Slack makes another 11 new investments in its Slack fund

As Slack’s rapid growth begins to slow a little bit, the company is looking to become a wider productivity platform — and that includes getting as many developers as it can building applications that can figure out new and unique use cases for it.

That’s part of the reason it established the Slack Fund, which makes investments in startups that are building tools on top of Slack. Jump-starting that ecosystem is going to be critical as Slack, as a startup, needs to allocate its resources properly and let other people figure out new ways to use its slick work messaging platform. The company is announcing that it’s making 11 new investments today as part of its continuing effort to invest in the ecosystem.

In July, the company said it invested $2 million in 14 startups through the Slack Fund. With these companies, Slack has made 25 total investments. Slack described the latest startups as ways to improve a variety of work tasks — which, naturally, is code for filling the holes in existing productivity suites that Slack proper might not.

Slack is one of the hottest startups in Silicon Valley — but it looks like the shine may start wearing off as its rapid growth starts to slow down a bit. Slack launched the Slack Fund at the tail end of 2015 along with an app directory. All this was an effort to try and cultivate an ecosystem of startups and tools that would not only entice developers but also new users. Slack is still growing fast, and is now up to 4 million daily active users with more than 1.25 million paid users. But as all startups’ growth inevitably slows, Slack has to get creative.

Here are some short explanations of the new investments:

Statsbot: an analytics bot that connects with Mixpanel, Salesforce, and Google Analytics so users can receive alerts about data or query reports from Slack.

SwayFinance: keeps users up-to-date with their company’s finances to help keep track of health of their company without leaving Slack or constantly pinging team members.

Guru: creates a searchable knowledge base for your team based on conversations in Slack.

Bold: an internal blog for your team’s knowledge and big ideas. Bold pushes content to the appropriate Slack channel(s) to keep everyone in the loop.

Demisto: automatically alerts users if a malicious URL or file is shared in Slack.

DataFox: automates prospecting by providing real-time alerts for the companies users care about. Users can customize notifications so they know the right time to reach out.

Troops: brings Salesforce data into Slack so users can search records, schedule automatic reports, and celebrate company wins.

WorkRamp: a next-generation training platform built on Slack. Create training and development paths to keep employees engaged and get visibility into how your team is progressing.

Synveroz: an always-on voice chat platform that helps distributed teams communicate simultaneously.

Twine: bridges the gap between your conference room and Slack. Plug Twine into your HDMI port then start a video call, share content, or move rooms without leaving Slack.

Donut: pairs teammates for coffee (or donuts!) on a regular basis.