Most of what's in DashboardFox was built for customers who never signed a contract.
Every demo, every trial, every support call that didn't convert taught us something. A feature shipping today often traces back to a conversation two years ago with a prospect who went with someone else. That's not a failure — that's how software gets shaped by real problems. We're 5000fish. No VC, no pressure to exit. When you reach out, you talk to the engineers who built what you're using.
25+
Years building BI software
Bootstrapped
No VC. No pressure to exit.
1
Codebase — not acquired pieces
Weekly
Releases — not annual upgrades
Built conversation by conversation. Build by build.
This isn't a marketing line. It's the actual process — and it's what makes DashboardFox different from software built for a pitch deck.
Every demo teaches us something
Most demos don't convert. That's fine. We listen harder in the ones that don't — because the friction that stops someone from buying is exactly what we need to fix next.
Every trial reveals gaps
Trial users hit things paying customers have learned to work around. A trial that churns after three days is one of the most valuable data points we have. We read every exit.
Every bug improves the engine
We don't treat bugs as exceptions. We treat them as signals. Every bug report traces back to a real user doing something real — and the fix usually makes the product better for everyone, not just the person who reported it.
Weekly builds, not annual roadmaps
We don't plan features 18 months out and ship them in a big bang release. We learn on Monday and ship on Friday. If you give us feedback today, there's a real chance it's in the product next week.
No VC-funded company can say their roadmap was built from lost deals. They're building for the next funding round. We're building from the last conversation.
25 years of learning
Not just a history — what each era taught us
Started building BI tools
Launched our first reporting product while providing IT services to companies who needed better analytics than their vendors offered.
→ What this taught us: Even non-technical people could build powerful reports if the tool got out of their way. That's still our product philosophy.
Founded 5000fish, launched Yurbi
Spun off our software into a dedicated company. Launched Yurbi for white-label embedded analytics — serving enterprises, SaaS companies, and ISVs.
→ What this taught us: White-label and multi-tenant security aren't enterprise luxuries. They're table stakes for anyone serving more than one client. Every plan includes them today.
Enterprise-hardened
Served organizations across government, healthcare, finance, education, and manufacturing. Built a rock-solid core engine under compliance pressure — security, reliability, and low maintenance were non-negotiable.
→ What this taught us: Healthcare and government clients don't tolerate shortcuts. Row-level security, dedicated databases, encryption at rest — these features exist in every plan today because regulated industries demanded they exist at all.
Launched DashboardFox
Same proven engine, new focus: powerful dashboards for growing businesses without the complexity or cost of enterprise tools.
→ What this taught us: Per-seat pricing is the thing SMBs and agencies hate most. MAU pricing came directly from those early conversations with teams who couldn't justify BI because their client roster didn't log in every month.
Cross-platform release
Rebuilt on .NET Core 9 — now runs natively on Windows, Linux, and Docker. Deploy wherever you want.
→ What this taught us: On-premise customers were leaving because we were Windows-only. We fixed the architecture, not the messaging. Now it runs anywhere.
DashboardFox Cloud
Launched our cloud platform to make enterprise-grade BI accessible to teams who don't want to manage infrastructure. Early Access — 7 days free.
→ What this taught us: Still learning. Every demo and trial right now is shaping what ships next.
Not another Frankenstein BI tool
Most BI vendors grow by acquisition — stitching together competing products with different codebases and inconsistent interfaces. We built DashboardFox from scratch. One codebase. One architecture. Refined build by build over 25 years.
- Acquired products stitched together
- Multiple codebases, inconsistent UI
- Security paywalled to enterprise tiers
- Annual "big bang" releases
- Roadmap set by investor priorities
- Support tickets routed to call centers
- Single codebase built from scratch in 1999
- One architecture, consistent everywhere
- Row-level security in every plan from $99
- Weekly releases based on real conversations
- Roadmap shaped by lost deals and live feedback
- You talk to the engineers who build the product
A note from our founder
I started building BI tools in 1999 because the existing options were either too expensive or too complex for normal businesses. Enterprise vendors charged a fortune and required dedicated IT staff. That problem still exists today — we're still solving it.
We're a small, bootstrapped team. No venture capital, no pressure to chase growth at all costs. When you reach out, you're talking to people who actually build the product. When you give us feedback, it shapes what we build next — sometimes next week.
We're a connect-and-build tool — database-first, built for teams who know their data. Pre-built SaaS connectors and AI features are on our roadmap, but we'd rather ship the core right before we layer on top of it. We'll tell you when we're not the right fit. We'd rather you figure that out during a 7-day trial than in month four.
— David Ferguson, CEO & Founder
How we actually operate.
Not a list of corporate values — the things we can point to as proof
Make things easier, not harder
Our north star in everything
Every interface decision, pricing decision, and support interaction runs through this filter. We deliberately chose MAU pricing because per-seat math is too complicated. We deliberately include security in every plan because choosing a tier to unlock a basic feature is friction we refuse to create.
Lost deals ship features
Most of our roadmap started as a "no"
When a trial doesn't convert, we ask why. When a demo stalls on one capability, we write it down. Most of what's in the product today traces back to someone who didn't buy — and told us exactly why. We read every exit, every support ticket, every comment in a trial.
We tell you when we're not the right fit
Honesty over conversion
We'd rather you find the right tool than start a trial on false premises. We actively redirect ISVs to Yurbi if they need deep OEM embedding. We tell teams building on Salesforce data to use a Salesforce-native tool. An honest "not yet" is better than a bad customer relationship.
Your best interest is our best interest
25 years with no bait-and-switch
We've never raised prices on existing customers without fair notice. We've never paywalled a security feature that was previously included. What you see on the pricing page is what you pay — always. We've operated this way since 1999 because we have no investors pressuring us to do otherwise.
We didn't chase the AI wave. We watched it first.
Every BI vendor added "AI-powered" to their homepage in 2023. We didn't. Here's why — and what's actually coming.
Getting the core right first
AI is only as useful as the layer it sits on top of. Our App/semantic layer — the way we model your data, build queries, and structure reports — is that layer. We've been refining it for years. It's solid. AI that connects to a shaky foundation produces shaky results. We're not there yet, and we're not going to pretend otherwise.
We also observed what happened to the first wave of "AI BI" features: query suggestions that hallucinated column names, natural language interfaces that couldn't handle real data complexity, chart recommendations that ignored context. We watched the market learn. Now we're building.
AI where it actually helps
Our architecture is well-suited for AI integration — the semantic layer means AI can build queries accurately because it understands the data model, not just raw column names.
- Build queries in plain language — describe what you want to see, get a working query
- Suggest and build visualizations — right chart for the right data automatically
- Analysis on your outputs — trend detection, anomaly flagging, predictions against your data
- Model-agnostic — we're not locked into one provider. We'll integrate the right model for the right task.
If AI is a hard requirement today, we're not the right fit right now. We'll get there — and when we do, it'll be integrated properly.
See it for yourself — 7 days free
Full access to every feature. No credit card required. You're talking to the team that builds it.
Are you a software vendor who needs to embed analytics inside your own product?
That's a different problem — and DashboardFox isn't the best fit for it. Yurbi is our product built specifically for ISVs and SaaS vendors who need deep OEM embedding with on-premise deployment options. Same proven engine, purpose-built for that use case.
Learn about Yurbi