Dropbox today, announced plans to acquire DocSend for a whopping $165 million. The company enables clients to exchange and monitor documents by sending a secure link instead of an attachment.
Earlier in 2019, Dropbox had also acquired HelloSign. The service allows users to manage their contracts and invoices, while Dropbox would enable users to work on projects and store files for individual projects.
According to the TechCrunch’s report, Dropbox CEO, Drew Houston said, “We’re announcing that we’re acquiring DocSend to help us deliver an even broader set of tools for remote work, and DocSend helps customers securely manage and share their business-critical documents, backed by powerful engagement analytics”.
Houston stated that the three services combined and offered by Dropbox would give consumers more power over document sharing workflows.
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Houston told Tech Crunch, “Dropbox, DocSend and HelloSign will be able to offer a full suite of self-serve products to help our millions of customers manage the entire critical document workflows and give more control over all aspects of that”
Russ Heddleston, co-founder and CEO of DocSend, has known Dropbox CEO Drew Houston for quite a few years now. Heddleston was initially a summer intern at Dropbox in 2010. He even requested for Houston’s approval before beginning DocSend in 2013.
According to Crunchbase, DocSend has raised a relatively modest $15.3 million since it launched. Heddleston told TechCrunch that self-sufficiency was more critical than raising money.
Heddleston went on to say that the firm “followed the thread of external sending,” which led to various workflows. He claims that a laser-like emphasis on that has resulted in a product that customers love.
Meanwhile, Houston was drawn to DocSend because it wasn’t looking for funding but instead focused on creating a valuable product. He told TechCrunch that the company was focused on creating user-friendly products that were well-received.
DocSend currently has about 17,000 customers, but its integration with Dropbox would enable it to reach a far wider audience. When the deal is finalized, the company’s 50 employees will join Dropbox.
PandaDoc and Box are Dropbox’s rivals in the market for integrated document-sharing workflows. The latter actually paid $55 million for e-signature startup SignRequest’s acquisition.