Airtable is now valued at $5.77B with a fresh $270m Series E

I have a love/hate relationship with Airtable. On the one hand, it's a true general purpose tool that anybody can use. A few simple Airtable integrations can replace a LOT of special-purpose business software out there, from CRMs to ERPs and even QuickBooks. I used Airtable to file my business taxes for many years, and as a consultant I used it to transform back-office workflows for several multi-million $ businesses.

As a developer that built a startup on top of their API and am poised to launch an app on their marketplace, I love their product and community, but they have a lot of work to do. The developer experience is still immature, the API is incredibly lacking in basic features with no improvements for almost 5 years that I've been using it, and their paid plans are too expensive for a whole class of businesses that I've worked with.

I'm very bullish about Airtable's future, provided they don't screw this up, and open up their API more. That's what VC money is for, right? Subsidize free access.