Microsoft Leads £2.5m Funding Round in Serverless Framework Provider Webiny

London-based Webiny plans multi-cloud support, starting with Azure; a Webiny Control Panel; and dynamic pages support for its Page Builder product.

Serverless framework provider Webiny raised $3.5 million (£2.5 million) last week in a seed funding round led by Microsoft’s venture arm M12, with notable participation from Samsung Next, Cota Capital, Episode 1 and Y Combinator.

London-based Webiny was started in 2019 initially as a serverless content management system. It picked up a pre-seed funding round of $347,000 (£253,300) in October 2019.

Sven Al Hamad, Founder of Webiny, says it has evolved from that into two different products. One is still the serverless CMS, but the other a new serverless application framework focusing on building full-stack apps and GraphQL APIs. Both products are “free” and open-source. Although Webiny offers a paid version for businesses that want extra security and support.

The funding will be used for a variety of things, but Al Hamad explains that there are four main ones.

These comprise multi-cloud support, starting with Azure; a Webiny Control Panel (its first commercial product); dynamic pages support for its Page Builder product; and a desire to improve its documentation and developer experience. (Webiny is also looking to make a couple of new hires.)

In terms of Webiny’s serverless CMS, this comes with several different apps – Headless CMS, Page Builder, Form Builder and File Manager – which can be used independently, or together as part of one solution. Use cases mentioned on its website include marketing sites and intranet portals.

The serverless application framework allows users to architect, build and deploy serverless applications. It allows people to define their infrastructure, deploy the stack, expand the GraphQL API, and then check user permissions. Quite a few example projects are listed on its website. For instance, full-stack web apps; external or internal APIs; multi-database solutions; microservices; multi-tenant SaaS applications; and internal applications.

Two clients mentioned on its website are both in Germany. S-Markt & Mehrwert is a service company that is is a part of the Sparkassen-Finanzgruppe. Reha Assist Deutschland provides rehabilitation services.

There are companies offering similar services as Webiny.

There is Google App Engine; and in San Francisco, Serverless Inc. (set up in 2016) and Heroku (founded 2007). Heroku was bought by Salesforce for $212 million (£154.8 million) in 2010.

In 2019, Zoho Corp., headquartered in India, announced the release of Catalyst, the company’s new-generation cloud Platform as a Service. Catalyst is designed to allow developers to create and run microservices and applications for their custom solutions with a serverless option.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Serverless Computing

Webopedia explains the advantages and disadvantages of serverless computing.

The positives are lower cost, scalability, and increased productivity and efficiency. With the latter, serverless architecture cuts down on time to market. Plus with Function as a Service (Faas), developers can create simple, event-driven functions.

The negatives are resource limits, diagnoses and privacy (as a lot of serverless computing environments are based on public cloud environments).

Over at eWeek, Chris J. Preimesberger, Editor Emeritus, discussed ‘Why Serverless May Become a Dominant Programming Paradigm’.

He noted that serverless computing – otherwise known as FaaS – doesn’t mean there isn’t a server doing the heavy lifting; it’s about the user not seeing or maintaining the server and not caring where in the world it’s located. It’s all about getting the work processed in a timely manner somewhere where you aren’t watching.

The idea of ‘serverless’ computing came upon the IT scene about 11 years ago as an interesting buzzword and potential greenfield for new products for enterprises, developers and IT product makers.

Antony Peyton
Antony Peyton
Antony Peyton is the Editor of eWeek UK. He has 18 years' journalism and writing experience. His career has taken him to China, Japan and the UK - covering tech, fintech and business. Follow on Twitter @TonyFintech.
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