Quixey
The business, the turning points, and the decisions behind them.
01 / WHAT IT BUILT
What the company did
Quixey was a mobile search company founded in 2009 in Mountain View, California by Tomer Kagan and Liron Shapira. Its 'functional' search engine let users find apps by the actions they wanted to perform rather than by app name, and its Deep View Cards and deep-linking technology powered in-app search for partners such as Sprint, Ask.com, browser makers and device manufacturers.
02 / Quixey FAILURE REASONS
Failure reasons
Quixey was undone by its dependence on Alibaba. After raising about $164 million, the company entered a $100 million commercial contract with Alibaba that soured; the dispute was settled in 2016 with a $10 million payment plus $30 million in debt that carried an 18-month repayment term and gave Alibaba veto power over any future funding. Unable to repay the loan or raise new equity, and squeezed by Google and Apple building their own in-app search and assistants, Quixey shut down in February 2017.
03 / EVENT HISTORY
Events in the structured record
- Company founded
Quixey was founded.
- Operations ended
Quixey ended operations.
04 / CONTEMPORARY REBUILD ASSESSMENT
Difficulty of rebuilding this project today
Material for this section is being gathered and checked. It will appear here once ready.
Overall assessment: Not completed
05 / CAUSAL CHAIN
How the factors connect
- 01
Quixey raised about $164.2 million in total funding, including a $60 million round in 2015 that valued it at roughly $600 million.
- 02
In August 2016, Alibaba settled a contract dispute with a $10 million payment plus $30 million in debt financing, with an 18-month repayment term and veto power over future equity funding.
- 03
Unable to repay the Alibaba loan or raise new capital, Quixey laid off most of its staff and shut down in February 2017.