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Connectbase: Building in the $1.6 Trillion Connected World Most Founders Never See

Ben Edmond built his company in an industry worth $1.6 trillion that most people have never heard of. While founders chase the latest AI trend or consumer app, Ben has spent nearly a decade solving fundamental problems in what he calls “the connected world” – the hidden infrastructure that powers everything digital.

In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, Benjamin Edmond, CEO and founder of Connectbase, shared how he transformed an industry plagued by Excel spreadsheets and manual processes into a streamlined digital ecosystem serving 427+ service providers, including 82% of the global Gartner Magic Quadrant.

The Hidden Infrastructure Powering Digital Life

Most founders think about building on top of existing infrastructure. Ben built the infrastructure itself. “We serve the service providers that deliver that connectivity experience that we know and depend on today,” Ben explains. “Think of three layered cake. We have a digital infrastructure layer made up of data centers, towers and fiber infrastructure. We have a network services layer with lots of brands that we know and love that are common out there. The AT&Ts of the world, the Comcasts of the world. And then we have this managed services layer, things like UCAAS and SD WAN and SASE.”

This isn’t a typical startup story. Ben didn’t stumble across this opportunity browsing Product Hunt. He lived it. After graduating from Northeastern University in the mid-90s, he went straight to work for MCI, the challenger long-distance company. “Back when long distance was an actual thing and we picked up the phone and we didn’t have, you know, all kinds of apps on the phone, we just literally dial,” Ben recalls.

The industry problem was massive but invisible: “The go to market team was disconnected from the engineering and operations team with where the aspects were, there wasn’t a good tool set. So things got conveyed in Excel spreadsheets to billion dollar buyers and across the industry. And spreadsheets were filled out by human beings with inaccuracy and bad data and no conform structure.”

From Zero to Million in 14 Months

Ben’s approach to building Connectbase defied conventional startup wisdom. Instead of raising funding first, he built. “From October 1, 2015 when I started the business through the end of March, was all build, build,” Ben says. “And then in April we launched our first product, the Connected World with a tool, a workflow tool called Building List Manager, that you know, super sexy product that took an Excel spreadsheet out of the equation and created a cloud based workflow for sharing where you could serve fiber.”

Six months from idea to launch. Fourteen months to $1 million ARR. No funding required initially.

“Yeah, we had good traction from the fiber industry in particular because most of them felt the pain that I lived before I started the company,” Ben explains. The solution was immediately obvious to anyone who had wrestled with the status quo.

His early go-to-market strategy was refreshingly simple: “Friends of Ben. So, you know, big network in the industry. Lots of people I’ve collaborated with and known and worked with over the years and literally doing demonstrations and talking to them about, you know, what they’re doing and what the solution I had and getting people on board that way.”

This friends-and-family approach worked until it didn’t. “Took about 12 months to hire that first, you know, salesperson on the team and, you know, have the courage to put somebody on payroll,” Ben recalls.

The Critical Mistake: Chasing Bright Shiny Objects

Even with early traction, Ben made costly mistakes that nearly every founder can relate to. “Selling to the wrong customers would probably be the number one thing as hard as it is as a small company,” Ben admits. “Really staying true to who your ICP is where you know you can deliver value and extend it in a repeatable way.”

Connectbase started selling to consultants and real estate companies – customers who seemed interested but weren’t the core market. “They were, you know, frankly just a waste of time and energy versus the service providers that you know, we serve over 427 of them,” Ben reflects. “We matter to them, they matter to us and we know it.”

This lesson cost time and resources but taught Ben a fundamental truth: “It’s pretty easy for lots of people to deliver one time value and then move on, but it’s not very valuable really focusing on customers that are going to get durable long term value and you’re aligned to accelerating, supporting and uniquely positioned to help.”

The Brand Investment Inflection Point

Around year three, Ben realized that Connectbase needed to evolve beyond direct sales. The problem wasn’t lead generation – it was market education. “We needed to start building a brand and having a position around things that were new and need to be educated because we’re, you know, fundamentally changing behavior and behavior is hard to change.”

This insight led to one of Ben’s most powerful concepts: location truth. Instead of letting each company maintain its own internal, biased data systems, Connectbase created a shared language for the entire ecosystem. “If 70% of the revenue flows through the ecosystem from channel partners and wholesale, you probably want to speak the same language as your trading partners, whether you’re buying or selling.”

The brand investment wasn’t about vanity metrics. Ben developed what he calls the “17 times rule”: “If I don’t say the same thing 17 times, you know, very confident that the words are not going to be, you know, completely understood and actioned on. But if I do, I’m going to get my point across and be relevant in positioning.”

Creating Categories of One

In an industry with 800+ companies and $35 billion in revenue, Ben could have positioned Connectbase as a better version of existing solutions. Instead, he chose a different path. “I like categories of one instead of categories of many,” Ben explains. “We’ve tried to establish that with, you know, things that might have point solutions and one or two things that we compete with holistically across the 16 different use cases, but doesn’t take the approach holistically that we do with an Ecosystem, fabric with location, truth.”

This positioning strategy extended to every aspect of the business. When building out the marketing team, Ben insisted on revenue focus from day one. “Vanity metrics, don’t pay anyone’s payroll. So you know, really focus on people that have a belief that marketing is part of the revenue engine and an important critical part and driving, you know, the marketing mix to get to close one customers and upsells and long term relationships.”

Fundraising as Partnership, Not Transaction

Connectbase has raised $70 million in funding, but Ben’s approach to fundraising reflects the same strategic thinking that built the company. “The importance of picking partners. Almost like getting married,” Ben explains. “But picking a investment partner is not about just getting the capital. You know, find the partners that actually understand your space that you operate in, be choosy, and partners that are going to, you know, help you move forward.”

This partnership mindset extends to every relationship. “Because business is hard, doesn’t matter, you know, if you think you are a genius and you have an amazing solution, you know, getting people to buy things and stay with you and keep doing that. And this thing called growth is all hard everywhere. And so you want people in the corner with a belief and a set of skills and capabilities that are going to elevate you, challenge you, and make you better.”

Building Ecosystem Champions

Ben’s advice for early-stage founders reflects everything he’s learned about building in complex, relationship-driven industries: “Build an ecosystem of champions and shout really loud because it’s a noisy world out there with a lot of distractions.”

This isn’t just about customer advocacy. “You got to get your customers as champions, your partners, your suppliers, you know, people talking about why you should do business with whatever you’re trying to accomplish.” Ben leverages LinkedIn, conferences, podcasts, email, and phone calls – multiple touchpoints to reinforce key messages across the entire ecosystem.

The Future of Connected Infrastructure

Looking ahead, Ben sees massive changes coming to the industry that enabled his success. “The world is changing more in the next three years is a fundamental belief I have, than it’s ever changed in the last 30 years. I’ve been doing work here and you know, we’re at the ground floor of an industry that enables that to actually happen.”

Connectbase sits on 1.95 trillion rows of data about the connected world. As AI, cloud, and content services demand more connectivity, that data becomes increasingly valuable. “We are going to lean into, you know, how we accelerate value creation for our customers in that context of change and deliver our own, you know, AI experiences, our own unique way of taking 1.95 trillion rows of data on the connected world and turning it into value creation that excites people.”

Ben’s journey with Connectbase proves that the biggest opportunities often exist in industries most founders never consider. By deeply understanding customer pain, staying focused on the right market, and building genuine ecosystem partnerships, he’s created a platform that powers the infrastructure powering everything else.