On the TechTO stage ×1
First seen on the TechTO stage in 2026. Every talk is searchable — ask the archive about Simon ↗
In their words
There's nothing wrong with bootstrapping. VC is a tool you only need if it makes sense for your business.
We literally ignore every investor email for the next 10 years, until maybe 2021.
By the first hire, just the two of us were probably doing 5 million ARR or so.
More from TechTO ×2
Around the web ×1
Quick answers
Who is Simon Wong?
Co-founder and CEO of Pixieset, the Vancouver photography SaaS company he started in 2013 with Phoebe Jiang. He had earlier founded Mobile604 Electronics and co-founded CakeDeals, and holds an engineering science degree from Simon Fraser University.
Did Pixieset raise venture capital?
Not for its first eight or nine years. Wong told the Together Vancouver stage that after two years of chasing investors at a previous startup with nothing to show, he and Jiang stopped reading investor email entirely and built on customer revenue instead, opening up around 2021.
What does Pixieset do?
Everything a working photographer needs online except take the pictures: photo delivery galleries, websites, marketing, storefronts and CRM. Its first product, in 2013, was a gallery that made delivering 500 wedding photos feel like art rather than a file transfer.