Cloudflare, Inc.
Company History
Cloudflare History: Founding, Growth & Key Milestones
Founded 2009 in San Francisco, United States
When was Cloudflare founded?
Cloudflare was founded in 2009 in San Francisco, United States by Matthew Prince, Michelle Zatlyn and Lee Holloway, making it 17 years old.
- Founded
- 2009
- Founding place
- San Francisco, United States
- Founders
- Matthew Prince, Michelle Zatlyn and Lee Holloway
- Headquarters today
- San Francisco, California
- Milestones documented
- 11 (2009–2026)
- Current CEO
- Matthew Prince
- Acquisitions
- 8
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 2009 | Cloudflare Founded |
| 2010 | TechCrunch Disrupt Launch |
| 2014 | Universal SSL and Project Galileo |
| 2017 | Cloudflare Workers Announced |
| 2018 | 1.1.1.1 DNS Resolver |
| 2019 | NYSE IPO |
| 2020 | Cloudflare One Launched |
| 2022 | Area 1 Security and R2 General Availability |
| 2024 | Revenue Reaches $1.67 Billion |
| 2025 | Revenue Passes $2 Billion |
| 2026 | VoidZero Acquisition and Growth Acceleration |
- Where was Cloudflare founded?
- Cloudflare was founded in San Francisco, United States in 2009. wikidata.org
- Who founded Cloudflare?
- Cloudflare was founded by Matthew Prince, Michelle Zatlyn and Lee Holloway.
- When did Cloudflare start?
- Cloudflare was founded in 2009.
- How old is Cloudflare?
- Cloudflare is 17 years old as of 2026.
Founding Story
In 2004, Matthew Prince and Lee Holloway built Project Honey Pot, an open-source project that tracked how spammers harvested email addresses from websites. While Prince was at Harvard Business School, he and classmate Michelle Zatlyn turned the idea into a business plan: instead of only tracking bad actors, sit in front of websites and stop them. The three founded Cloudflare in 2009 and launched publicly at TechCrunch Disrupt in September 2010, offering free basic protection and acceleration to any website.
Founders
Matthew Prince
Matthew Prince is Cloudflare's co-founder, CEO, and board chair. In 2004 he and Lee Holloway built Project Honey Pot, which let website owners track spammers harvesting email addresses but could not stop them. While at Harvard Business School, Prince worked with classmate Michelle Zatlyn on a plan to sit in front of websites and block that traffic, and the three founded Cloudflare in 2009. The company launched at TechCrunch Disrupt in September 2010 with free protection for any website. Prince led Cloudflare through its September 2019 NYSE IPO and its expansion from web security into Zero Trust networking, developer services, and AI tools. Under his leadership revenue passed $2 billion in 2025 ($2.17 billion), and he has become one of the more outspoken tech executives on deplatforming, privacy, and AI crawler economics. Matthew Prince was born in 1974 in Salt Lake City.
Michelle Zatlyn
Michelle Zatlyn is Cloudflare's co-founder, President, and Chief Operating Officer, and a member of its board. She met Matthew Prince at Harvard Business School, where the two developed the business plan that became Cloudflare in 2009. She has led go-to-market, operations, and company-building functions as Cloudflare grew from a startup into a public company with more than 5,000 employees. Michelle Zatlyn was born in 1979 in Prince Albert.
Lee Holloway
Lee Holloway co-founded Cloudflare in 2009 and was its first lead engineer and systems architect. He had earlier built Project Honey Pot with Matthew Prince starting in 2004, and he designed much of Cloudflare's early software infrastructure. Holloway later stepped away from the company after being diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia, an illness his family and Prince have spoken about publicly. Lee Holloway was born in 1981.
Key Milestones
Cloudflare Founded
Matthew Prince, Michelle Zatlyn, and Lee Holloway founded Cloudflare, building on the Project Honey Pot spam-tracking project.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgTechCrunch Disrupt Launch
Cloudflare launched publicly at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco in September 2010, offering free website protection and acceleration.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgUniversal SSL and Project Galileo
Cloudflare gave free SSL certificates to all customers with Universal SSL and launched Project Galileo to protect at-risk nonprofits and journalists for free.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgCloudflare Workers Announced
Cloudflare introduced Workers, a serverless platform built on V8 isolates that lets developers run code across its network.
Source: en.wikipedia.org1.1.1.1 DNS Resolver
Cloudflare launched its 1.1.1.1 public DNS resolver on April 1, 2018.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgNYSE IPO
Cloudflare completed its IPO on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker NET in September 2019 at $15 per share, raising about $525 million.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgCloudflare One Launched
Cloudflare bundled its Zero Trust access, secure web gateway, and network services into Cloudflare One, its SASE platform.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgArea 1 Security and R2 General Availability
Cloudflare acquired email security company Area 1 Security for about $162 million and made R2 zero-egress object storage generally available.
Source: en.wikipedia.orgRevenue Reaches $1.67 Billion
Cloudflare reported 2024 revenue of $1.67 billion and free cash flow of $166.9 million.
Source: cloudflare.comRevenue Passes $2 Billion
Cloudflare reported 2025 revenue of $2.17 billion (+29.8%) and closed its largest contract ever, averaging $42.5 million per year in ACV.
Source: cloudflare.comVoidZero Acquisition and Growth Acceleration
Cloudflare acquired VoidZero, the company behind the Vite JavaScript tooling ecosystem, in June 2026 and reported Q2 2026 revenue growth of 36%.
Source: cloudflare.comMajor Acquisitions
Area 1 Security
2022To integrate predictive email security and phishing prevention capabilities into the Cloudflare One Zero Trust platform, securing the primary attack vector for enterprise breaches.
Zaraz
2021To allow developers to run third-party tools and microservices on Cloudflare's edge network rather than in the browser, improving website performance and security.
Nefeli Networks
2024Added cloud networking and firewall technology to support Cloudflare's network-as-a-service and Zero Trust products.
Baselime
2024Added serverless observability (logs, traces, and errors) for applications running on Cloudflare Workers.
Replicate
2025Added a large catalog of open AI models and model-hosting tools to Cloudflare's Workers AI developer platform.
Human Native
2026Brought an AI training-data marketplace team to support Cloudflare's tools for publishers to control and monetize AI crawler access.
Astro Technology Company
2026Brought the team behind the Astro web framework to Cloudflare to deepen its developer platform.
VoidZero
2026Acquired VoidZero, the open source-first company behind the Vite JavaScript tooling ecosystem, announced June 4, 2026.
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Cloudflare Company History FAQ
When was Cloudflare founded and where did it launch?
Cloudflare was founded in July 2009 in San Francisco by Matthew Prince, Michelle Zatlyn, and Lee Holloway, officially launching to the public at TechCrunch Disrupt in September 2010.
When did Cloudflare launch Universal SSL and double the encrypted web?
In September 2014, Cloudflare launched Universal SSL, issuing free HTTPS certificates to all users and doubling the number of encrypted sites on the global internet overnight.
When did Cloudflare launch Cloudflare Workers and serverless computing?
Cloudflare announced Workers in September 2017, a serverless platform built on V8 isolates that lets developers run code across its global network.
When did Cloudflare launch 1.1.1.1 public DNS resolver?
On April 1, 2018 (4/1), Cloudflare launched 1.1.1.1, the world's fastest and most privacy-focused public DNS resolver, followed by the WARP consumer VPN app.
When did Cloudflare complete its initial public offering on the NYSE?
On September 13, 2019, Cloudflare completed its initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange under ticker symbol NET, raising $525 million at an IPO price of $15 per share.
When did Cloudflare launch Cloudflare One Zero Trust and R2 Storage?
Cloudflare launched its Cloudflare One Zero Trust SASE platform in October 2020 and introduced Cloudflare R2 zero-egress object storage in September 2021, directly challenging AWS S3.
When did Cloudflare launch Workers AI and edge GPU computing?
In September 2023, Cloudflare launched Workers AI, deploying Nvidia GPUs across its global edge network to provide serverless AI inference close to global end users.
What is Cloudflare's global impact on the internet today?
Cloudflare operates in more than 330 cities, says roughly 20% of websites use its services, and reported $2.17 billion of revenue in 2025.
How did Cloudflare start?
Cloudflare was founded in 2009 by Matthew Prince, Michelle Zatlyn, and Lee Holloway. It evolved out of "Project Honey Pot," an open-source project Prince and Holloway created in 2004 simply to track how spammers harvested email addresses.
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