Melbourne developer tools scaleup Buildkite raised $21 million through a convertible note in January this year, in the wake of rising losses and leadership changes, including the ousting of its CEO-cofounder 18 months ago.
Capital Brief reports that ASIC accounts show the company burnt through $23.4 million in operating cash during FY25, compared with $4.9m the previous year.
Its cash reserves fell from $33.7m to $10.1m while revenue grew 16% to $43.2m. But the net loss more than doubled to $28.4 million.
Employee costs rose to $39.1m, while hosting expenses hit $11.3m.
Those figures cover FY2025, rather than last financial year, with Capital Brief noting that there was no information on whether the cash burn rate had continued at the same level in FY26..
The accounts did not disclose the convertible note’s investor, pricing or conversion terms. Convertible notes do what the packet says, and can subsequently convert into company shares.
The financing followed cofounder Keith Pitt’s departure as CEO in March 2025. Kevin Gounden took the role five months later, while cofounder Lachlan Donald subsequently returned as chief technology officer.
Pitt talked about his departure six months on with Scott Handsaker on Valley of Doubt, and in a LinkedIn post about that conversation, recounted how Atlassian cofounder Scott Farquhar called him and asked how his mental health was, confessing that he tried to brush the issue away, but wasn’t coping and the father of three was concerned about the impact it had on his children.
“The exit put a major strain on me, but it was nothing compared to the strain it put on my family. I’d be sitting on the couch crying and my kids would come up to me and say “daddy why are you crying”. I started hiding away because I didn’t want me kids to see my upset,” PItt wrote.
“What I was going through was nothing compared to what it did to my wife. She had to watch me go through this awful experience and not have any control over what was happening. It was like being in the drivers seat of a slow motion car crash with a broken steering wheel. You want to take control, but not matter how hard you try, nothing changes.”
Pitt went on to found Unreasonable Magic.
He cofounded Buildkite in 2013 with Donald and Tim Lucas, who was also co-CEO, but exited the business in 2022. Lucas returned as a director the day after Pitt’s departure.
The AI coding boom
Buildkite provides the infrastructure developers use to test software and prepare it for release, and potentially has a new lease of life amid the AI coding boom.
Capital Brief reported that in a May recruitment ad, the veteran DevOps scaleup said workloads had doubled over three months. Customers were seeking capacity for five to 10 times more work during 2026 as AI agents generated more code.
Its customers include OpenAI, Anthropic, Canva, Uber, Airbnb and Cursor.
The software development startup raised a $31 million Series B in 2022, led by OneVentures and AirTree, with Up bank founder Dom Pym also chipping in alongside US firm General Catalyst. It previously raised $28 million in 2020 at a $200 million valuation.
Capital Brief sought comment from Buildkite but did not receive a response. You can read Bronwen Clune’s story here.
