Ask Appian Chief Technology Officer Michael Beckley how the D.C. region helped the company get to the public market, and he won't know where to begin.
"D.C. is a fantastic place to start a tech company," Beckley said in an interview with DC Inno from the Nasdaq trading floor Thursday. "I can't think of a better place."
Today, Appian made its debut on the Nasdaq, with shares starting at $12 a piece. After 17 years with the company, helping it launch and grow, it's incredibly rewarding to be standing where Beckley is right now—and being in the D.C. region helped them get there, he says, no doubt about it.
"I know this to be true because we've been doing this for so long, we've seen so many of our friends build great tech companies," he said. "We know Appian is not just a fluke, it's quite the opposite."
On Wednesday, a group of 50 people, including Appian executives, team members and family members, bused up to New York City for the debut of the application software company on the stock market. To make sure they weren't just bringing your run-of-the-mill group—like executives, board members and investors—to the debut, Appian hosted a raffle to pick 10 members of the company to make the trek, too.
"I rode up on a bus with them yesterday, and it was just great to sit there with them and be asked for all these stories about how things emerged," Beckley said. "There were also a lot of our most tenured employees with us, so I wasn't the only one telling these stories. It was great to call out people who I had worked with on projects to get us to where we are. It's been like a reunion, as well."
Beckley admits that the company has long been big enough to make its public debut. They took their time, he said, and having the space and community that also things more long-term in the D.C. area helped them a lot.
"People in D.C. they tend to think longer term, especially in the tech industry," Beckley said. "We have the benefit of that government research culture, injected with the fast pace of innovation in a commercial industry."
Now that Appian has (finally) debuted on the public market, what's next? Expansion of their current product offerings, finding new capabilities for their tech, and hiring more people are all on the plate, Beckley said.
"This is not the end, this is not an exit in anyway. This is really the end of the beginning."
Images courtesy of Appian
