Slack is the World's Fastest Startup to Reach $2 Billion Ever

But now that Slack has cracked the $2 billion mark—indeed, already pushing $3 billion—data shows it’s the fastest startup not just in Canada, or even North America, but the entire world. Ever.

According to PitchBook, Slack reached a valuation of $1 billion 1.25 years after launching, ahead of Groupon (1.46 years) and Akamai Technologies (1.58 years).

Slack then reached a valuation of $2 billion just 1.71 years after launching, ahead of companies like Xiaomi Technology (2.24 years) and Instacart (2.58 years).

Slack, with offices in Vancouver and Silicon Valley, now has more than 200,000 paying users, and that number is increasing constantly.

“Slack radically increases internal transparency and turns communication archives into a powerful shared resource,” founder Stewart Butterfield said earlier this year. “We feel safe predicting all businesses will move a centralized system for communication within the next 10 years.”

Butterfield founded Flickr in 2002, which he sold to Yahoo in 2005.