Investing Talk #24: Atlassian Business
Atlassian Corporation Plc is an Australian-founded global software company, headquartered in Sydney, Australia, with co-headquarters in San Francisco, USA.
Founded in 2002 by Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar, Atlassian develops collaboration, project management, and software development tools designed to help teams plan, track, and build products more efficiently.
As of 2025, Atlassian serves over 300,000 customers worldwide and has a market capitalization exceeding USD $50 billion.
Core Business Segments
1. Work Management & Collaboration Tools
Tools that help teams organize projects, tasks, and communication.
Key Products:
- Jira Work Management – project and task tracking for business teams.
- Confluence – documentation and knowledge-sharing workspace.
- Trello – visual project management and task boards (acquired in 2017).
- Atlas – team alignment and goal tracking tool.
2. Software Development & IT Service Management
Tools that power agile software development, DevOps, and IT operations.
Key Products:
- Jira Software – agile project management for software teams.
- Jira Service Management – IT service management (ITSM) for support teams.
- Bitbucket – source code management and Git repository hosting.
- Bamboo – continuous integration and deployment (CI/CD).
- Opsgenie – incident response and alerting platform.
These tools are used across industries for software development, product management, and technical operations.
3. Cloud Services & Platform
Atlassian has transitioned most of its products to cloud-based offerings, hosted on its own infrastructure or via AWS.
Includes:
- Atlassian Cloud – subscription-based SaaS model.
- Data Center – for self-managed enterprise deployments.
- Marketplace – ecosystem where third-party developers sell apps, add-ons, and integrations (Atlassian takes a revenue share).
Revenue Model
| Source | Description |
|---|---|
| Cloud Subscriptions | Recurring revenue from SaaS customers (main growth engine). |
| Data Center Licenses | On-premise enterprise licenses with annual maintenance fees. |
| Marketplace Commissions | Percentage from third-party app sales. |
| Training & Services | Certification, consulting, and enterprise support. |
Atlassian uses a low-touch, self-service sales model, meaning customers typically purchase online with minimal direct sales involvement — this keeps costs low and margins high.
Financial Snapshot (2025 est.)
- Revenue: ~USD $4.5–5 billion
- Annual Growth: ~20%+ year-over-year
- Net Income: Modest or break-even (due to heavy R&D investment)
- Employees: ~12,000 globally
- Customers: 300,000+ across 190 countries
Key Markets
- Software and IT teams
- Business and marketing project teams
- Enterprises and SMBs (especially tech-driven organizations)
- Government and education sectors
Strategic Focus & Growth Drivers
- Cloud-first transition – migrating all legacy customers to Atlassian Cloud.
- AI Integration – adding generative AI features (Atlassian Intelligence) for automation, summarization, and task suggestions.
- Platform Ecosystem – growing the Atlassian Marketplace and integration ecosystem (Slack, GitHub, Zoom, etc.).
- Enterprise Expansion – scaling Jira Service Management and Confluence for large organizations.
- Developer and Team Collaboration – blending dev and business tools under one ecosystem.
Major Competitors
- Project Management: Asana, Monday.com, Smartsheet, ClickUp
- Collaboration: Notion, Google Workspace, Microsoft Teams
- DevOps & ITSM: GitLab, ServiceNow, GitHub, PagerDuty
Business Strengths
✅ Strong brand loyalty among software engineers and IT teams
✅ Scalable self-service business model with high margins
✅ Diversified product ecosystem
✅ Recurring subscription-based revenue
✅ Global customer base and developer community
Challenges
- Dependence on cloud migration success
- Intense competition from AI-driven collaboration tools
- Complexity for non-technical users
- Revenue concentration in a few key products (mainly Jira and Confluence)
Future Outlook
Atlassian aims to:
- Become the dominant cloud collaboration platform for teams worldwide.
- Integrate AI across all workflows (Atlassian Intelligence).
- Expand its enterprise customer base while maintaining its strong foothold among developers and startups.
- Continue developing its marketplace ecosystem to drive third-party innovation.