From Red Hat to $10.8M in Funding

Meet Frederic Branczyk, CEO and Founder at Polar Signals:

Frederic Branczyk is the Founder and CEO of Polar Signals, a pioneering company in continuous profiling for cloud-native environments. With a rich background in observability, Frederic previously served as a Senior Principal Engineer at Red Hat, where he was the architect of observability systems following the CoreOS acquisition.

A prominent contributor to the open-source community, Frederic is a maintainer of Prometheus and Thanos and has held leadership roles, including serving as the Tech Lead for Kubernetes’ SIG Instrumentation. Earlier in his career, he worked as a security researcher, focusing on key management and intrusion detection systems.

Beyond his technical achievements, Frederic is on a mission to revolutionize performance monitoring in cloud infrastructure, securing $10.8 million in funding for Polar Signals. In his downtime, Frederic has a passion for perfecting the art of brewing coffee.

Listen Up: Frederic Branczyk, CEO and Founder at Polar Signals — Full Podcast Episode on Spotify

Watch Now: Vit’s In-Depth Talk with Frederic Branczyk

Quick Read: Frederic Branczyk, CEO and Founder at Polar Signals, Interview Highlight

Understanding the Problem: Profiling in Observability

I recently had an enlightening conversation with Frederic Branczyk, the founder and CEO of Polar Signals, on the Default Global podcast. I asked him about the problem he identified in the market that led to the creation of his company. Frederic described his time at Red Hat, where he noticed engineers manually profiling software daily, a task essential for diagnosing performance issues. This realization, combined with insights from a Google white paper on continuous profiling, sparked his interest in automating the process.

Frederic explained:

“It brought so much value to my team’s address at Red Hat very, very quickly.”

This initial foray into continuous profiling revealed the potential for a product that could transform observability in infrastructure.

Polar Signals’ Solution

Curious about the technology behind Polar Signals, I inquired how the company addresses profiling challenges. Frederic shared that their solution involves an agent installed on every host that uses eBPF (a Linux kernel technology) to collect data with minimal overhead. This allows for high-resolution profiling across all processes, offering unprecedented insights.

“It’s a really cool technology,”

Frederic noted, emphasizing its efficiency and the detailed data it provides.

Impressive Impact

I was eager to hear about the impact Polar Signals has had, particularly any numbers that illustrate the company’s success. Frederic highlighted a case involving Materialize, a streaming database company. Within two hours of deploying Polar Signals, Materialize achieved a 35% improvement in latency and cloud cost reduction—an impressive feat for an already optimized codebase.

“Double-digit percentage points improvements are something we see all the time,”

he added, reinforcing the value of their continuous profiling approach.

The Fundraising Journey

Discussing finance, I asked Frederic about Polar Signals’ fundraising journey. Over two rounds, they raised $10.8 million. The decision to raise funds came after they had a clear understanding of their product and company direction.

Frederic explained:

“We understand what we’re going to be doing with this money that we’re going to be raising.”

The second round focused on growth, adapting to a changing fundraising landscape to ensure the company’s ongoing success.

Investor Relationships and Technical Expertise

Given Frederic’s technical background, I was curious how this influenced his interactions with investors. His expertise proved advantageous, particularly when engaging with tech-savvy VCs who understood the company’s value.

“Developers are extraordinarily difficult to sell to,”

he noted, highlighting the importance of in-depth technical knowledge in securing trust and investment.

Choosing the Right Investors

Finally, I explored Frederic’s strategy in selecting investors, such as GV and Light Speed Venture Partners. Beyond capital, Frederic prioritized investors with experience in DevTools and those with existing connections.

He elaborated:

“It was a combination of confidence in a long-term business relationship and increasing the chances of business success,”

This strategic choice reflects an emphasis on collaboration and growth potential.

In summary, my conversation with Frederic Branczyk on Default Global offered valuable insights into how identifying a critical problem and leveraging deep technical knowledge can drive business success. Polar Signals exemplifies how innovative solutions in observability can revolutionize performance optimization across infrastructures.