AUTOMATTIC

Matt Mullenweg helped create WordPress in 2003 as free open-source publishing software, built on an abandoned project called b2/cafelog. It exploded.

Millions of people wanted WordPress but did not want to run their own servers. So in 2005 Mullenweg left his job at CNET and founded Automattic to offer hosted WordPress through WordPress.com, plus the spam-fighting tool Akismet.

The trick was keeping the software free and open while charging for convenience, hosting, and add-ons. That model funded two decades of growth.

Automattic makes money selling convenience on top of free software. The WordPress software itself is open-source and costs nothing.

Automattic charges for hosting on WordPress.com, premium plans, the WooCommerce store ecosystem, Jetpack security and backup tools, and enterprise WordPress through WPVIP. In plain terms, the code is free but running it well, at scale, without headaches is the paid part.

It also owns consumer apps like Tumblr, Pocket Casts, and Day One.

WordPress.com is the flagship hosted publishing platform. WooCommerce powers a huge share of online stores.

Jetpack adds security, backups, and performance tools to self-hosted WordPress sites. Automattic also runs WPVIP for large enterprise clients, plus consumer apps Tumblr, Pocket Casts, and Day One.

The growth engine is WordPress itself. Because the software is free and open, it spread until it powered more than 40% of all websites, and Automattic sits at the commercial center of that ecosystem.

Rather than market hard, Automattic acquired its way into adjacent tools, buying WooCommerce in 2015 and Tumblr from Verizon in 2019 for a reported few million dollars. Owning the dominant open-source platform means every new WordPress user is a potential Automattic customer.

The deepest challenge is that Matt Mullenweg controls both the WordPress open-source project and the for-profit company, and those two roles can collide. That tension exploded in 2024 when Mullenweg publicly attacked WP Engine, a rival WordPress host, cut off its access to WordPress.org resources, and triggered lawsuits and a developer backlash.

The fight raised an uncomfortable question about how neutral an open-source project can be when one person runs both the foundation and the business. Trust, once dented in open source, is very hard to rebuild.

Automattic stayed lean on outside money for years before raising bigger rounds as it scaled. Salesforce Ventures led a $300 million round in 2019 that valued it at $3 billion.

In 2021, Insight Partners led a $288 million round that more than doubled the valuation to $7.5 billion. Backers were betting on WordPress staying the default way the open web gets built.