Atlassian buys DX for $1 billion to boost developer productivity

Productivity software giant Atlassian announced Thursday that it will acquire developer productivity insight platform DX in a $1 billion cash and restricted stock deal, marking its largest acquisition to date.

DX helps enterprises analyze engineering team productivity and pinpoint bottlenecks that slow down development. The platform, founded five years ago by Abi Noda and Greyson Junggren, has gained traction with more than 350 enterprise customers including ADP, Adyen, and GitHub, while raising under $5 million in venture funding.

A Natural Fit

Atlassian co-founder and CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes said the company had been working for three years on building its own developer productivity tool before deciding to acquire instead. DX emerged as the natural choice, particularly since 90% of DX’s customers already use Atlassian’s project management and collaboration tools.

“DX has done an amazing job [of] understanding the qualitative and quantitative aspects of developer productivity and turning that into actions that can improve those companies and give them insights and comparisons,” Cannon-Brookes told TechCrunch.

He added that the timing was right amid the rise of AI tools, with companies eager to measure whether their growing budgets are being spent effectively.

DX’s Growth Story

Noda said he launched DX after his experience as a product manager at GitHub showed him that traditional engineering metrics failed to capture the full picture. Instead of relying on surveillance-like tools, DX blends quantitative data with qualitative insights from developers themselves.

Since coming out of stealth in 2022, DX has tripled its customer base annually. Noda said Atlassian’s acquisition creates an end-to-end productivity “flywheel”, allowing customers to identify bottlenecks using DX’s platform and resolve them with Atlassian’s suite of tools.

“We are able to provide customers with that full flywheel to get the data and understand where we are unhealthy,” Noda said. “They can plug in Atlassian’s tools and solutions to go address those bottlenecks. An end-to-end flywheel that is ultimately what customers want.”

Expanding Atlassian’s Portfolio

The DX acquisition comes just weeks after Atlassian bought The Browser Company, developer of an AI-first web browser, marking the company’s second acquisition in September.

Both moves highlight Atlassian’s strategy to broaden its developer-focused product ecosystem at a time when demand for AI-driven insights and efficiency tools is accelerating.

DX’s platform will be integrated into the broader Atlassian suite following the close of the deal.