SmartBear is a company that provides a portfolio of trusted tools that give software development teams worldwide visibility into end-to-end quality through test management and automation, API development lifecycle, and application stability – ensuring each software release is better than the last. Pulse 2.0 interviewed SmartBear chief revenue officer Melissa Campbell to learn more about the company.
Melissa Campbell’s Background
Photo Credit: Melissa Campbell, Chief Revenue Officer, SmartBear
Campbell has 30 years of experience in enterprise software sales for companies ranging from early-stage venture backed to large public organizations. And Campbell said:
“My career began in procurement at Texas Instruments and then Lotus Development where I moved from procurement to renewals, and eventually found my stride in the world of sales. In 1995, when IBM acquired Lotus, that opened the door to opportunities and set me on the path to a successful career. I earned the IBM Rep of the Year award, a milestone that led to my promotion into sales management at IBM. I went on to sales leadership roles at Tamr, Inc., Oracle, BMC Software, and BEA Systems, and now I am Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) at SmartBear.”
“I am leading SmartBear’s global sales team as we deliver best-in-class software development and visibility tools to dev teams worldwide. This means nurturing our sales talent and teams in SmartBear’s culture of excellence, which includes our increasing presence in the EMEA and APAC regions as well as our growing channel partner network around the world. I have a track record of bringing high energy and data-driven decision making, while being results focused and obsessed with customer satisfaction. SmartBear customers are facing many challenges today, so we are focused on solving their problems so they can deliver better software releases faster, ultimately bringing them value for long-term success.”
Favorite Memory
What has been your favorite memory working for the company so far? Campbell reflected:
“As part of SmartBear’s Kitchen Series where the company hosts various events, we recently had a pickle ball tournament with about 40 employees. We compared job strategies in sales to pickle ball strategies. It was so much fun.”
Core Products
What are the company’s core products and features? Campbell explained:
“SmartBear provides a portfolio of trusted products that give software development teams around the world visibility into end-to-end quality through test management and automation, API development lifecycle, and application stability, ensuring each software release is better than the last. Our award-winning products include SwaggerHub, TestComplete, BugSnag, ReadyAPI, Zephyr, PactFlow, and Stoplight, among others.”
Challenges Faced
After asking Campbell about challenges faced in her sector of work, she acknowledged:
“There is no field or industry today that is moving as fast as technology. It’s changed how we live, work, and connect with others – it’s also changed the pressure on software teams. While our focus has always been quality, there’s a growing need to provide even more support to software teams operating in high-pressure environments, where speed and efficiency are so important in the face of stiff competition. Each day, we strive to address the immediate and long-term challenges faced by developers. Our objective is to continually enhance and seamlessly integrate our suite of widely acclaimed, popular, and rapidly growing tools, all to help to accelerate the development team’s journey. It’s also imperative that we continuously demonstrate the value of our products to our customers, always showing how we benefit and enhance their daily lives.”
Evolution Of SmartBear’s Technology
How has SmartBear’s technology evolved since launching? Campbell noted:
“As a company, we spend a lot of time working with customers and partners to really understand what it is they are looking to do. What is their path? Where are they on their journey, and how can we, together, help them get there?”
“With customers at the center, we have been building out and investing in both our product and acquisition strategy to ultimately help our customers provide better experiences for their own customers. We believe in meeting customers where they are and providing them with starting points, not dictating what those starting points are, because each of them are different with different objectives. We do this while also giving them the tools and solutions to take their work to the next level to ensure that each release is better than the last.”
Significant Milestones
What have been some of the company’s most significant milestones? Campbell cited:
“SmartBear has had many milestones in 2023. The company has expanded its API product portfolio through innovative enhancements to its popular solutions as well as strategic acquisitions. SmartBear released SwaggerHub Explore for API exploratory testing, as well as SwaggerHub Portal, the API portal that provides consumers with comprehensive resources for easy implementation. In August, SmartBear announced acquiring Stoplight to ultimately create the most comprehensive API development platform in the industry.”
“On the testing side, early in the year, SmartBear released VisualTest, its AI-powered automated regression testing tool that allows developers to catch visual defects and quickly confirm their website looks as designed for the best customer experiences. There have also been various enhancements with BugSnag, the company’s error monitoring and application stability tool where teams are achieving better collaboration, faster deployments, and more stable applications, giving developers more confidence behind their code. SmartBear integrated observability into its portfolio with the acquisition of Aspecto, an OpenTelemetry (OTel) pioneer, in March. Through an integration with BugSnag, developers now have the unique capability to rapidly identify and correct bugs in distributed environments.”
“SmartBear has successfully integrated multiple acquired toolsets this year to provide optimum application design, development, and operational visibility along with our own organic products, and this will continue into next year and beyond.”
Customer Success Story
After asking Campbell about cutomer success stories, she shared:
“SmartBear is trusted by over 16 million customers at over 32,000 organizations. Customers like Lyft which reduced their time to resolution by 30%, or moz://a which cuts test cycles from 75 hours to five hours. And, PRAXIS which reduced its regression testing from six weeks to one week.”
Funding
After asking Campbell about the company’s funding information, she revealed:
“SmartBear is owned by two award-winning private equity partners, Francisco Partners and Vista Equity Partners.”
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates the company from its competition? Campbell affirmed:
“With award-winning products across the entire software development lifecycle, only SmartBear provides the visibility to make each release better than the last. At SmartBear, we are your partner. Our support goes beyond our products to help customers solve their challenges today and in the future. We provide award-winning support, have unrivaled resources like our SmartBear Academy, for example, and our vibrant community of over 100K+ QA, DevOps, API, and testing professionals.”
Future Company Goals
What are some of the company’s future company goals? Campbell concluded:
“In 2024, SmartBear is converging its toolsets into three integrated hubs for the industry’s most comprehensive API development, testing, and production readiness. The SmartBear API Hub will be the most comprehensive API development lifecycle platform, providing exploration, planning, testing, contract testing, documentation, and a front-end portal. The SmartBear Test Hub will provide the broadest test coverage and management in the industry, featuring intelligent automation to best impact speed and coverage. The SmartBear Insight Hub will allow developers to shift left or shift right to understand and trace where any bug comes from and quickly prioritize where developers need to focus – and where they don’t.”
“All our goals work toward giving development teams visibility and actionable insights across the software development lifecycle, so they can accelerate delivery with confidence, making each release better than the last.”
