Waldo is a ‘no code’ automated mobile testing service that anyone can use

Published July 16, 2020

Meet Waldo, a new product that wants to make mobile testing both faster and easier. The New York-based startup lets you record tests in your browser by interacting with your app like you’d normally do. Every time you compile a new build, Waldo runs the same tests you previously recorded on multiple software and hardware models to tell you if everything works fine.

If you’re an app developer, you currently have two possibilities. You can keep a bunch of smartphones and run your current build on these devices to see if there’s anything wrong, but it takes a ton of time. Or you can develop testing scripts that validate the core features of your app — but that requires additional development and creates a whole new set of headaches when you need to update your scripts.

“It’s always a bit weird that we can create incredible experiences when it comes to UX, but that the way we test those apps is outdated,” co-founder and CEO Amine Bellakrid told me.

Waldo wants to lower the barrier to entry and let smaller mobile development teams take advantage of automated functional and UI testing. It is part of a bigger trend of “no code” startups — no technical skills required.

The company raised a $6.5 million round led by First Round Capital (with Josh Kopelman), with existing investor Matrix Partners and business angels also participating.

‘No code’ will define the next generation of software

Creating tests on Waldo is pretty straightforward. The product runs your app directly (.app / .ipa / .apk), which means you don’t have to create a special version of your app to take advantage of the platform.

After uploading your app, you see your app running in your browser window. Waldo records every screen and every action you take. For instance, you can record the signup flow or a feature that lets you upload content.

Image Credits: Waldo

When you’re done recording your tests, Waldo keeps them for future versions. Every time you have a new build of your mobile app, Waldo runs the same tests on that new version. In addition to that, Waldo can run those tests on other devices with different screen sizes, older versions of mobile operating systems and in different languages.

If a test fails, users get notified and can browse the replay of the test. You can see exactly what went wrong to spot the problematic step more easily.

The idea is that you set up Waldo once and let it run in the background. It integrates with popular continuous integration (CI) tools, such as Fastlane, Bitrise and CircleCI. You can receive alerts in Slack or see the status of your test results in GitHub directly.

“We have customers that run 500 tests at once every week or we have customers that run 10 to 15 tests multiple times a day,” Bellakrid said.

Waldo is launching a free plan today to kick the tires, and you can then pay a subscription to run more tests. Some companies have started using Waldo already, such as AllTrails, Jumprope, KeepSafe and Elevate. Right now, Waldo only works with iOS apps, but the team is already working on adding Android support in the future.

Image Credits: Waldo

Automated web app testing startup ProdPerfect raises $13M Series A led by Anthos Capital

Published December 17, 2019

This morning ProdPerfect, a technology startup focused on web application testing, announced a $13 million Series A led by Anthos Capital. Anthos is perhaps best known for investing in Honey, a startup which recently sold to PayPal for several billion dollars.

ProdPerfect, a remote-focused company, closed a $2.6 million seed round earlier in 2019. Fika Ventures and Eniac Ventures took part in the Series A after also putting capital into the company in the company’s preceding seed investment. The startup has now raised $15.7 million across three rounds, according to Crunchbase.

What does ProdPerfect’s product do regarding testing? And what is it going to do with all its new money? TechCrunch chatted with Dan Widing, ProdPerfect’s founder and CEO, to answer those questions, and learn how quickly the company is growing.

Testing

ProdPerfect automates end-to-end testing for web developers. According to Widing, the product “followed some of the lessons of the product analytics industry to build a tool that lets us quantitatively understand how our customers’ live users traverse the customers’ web application.” The company estimates that “many companies are compelled to put around 20% of their engineering budget into staffing a QA engineering department,” spend that it reckons it can help cut.

The web is a big place, with lots of pages and apps and more built and maintained by a global army of developers. Those end products require testing to find errors and bugs that could cause havoc for end users and companies alike. You can test well, or poorly. But according to Widing, the “gold standard of web testing is either directly or indirectly controlling a browser to traverse the site like a user does,” also known as “end-to-end testing.”

The product seems to have found early market traction. According to Widing, 18 months after landing its first handful of customers, his company has reached the 50-customer mark, generating “around $2 million” in annual recurring revenue (ARR), a standard revenue metric for modern software (SaaS) companies.

What’s next

When TechCrunch last covered ProdPerfect, we called it a “Boston-based startup focused on automating QA testing for web apps.” All of that is still true aside from the location. According to its CEO, ProdPerfect transferred its headquarters from Boston to San Francisco earlier in 2019. However, Widing said, ProdPerfect doesn’t focus on the move much, as it views itself as “a remote-first company.”

But no matter where its nexus sits, the company plans on investing heavily in sales and marketing spend (traditional for a Series A-level company looking to quickly expand revenue), and invest in “product development and customer service,” according to Widing. So, tech investments, go-to-market spend and a modest war chest for the future are the game plan for ProdPerfect’s new money. (Widing noted in an email to TechCrunch that “it helps to have a good stockpile” in times of global macro uncertainty, which is a smart perspective.)

The firm ARR figure that ProdPerfect provided will help the market vet its progress over the next few years. The company will probably aim for more than a doubling in size next year, more likely shooting for a tripling. So, how close to $6 million ARR that ProdPerfect can reach in 2020 will be fun to watch. If the firm manages that sort of growth, expect it to raise again to keep investing in its product and go-to-market motion.

Photo by Ilya Pavlov on Unsplash

Instagram launches an alpha testing program on iOS and Android

Published December 19, 2017

Are you an early adopter? Okay, but are you a really early adopter who likes to test new, experimental things even if it means you’ll experience crashes and bugs? Then you may be interested to know that Instagram has launched Alpha testing programs on iOS and Android aimed at those who want to test pre-release versions of its popular photo-sharing app. Instagram has been running an… Read More