In 2001, Mike Cannon-Brookes sent an email to his college classmates in Sydney, asking if anyone was interested in helping him launch a tech startup after graduation. Back then, entrepreneurship wasn't a popular career path in Australia; and Mike's only taker was Scott Farquhar, a fellow student who shared Mike's passion for computers and his frustration for the corporate grind. Together they launched Atlassian, a two-man tech support service that they managed from their bedrooms at all hours of the night. Unable to make money, Scott and Mike decided to pivot and sell some of the software they'd developed for themselves. Out of that grew Jira, a project-management tool that's used in all sorts of endeavors, from pizza delivery to the exploration of Mars. Today, Atlassian is valued at over $50 billion and Scott and Mike are Australia's first startup-to-IPO tech billionaires.

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Show Notes:

2:27 - Intro
4:50 - Scott’s childhood
7:17 - Mike’s childhood
10:03 - Mike and Scott meet in college
11:36 - Mike’s software assignments
12:30 - Mike leaves scholarship and begins a startup
15:20 - Scott’s assignments
16:30 - Scott joins Mike’s new startup
20:11 - The original business idea
22:30 - The name Atlassian
23:27 - Formal business procedures
25:30 - Pivoting away from the service business
29:30 - Building the software
36:59 - Selling Jira
41:37 - The end of the first year
44:30 - The learning curve
48:10 - Running the business
54:35 - Offers to sell the business
58:54 - The possibility of moving on
62:03 - Seeing eye to eye
63:45 - Gaining visibility
65:37 - The challenges of starting in Australia
67:35 - The effects of Covid
70:05 - Why stay?
71:45 - Luck vs. hard work
72:50 - Rock, paper, scissors

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Selected Links:

Mike Cannon-Brookes
Scott Farquhar
Atlassian
Bay Networks
Nortel
Blink.com
Frontdoor
Jira
Riot Games Episode
League of Legends
Dropbox
Atlassian stocks
Rock, paper, scissors odds