established a market capitalization of about $1.6 billion. [13]

In Jan 2016, some of the employees moved into their new headquarters in downtown Redwood City, California[14]

Business model

Box is a cloud computing business which provides file-sharing, collaborating, and other tools for working with files that are uploaded to its servers. Users can determine how their content can be shared with other users.[15] Users may invite others to view and/or edit an account's shared files, upload documents and photos to a shared files folder (and thus share those documents outside of Box), and give other users rights to view shared files.[16]

Box offers three account types: Enterprise, Business and Personal.[17] There are official clients offered for Windows and macOS, but not for Linux. A mobile version of the service is available for Android, BlackBerry 10, iOS, WebOS, and Windows Phone devices.[18]

Box's enterprise clients include IBM,[19] GE,[20] Schneider Electric,[21] and Procter & Gamble.[22]

In December 2007 the company announced OpenBox, which allows developers to create services that interact with files on both Box.com and competing web-based applications and services. The application programming interface is implemented over conventional XML.[23]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Reinventing Collaboration - Leadership - Box". box.com.
  2. ↑ Freytas-tamura, Kimiko De (31 March 2013). "Box, a Data Storage Company, Prepares to Expand in Europe" – via NYTimes.com.
  3. ↑ "box.com Site Overview". Alexa Internet. Retrieved 2015-12-08.
  4. ↑ Rachel King (March 6, 2014). "How Aaron Levie and his childhood friends built Box into a $2 billion business, without stabbing each other in the back". TechRepublic. Retrieved December 1, 2016. Development for Box, then Box.net, started at the end of 2004, but really got off the ground and went online in 2005 during their sophomore years of college.
  5. ↑ Aaron Levie (September 14, 2011). "Commentary: Why we had to leave Seattle to build Box.net". GeekWire. Retrieved December 1, 2016. Box – which now competes with Redmond's very own Microsoft SharePoint – had been started in early '05 from college dorm rooms in California and North Carolina.
  6. ↑ Fisher, Sharon (2010-11-03). "Box.net Expands Capacity And Services – Network Computing". Networkcomputing.com. Retrieved 2013-06-27.
  7. ↑ Arrington, Michael. "Box.net Acquires Increo Solutions To Expand Document Collaboration And Sharing". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2016-10-02.
  8. ↑ Ha, Anthony. "Box Raises $125M To Target Global Growth And Large Enterprises, Round Led By General Atlantic". TechCrunch. Retrieved 16 December 2015.
  9. ↑ "Box Announces $125 Million Investment to Fuel Enterprise Growth". General Atlantic website. Retrieved 16 December 2015.
  10. ↑ Darrow, Barb. "Yowza: Box touts $100M investment to fund global land grab". Gigaom. Retrieved 16 December 2015.
  11. ↑ Wilhelm, Alex. "Box Picks Up $150M More As It Waits For Favorable IPO Winds". TechCrunch. Retrieved 16 December 2015.
  12. ↑ By Jordan Novet, VentureBeat. “Box paid out $3.8M in stock to buy MedXT.” November 17, 2014. November 17, 2014.
  13. ↑ Matt Egan, CNN Money. "Box jumps 66% in first big IPO of 2015."
  14. ↑ "Redwood City Welcomes First Wave of Box Employees - RealSmart Group". realsmartgroup.com.
  15. ↑ "Box Privacy Policy". box.com.
  16. ↑ "Privacy Policy". Box. 2012-06-13. Retrieved 2013-06-14.
  17. ↑ "Select a Plan". Box. Retrieved 2013-06-14.
  18. ↑ "Box Mobile Access". Box.com. Retrieved 2013-06-27.
  19. ↑ "IBM and Box Forge Global Partnership to Transform Work in the Cloud".
  20. ↑ Ron Miller. "Box Scores Huge Win With GE". TechCrunch. AOL.
  21. ↑ "Consumer Technology". CIO.
  22. ↑ "How P&G Promotes Box File Sharing". InformationWeek.
  23. ↑ "Box Platform Developer Documentation / Welcome to the Box Platform". Developers.box.net. Archived from the original on June 22, 2013. Retrieved 2013-06-27.
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