Investments·Updated Mar 17, 2026 by Drake Star Partners
Dev-focused companies significantly outperformed the broader market with a 23 percent total return over the past four quarters, doubling the 11 percent gain seen by Ops-centric peers.
Leading DevOps firms currently command premium revenue growth multiples ranging from 12-to-20-times, with Atlassian, GitLab, HashiCorp, and DataDog identified as top performers.
M&A activity in the DevOps sector rebounded to $27.6 billion in the first half of 2024, driven by major acquisitions including Cisco’s $31 billion purchase of Splunk and IBM’s $7.7 billion acquisition of HashiCorp.
Private-market investment remains highly active, with the ten best-funded DevOps startups securing a cumulative $4.3 billion in capital.
Low-code platforms are becoming a dominant development standard, with projections indicating they will account for more than 65 percent of all new applications.
The convergence of development and operations is being accelerated by the integration of AI-enhanced automation, open-source tools, and a strategic shift toward serverless architectures.
Dev-focused companies significantly outperformed the broader market with a 23 percent total return over the past four quarters, doubling the 11 percent gain seen by Ops-centric peers.
Leading DevOps firms currently command premium revenue growth multiples ranging from 12-to-20-times, with Atlassian, GitLab, HashiCorp, and DataDog identified as top performers.
M&A activity in the DevOps sector rebounded to $27.6 billion in the first half of 2024, driven by major acquisitions including Cisco’s $31 billion purchase of Splunk and IBM’s $7.7 billion acquisition of HashiCorp.
Private-market investment remains highly active, with the ten best-funded DevOps startups securing a cumulative $4.3 billion in capital.
Low-code platforms are becoming a dominant development standard, with projections indicating they will account for more than 65 percent of all new applications.
The convergence of development and operations is being accelerated by the integration of AI-enhanced automation, open-source tools, and a strategic shift toward serverless architectures.