SendGrid

SendGrid was founded by Isaac Saldana, Jose Lopez and Tim Jenkins, all alumni of the University of California, Riverside’s Bourns College of Engineering. The company described its founders as developers frustrated by their own experiences managing email delivery.⁠[1][2]

In 2009, the founders applied with the idea to Techstars, an accelerator in Boulder, Colorado, and graduated in July of that year. The company was incorporated in Delaware in July 2009 and introduced its Email API service the same year.⁠[1][2]

SendGrid grew from 58 employees on December 31, 2011, to 384 full-time employees on June 30, 2017, and opened an office in London. By December 2016 it had raised a $33 million Series D led by Bain Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners and Foundry Group, had an office in Orange, California, with about 60 engineers and support staff, and counted Pandora, SpotifySpotifySpotify is an audio streaming subscription service offering on-demand music, podcasts, and audiobooks through a free ad-supported service and a paid Premium subscription. Its parent company, Spotify Technology S.A., is incorporated in Luxembourg, has its principal operations in Stockholm, Sweden, and is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (ticker SPOT). It helped move the recorded-music business from buying and owning music to on-demand streaming and is one of the largest audio streaming subscription services by users.Open the full entry, Uber, Wal-MartWalmartWalmart is an American retailer founded by Sam Walton in 1962, with businesses spanning physical retail, membership warehouse clubs, e-commerce and related services. Its businesses include Walmart and Sam’s Club, and it has expanded into other markets through international investments; its shares trade on Nasdaq under the ticker WMT.Open the full entry and Costco among its customers.⁠[2][1]

On November 14, 2017, SendGrid issued its IPO prospectus, offering 8.2 million shares of common stock at $16 per share; the stock was approved for listing on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol SEND. Sameer Dholakia was chief executive officer, and the company was headquartered in Denver, Colorado.⁠[3][2][3]

The prospectus described SendGrid as a digital communication platform enabling businesses to engage with customers via email, offering an Email API, Marketing Campaigns and Expert Services. Revenue was $42.8 million, $58.5 million and $79.9 million in 2014, 2015 and 2016, and the company had more than 58,000 customers globally as of September 30, 2017.⁠[3]

In October 2018, cloud communications company Twilio announced an all-stock acquisition of SendGrid, valued at about $2 billion at announcement.⁠[4][5]

After both companies’ stockholders approved the deal on January 30, 2019, Twilio completed the acquisition on February 1, 2019. Based on an exchange ratio of 0.485 Twilio Class A shares per SendGrid share and the prior day’s closing price, the transaction was valued at about $3 billion, or about $53.99 per SendGrid share. SendGrid stock ceased trading before the market opened that day and was delisted from the New York Stock Exchange.⁠[6][7]

SendGrid became a wholly owned subsidiary of Twilio and was renamed Twilio SendGrid, remaining under Sameer Dholakia, who reported to Twilio co-founder and CEO Jeff Lawson.⁠[6][4]

As of October 2026, sendgrid.com redirects to Twilio’s website, where SendGrid’s site has been combined with Twilio.com; its products include the Twilio SendGrid Email API and SMTP service and email campaigns for marketers. Twilio says the platform delivers more than 200 billion emails every month.⁠[8]

Twilio SendGrid: Official website: https://www.twilio.com/en-us/sendgrid (opens in a new window)⁠[8]

Twilio: Official website: https://www.twilio.com/ (opens in a new window)⁠[8]