Evernote’s Quiet Destruction Of The Notepad

Calling it one of the it-apps of the moment wouldn’t do justice to Evernote, a company that’s been holding the line in the productivity space for years. The cross-platform note-taking program has found its way into the lives of some 90 million people and taken in a lot of growth capital on its way to a billion dollar valuation.
The company’s freemium product lets users take notes through typing, cut n’ paste or photos; then allows access to that information across most platforms—mobile and otherwise. The organizational virtues are many and the sharing capabilities allow for greater communication between coworkers. Evernote’s apps – and the user’s they’ve attracted – have inspired confidence in investors and the Northern California-based firm has raised over $250 million to date from the likes of Sequoia Capital, Morgenthaler Ventures and M8, among others. Along the way Evernote’s absorbed other companies like Penultimate, Skitch, and Readable—firms in which it found synergy in the mobile notes and photo sharing space.  
Launching in 2004, CEO Phil Libin and Co. pondered what route to take with their fledgling enterprise, settling on productivity over gaming and social media. At the time the mobile space looked quite different than it does today and Evernote built for established players Palm, Blackberry and Windows Mobile. As smartphone technology took hold and became ubiquitous, it simply adapted its core product—as market players and tools changed, the concept remained the same. “We haven’t really pivoted,” said Libin, in a sit-down with Forbes’ Jeff Bercovici. “We had this idea that we wanted to be the modern definition of productivity and we still want to do that.”   

http://www.forbes.com/sites/karstenstrauss/2014/04/03/evernotes-quiet-destruction-of-the-notepad/