“Knowing different people in Minecraft” changed the company-from the age of 49, the founder of ServiceNow-ZDNet Japan

ServiceNow is one of the suppliers gaining growth momentum in the enterprise IT field. The previously announced “Forbes” magazine “Most Innovative Company” suddenly jumped to number one, ahead of Workday, Salesforce.com and Tesla. Sales in 2017 were US$1.93 billion, an increase of 39% over the previous year. It is also expected to increase by 30% in 2018.

What kind of company is the company? At the ServiceNow event “Knowledge 2018”, founder Fred Luddy and CEO John Danahoe discussed the background and vision of the company’s establishment. tell.

Start a young company

ServiceNow is a SaaS provider that provides IT service management (ITSM) through the cloud, such as IT service desks. Founded in 2003. Luddy, 63, was only 49 at the time and was never young.

Before founding, Luddy was the chief technology officer of Peregrine Systems’ IT services and asset management department. In 2003, Peregrine was hit by an accounting scandal and subsequent bankruptcy. So Luddy continues to develop ServiceNow, but since the Peregrine era, he seems to think that “IT should be easier”.

“In terms of’how to treat employees, I feel frustrated.’ For ordinary people, the IT department is too difficult. Thanks to Excel and other people, employees’ knowledge of technology is increasing, but I want to know even at lower technical levels How to build your own application.” He developed an office service there, but “no one knew that there was such a thing on the Internet, but in the end it was not sold,” Ludi said with a smile.

At that time, client/server was still the mainstream, and “Internet Explorer 5.5” dominated the market. Cloud is still very new, but he is determined to “do it in a different way. License, implement and upgrade in a new way.”

After creating Luddy, a simple platform for building workflows, he gradually gained market acceptance by focusing on IT support.

“The platform I drew on the first day was still the foundation,” Luddy said. When describing the company, ServiceNow still quoted Luddy: “Build a cloud-based platform that allows ordinary people to interact effectively.”

He made several improvements to the user interface so that “normal people” can use it. When I started my career in the mainframe era, what I learned was the spirit of “do everything possible to satisfy customers.” The phrase “listen, learn, do” can also say this.

ServiceNow has expanded from ITSM to customer service, security and personnel management on a single platform. The IPO was also realized in 2012. It was valued at 2 billion U.S. dollars, and its current value is 15 times that of 30 billion U.S. dollars.

When the company grew and successfully raised funds, Luddy decided that he was not a “management professional” and decided to hire a CEO from outside. The first is Frank Slotman, who has grown from a startup to a company. As a result, Luddy became chief product officer. In 2017, starting from the serious expansion of ITSM’s service delivery field and the attractiveness of being easy to use like consumers, the former top manager of eBay Danahoe was appointed as CEO. At this time, Luddy also handed over the position of CPO to EMC’s invitation.

Luddy said: “In 2018, the cloud computing ecosystem has calmed down. It is not that the hype cycle is constantly changing.” He said: “We can get outstanding talent.” It seems that “people who understand the world are different from their own world.” “For example, designers with a background in the game industry and a management team appointed from outside will enable the company to grow.