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Since its start in 2007, Acquia has come to be known as one of the city's proud anchor companies. Just last year, Inc. magazine ranked the Boston-born firm the number one fastest-growing software vendor. Back in November, the company also stole the second spot on the Deloitte 2013 Technology Fast 500 of fastest-growing private companies in North America, boasting a five-year sales growth of more than 84,100 percent.
When the company's current Chief Marketing Officer Tom Wentworth joined Acquia a year ago, the decision to leave his gig in the same position at a rival New England Web solution company was an easy one.
"I never answered a recruiter's call faster than when I heard Acquia was looking for someone to head up marketing...It was a clear case of, 'If you can't beat them, join them,'" Wentworth told BostInno in a conversation, touting the opportunity of joining such a powerful leading company within the space. After all, the CMO had born witness to the transition from proprietary to cloud-sourced software and the dawning of Acquia's success himself.
But how does a startup become a standout with the power to draw high-caliber talent from market competitors?
To Wentworth, the question can be best answered with a two-part answer: business model and community.
"We sit at the intersection of two very disruptive business models," explained Wentworth.
For those who don't know, Acquia sells cloud products compatible with free and open-source content management system, Drupal. Initially created by Acquia Co-founder and CTO Dries Buytaert, Drupal is one of the most popular platforms on which developers build out their digital products.
Rather than selling Drupal off as an individual enterprise-facing software and platform, however, Acquia founders Buytaert and Jay Batson decided to keep Drupal free to the public, thereby allowing for the creation of an "incredibly vibrant community" around the product.
Acquia, on the other hand, would create tools to help enterprises succeed with Drupal.
As a result, the company's success is tied directly to the adoption of the Drupal platform, explained Wentworth.
"In the early days, there were concerns about steering the Drupal community in a different way," noted the CMO. "But [Buytaert and Batson] struck the delicate balance between making sure Acquia is advancing our business without impacting the overall momentum of the Drupal community."
While the tech itself is enough to attract the masses, the company is also certainly doing its part in cherishing the Drupal community. Wentworth said that Acquia often sponsors and participates in Drupal meetups and conferences which bring together and empower the more than one million users. Acquia even has over 100 Drupalists dedicated to giving back to the community and helping drive the evolution of Drupal.
"The people that are attracted to Drupal are different," said Wentworth, adding that so are the employees hard at work in Acquia's Burlington, Mass. headquarters.
One of the pillars of Acquia's culture is shared with the very own community it has created around Drupal: Inspire a little crazy.
"Although we sell enterprise software, we're not an enterprise software company," Wentworth argued. "We don't hold ourself to the rules that have been there in the past...We're always looking for the next thing to grow and create."
