NEWS
NEWS
NEWS
How Slack is breathing new life into an old concept | #NEXTConf
Since shifting focus from its unlikely beginnings as a video game company, Slack is fast becoming an industry leader in professional chat-based communication tools.
Keith Adams, chief architect at Slack Technologies, Inc., joined Dave Vellante (@dvellante) and Stu Miniman (@stu), cohosts of theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, during the Nutanix .NEXT Conference 2016 event in Las Vegas to talk about his vision for the direction of Slack.
The Slack vision
Even though the Slack network only currently supports a user base of 3 million users, the company is valued at $3 billion, and it has just received another round of funding worth $200 million. With this substantial valuation, Slack is confident about its broad plans to become a tool that business professionals will embrace worldwide.
“Our goal is to affect the lives of every knowledge worker in the world,” said Adams.
More than a communications tool
Online text-based chat has been around for decades, so the concept is hardly anything new. Slack’s goal is to take this concept and create a highly user-friendly communications environment for business professionals. Originally little more than a set of custom IRC functions for a Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) game company, the heart of Slack has grown into the billion-dollar company that exists today.
“It’s true that chat has historically been treated as a little bag on the side of your product,” explained Adams. “One of the things we strive to make happen in our messaging product that isn’t a given in competitor messenger products is a sense of place.”
Watch the full interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE and theCUBE’s coverage of the Nutanix .NEXT Conference 2016.
Photo by SiliconANGLE
A message from John Furrier, co-founder of SiliconANGLE:
Support our mission to keep content open and free by engaging with theCUBE community. Join theCUBE’s Alumni Trust Network, where technology leaders connect, share intelligence and create opportunities.
- 15M+ viewers of theCUBE videos, powering conversations across AI, cloud, cybersecurity and more
- 11.4k+ theCUBE alumni — Connect with more than 11,400 tech and business leaders shaping the future through a unique trusted-based network.
About SiliconANGLE Media
SiliconANGLE Media is a recognized leader in digital media innovation, uniting breakthrough technology, strategic insights and real-time audience engagement. As the parent company of SiliconANGLE, theCUBE Network, theCUBE Research, CUBE365, theCUBE AI and theCUBE SuperStudios — with flagship locations in Silicon Valley and the New York Stock Exchange — SiliconANGLE Media operates at the intersection of media, technology and AI.
Founded by tech visionaries John Furrier and Dave Vellante, SiliconANGLE Media has built a dynamic ecosystem of industry-leading digital media brands that reach 15+ million elite tech professionals. Our new proprietary theCUBE AI Video Cloud is breaking ground in audience interaction, leveraging theCUBEai.com neural network to help technology companies make data-driven decisions and stay at the forefront of industry conversations.
