news  Jack Ellis · Dec 2, 2024

The day has finally come. Fathom Analytics, a company we’ve been running since 2019, has been acquired. We will reveal why we sold, who acquired us, and Fathom’s future.

Surely you’re joking, Mr Ellis?

For those of you who have been following us over the years, especially on social media, you’ll know that we’ve made various jokes about acquisitions and investments (like the time we convinced everybody that we’d taken $100 million in funding but then redirected them to a Rickroll video). But this time, it isn’t a joke.

Fathom has been doing great for a long time. We’ve grown every month since we started, and we’re only improving. We’ve been receiving offers for our company for years—offers from huge private equity companies that would mean we’d never have to work again. But we’ve always said no. We are proudly independent, with 100% ownership split between Paul and me, and we never wanted to sell our company or take outside capital. Plus, acquisitions are challenging to get right. If you don’t do them properly, you can end up with new owners who run the beautiful company you’ve built into the ground.

Why did you sell?

For a long time, Paul and I would often check in and see how the other one felt about everything. During these chats, we’d also discuss how much longer we each want to run Fathom. And as the company got older, our discussions turned towards what might happen when we’re old and grey. We had one idea where we could hire a CEO, with us staying on as board members and both of us being able to retire comfortably. But those conversations often fizzled out as our focus shifted back to running our business.

However, as 2024 came to a close, it became clear that Paul was ready to retire, while I felt like I had many more years left. After all, he’s been working on the internet for a long time, since I was a kid, and he was ready to be done. And while this made me feel incredibly sad, I completely understood.

Who acquired you?

In the interest of transparency, we’ll share who acquired us. The acquirer has promised to keep everything the same, keep the team, keep the same ethics, etc., and they align with Paul and me completely.

The acquirer has the same technical background as me, has experience running analytical workloads at scale, and they’re also British.

I’ve personally known the acquirer for over 25 years. They grew up in the same town as me, and we also went to the same school. We’ve spent thousands of hours together, and I can vouch for them completely, 100%, with all of my heart.

I, Jack Ellis, the technical cofounder of Fathom Analytics, am the person who acquired it. We are so pleased to announce that we’ve officially signed an acquisition agreement, with me taking full control of the company as of 1st December 2024 and Paul exiting the company. I can confirm that he will still be involved on a part-time freelance basis to handle design work for us (phew!).

Fun fact: We actually came to an agreement within 24 hours of discussing Paul’s desire for retirement. We had solidified our agreement on 25th October, but then we spent a month with lawyers and accountants to dial everything in.

But everything is now signed.

What will be changing?

Nothing. Paul and I have always been so heavily aligned with how we run our business. The only thing that will change is that I will likely put more time into enterprise sales deals and spend more money on paid advertising/sponsorships, etc.

The fact that we negotiated an exit in less than 24 hours doesn’t surprise me. It’s a testament to how we work together. We have been able to run this company without a shareholder agreement since starting it because we are aligned in many ways. We’ve also always respected each other’s opinions, even when we disagreed. We always heard each other out. Our relationship has been and will continue to be one of the strongest I’ve had in my life.

The Future

Our team is excited and ready for the next phase of Fathom. We’re not searching for investors, exits, or IPOs. We are 100% focused on delivering value to our customers, whom we sincerely appreciate. We’ll be shipping faster than ever, and we have so much to come in 2025.

I hope that the way we structured Paul’s exit here demonstrates to you how serious we are about being independent, putting our customers first, and staying around for a long time.

Some words about Paul

I met Paul when I was freelancing. We met via his freelancer course, which taught folks how to improve their freelancing business. He was already very successful as an entrepreneur.

We happened to live close to each other here in Canada, so we met for coffee. We instantly clicked on multiple things, and the energy was solid. From there, we worked on a few fun projects and found that we worked well together; the rest is history.

I want to publicly thank and acknowledge Paul for all he has done for me. He was the foundation behind every blog post I’ve ever written. In the early days, when I had no confidence in my writing voice, Paul edited my first blog post and gave me the confidence I needed to publish to the world.

Paul helped me launch and grow my two Laravel courses, sharing what he did with his courses to help me succeed. He even designed both of the websites.

Paul has been incredible to work with. He’s taught me a lot about business, to the point where I am now 1000% ready to run the company by myself. I am so grateful for everything he has done for me.

And while our cofounder relationship has ended, our friendship will live on.

PS: Listen to the podcast episode about Paul retiring