I like graphql as technology - I find it just a better way than REST for building services, and I like that it's just json - simple easy to debug text responses. I like that there are companies investing in this technology.
But, I don't see how you build a VC funded business out of this - countless examples of infra companies trying to build a business out of OSS technology and they always struggle to get paid because they provide so much value for free.
Our approach (at Apollo) for building a VC funded business out of this is:
1. Build the best GraphQL developer tools we can, focusing on making developers happy. Make sure those tools are open source, and involve the GraphQL community as much as possible when building them, to make sure we're building tools developers actually want to use. With those tools available, make sure any developer who wants to use them can, for free.
2. At the same time, build more advanced tooling and sophisticated GraphQL infrastructure components (that would be costly for an individual organization to build and maintain themselves), that provide a way for businesses and organizations to effectively, efficiently, and securely manage their GraphQL based infrastructure. Give anyone the chance to use these more advanced tools/components for free up to a certain threshold, to see if they're a good fit and if they're worth the money. If all signs point to yes, we then start charging.
Our approach is fairly simple, and has been followed successfully by many companies before us (a simple plan is a good plan). We've been following this approach for a while (before this funding came into place), and things have been going extremely well.
As a customer, I see a lot of value from Apollo's SAAS, which helps in "productionizing" graphQL. GraphQL has more sophisticated instrumentation and access control needs than simpler APIs like REST/RPC and there are few if any open source projects that can do this. It was a pretty easy buy vs build decision for my team. Granted open source alternatives may pop up at some point.
But, I don't see how you build a VC funded business out of this - countless examples of infra companies trying to build a business out of OSS technology and they always struggle to get paid because they provide so much value for free.
Docker Inc's struggles come to mind here...