Topic
Sourced startup case studies: how companies like Canva and Cursor grew so fast, why others failed, and what founders can copy, with free data downloads.
Everyone quotes 15-20% a month, 5-7% a week, or T2D3, and rarely says where it came from or what it measured. Here are five benchmarks, each traced to its original source and put on the same monthly basis.
Nov 8, 2026 · 6 min read
Every few months a startup announces it is the fastest ever to $100M ARR. They are rarely measuring the same thing. Here are nine claims, each traced to the company's own words, with the starting line and the metric spelled out.
Nov 7, 2026 · 8 min read
Afterpay processed A$0.27 million of sales in June 2015. Six years later Square agreed to buy it for US$29 billion in stock, and by closing day those shares were worth US$13.9 billion. Here is how it grew, from its own ASX filings and Block's SEC documents.
Nov 4, 2026 · 8 min read
Stripe launched publicly in September 2011 with about 100 users. In 2025, businesses on Stripe processed $1.9 trillion. Here is what moved the curve, in the Collisons' own words and Stripe's own numbers.
Nov 4, 2026 · 8 min read
Element AI was meant to be Canada's AI champion. Four years after its record Series A, ServiceNow bought it for its researchers and wound down the business. Here is what went wrong, sourced to SEC filings, the sale circular and a co-founder's own account.
Nov 4, 2026 · 8 min read
Canva launched from Sydney in 2013 to almost no one. By the end of 2025 it had 265 million monthly users and $4 billion in ARR. Here is what actually moved the curve, in the founders' own words.
Nov 3, 2026 · 8 min read
Cursor went from four MIT students to a $60 billion all-stock sale in about four years. Here is what actually drove it, dated and sourced, plus the parts most founders should not copy.
Nov 3, 2026 · 9 min read
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