Before a visit from executives of a big company, someone had to clear away the takeout containers.
The meeting place was a townhouse in Vancouver. Upstairs, a bedroom doubled as the boardroom. Downstairs, servers were stacked on the kitchen counter. There was no air conditioning, and the team could not open the windows because of construction across the street. The product they were about to demonstrate was, by their own later account, a click-through prototype made mostly of mock-ups.
One of the founders put it plainly: they had to create the market they wanted to sell into.
This was Visier in 2010, and the people inside called themselves data geeks. They were building it while still holding full-time jobs, and they were later nicknamed the Townhouse Crew. John Schwarz, who had earlier led the analytics company Business Objects, was involved, and so was Ryan Wong, who would become chief executive. At its most crowded, thirteen people worked in about 1,500 square feet.
Their problem was not only the heat. One of the founders put it plainly: they had to create the market they wanted to sell into. Companies kept employee data in payroll and HR systems, but few leaders could ask a simple question of it, such as why people were leaving, and get an answer without waiting for a report. Visier wanted to hand HR those answers ready-made.
What almost nobody outside the townhouse saw was how thin the proof was at the start. Wong later recalled reaching ten customers and the first payment, which looks tiny by today's standards. The first big deal, with Commonwealth Bank of Australia, changed what the team believed was possible, and the bank remains a major customer.
The next test was technical. Rather than rely on someone else's database, the developers built their own in-memory analytics engine from scratch. They worked through the Christmas holiday and released it a few weeks later in early 2012, after the first customers had gone live in late 2011. A founder said there were moments when he wondered whether all the effort would pay off.
Money followed the evidence. Foundation Capital led the first round, a US$6m Series A in 2011, and more rounds came in 2013, 2014 and 2017. In June 2021, Goldman Sachs Asset Management led a US$125m Series E that valued the company above US$1bn, taking total funding to about US$219.5m.
The founders' reaction to the label is the most human part of the story. Wong called it exciting but stressful. Schwarz said he would celebrate quietly until the private valuation became a public one.
The lesson is in the townhouse. Visier did not wait for a market, a boardroom or a finished product. It showed up with mock-ups, a kitchen full of servers and a clear question, and let one customer after another turn the picture into software.