Wix Acquires AI-Powered Vibe Coding Startup Base44 for $80M in Cash

6-month-old, solo-owned vibe coder Base44 sells to Wix for $80M cash | TechCrunch

There's a lot of talk in the startup world about how AI makes individuals so productive that it could give rise to a generation of "solo unicorns" -- one-person companies worth over $1 billion. While an actual solo unicorn remains a mythical creature, Israeli developer Maor Shlomo provided compelling evidence Wednesday that the concept might not be impossible. Shlomo sold his 6-month-old, bootstrapped vibe-coding startup Base44 to Wix for $80 million deal, Wix announced Wednesday. And the deal was cash, Wix confirmed to TechCrunch. Admittedly, this wasn't a billion dollars or close to it. And Shlomo wasn't truly solo -- he had 8 employees, Wix confirmed. They will collectively receive $25 million of the $80 million as a "retention" bonus. Wix declined to give details on that part of the deal, like how long they have to stay in their jobs to get full payouts. Still, Base44's rapid rise and impressive sale price has been the talk of the vibe coding community. In its six months as a standalone company, it reportedly grew to 250,000 users, hitting 10,000 users within its first three weeks. According to Shlomo's posts on X and LinkedIn, the company was profitable, generating $189,000 in profit in May even after covering high LLM token costs, which he also documented publicly. Base44 spread mostly through word of mouth as Shlomo, a 31-year-old programmer, shared his building journey on LinkedIn and Twitter. The project began as side venture, he told Israeli tech news site CTech. "Base44 is a moonshot experiment - helping everyone, technical or not, build software without coding at all," he explained on LinkedIn when he launched it to the public. It's one of the newer crop of vibe-coding products designed for non-programmers. Users enter text prompts, and the platform builds complete applications, with database, storage, authentication, analytics, and integration. It also supports email, texting, and maps, with a roadmap for more enterprise-grade security support. Base44 isn't unique in this area. Other vibe coders like Adaptive Computer handle similar infrastructure work. But Base44's fast rise was astounding all the same. Shlomo was already known in the Israeli startup community through his previous startup, the Insight Partners-backed data analytics startup Explorium. His brother is also a co-founder of an AI security startup, Token Security, which just raised $20 million led by Notable Capital (formerly GGV Capital) and a bunch of Israeli tech angels. He quickly gained partnership agreements for Base44 with big Israeli tech companies like eToro and Similarweb. After posting about his decision to use Anthropic's Claude LLM through AWS instead of models by OpenAI -- mostly for cost-per-performance reasons -- Amazon invited Base44 to demo at a Tel Aviv AWS event last month, which Shlomo documented. "Crazy f***ing journey so far," Shlomo posted on LinkedIn when announcing the news of the acquisition. Despite the growth and the profits - or really because of it - he sold his still-bootstrapped company because "the scale and volume we need is not something we can organically grow into ... If we were able to get so far organically, bootstrapped, I'm excited to see our new pace now that we have all the resources in place," he wrote. For its part, Wix picked up a proven, fast-growing, local vibe-coding platform for a relative song because of its youth. OpenAI paid $3 billion for Windsurf, which was funded in 2021. Wix, of course, offers no-code website building that look professionally designed. Adding a profitable LLM vibe coding product to its offerings is a logical move. Shlomo could not be immediately reached for additional comment.

Six-month-old, solo-owned vibe coder Base44 sells to Wix for $80M cash | TechCrunch

There's a lot of talk in the startup world about how AI makes individuals so productive that it could give rise to a generation of "solo unicorns" - one-person companies worth over $1 billion. While an actual solo unicorn remains a mythical creature, Israeli developer Maor Shlomo provided compelling evidence Wednesday that the concept might not be impossible. Shlomo sold his six-month-old, bootstrapped vibe-coding startup Base44 to Wix for $80 million deal, Wix announced Wednesday. And the deal was cash, Wix confirmed to TechCrunch. Admittedly, this wasn't a billion dollars or close to it. And Shlomo wasn't truly solo -- he had 8 employees, Wix confirmed. They will collectively receive $25 million of the $80 million as a "retention" bonus. Wix declined to give details on that part of the deal, like how long they have to stay in their jobs to get full payouts. Still, Base44's rapid rise and impressive sale price has been the talk of the vibe coding community. In its six months as a standalone company, it reportedly grew to 250,000 users, hitting 10,000 users within its first three weeks. According to Shlomo's posts on X and LinkedIn, the company was profitable, generating $189,000 in profit in May even after covering high LLM token costs, which he also documented publicly. Base44 spread mostly through word of mouth as Shlomo, a 31-year-old programmer, shared his building journey on LinkedIn and Twitter. The project began as side venture, he told Israeli tech news site CTech. "Base44 is a moonshot experiment - helping everyone, technical or not, build software without coding at all," he explained on LinkedIn when he launched it to the public. It's one of the newer crop of vibe-coding products designed for non-programmers. Users enter text prompts, and the platform builds complete applications, with database, storage, authentication, analytics, and integration. It also supports email, texting, and maps, with a roadmap for more enterprise-grade security support. Base44 isn't unique in this area. Other vibe coders like Adaptive Computer handle similar infrastructure work. But Base44's fast rise was astounding all the same. Shlomo was already known in the Israeli startup community through his previous startup, the Insight Partners-backed data analytics startup Explorium. His brother is also a co-founder of an AI security startup, Token Security, which just raised $20 million led by Notable Capital (formerly GGV Capital) and a bunch of Israeli tech angels. He quickly gained partnership agreements for Base44 with big Israeli tech companies like eToro and Similarweb. After posting about his decision to use Anthropic's Claude LLM through AWS instead of models by OpenAI -- mostly for cost-per-performance reasons -- Amazon invited Base44 to demo at a Tel Aviv AWS event last month, which Shlomo documented. "Crazy f***ing journey so far," Shlomo posted on LinkedIn when announcing the news of the acquisition. Despite the growth and the profits - or really because of it - he sold his still-bootstrapped company because "the scale and volume we need is not something we can organically grow into ... If we were able to get so far organically, bootstrapped, I'm excited to see our new pace now that we have all the resources in place," he wrote. For its part, Wix picked up a proven, fast-growing, local vibe-coding platform for a relative song because of its youth. OpenAI paid $3 billion for Windsurf, which was funded in 2021. Wix, of course, offers no-code website building that look professionally designed. Adding a profitable LLM vibe coding product to its offerings is a logical move. Shlomo could not be immediately reached for additional comment.

Wix jumps on the vibe coding bandwagon with a new acquisition

This morning, the company shared a press release with TechRadar Pro, in which it announced its purchase of the AI-powered platform that "enables anyone to create fully functional, custom software solutions and applications using natural language, without the need for traditional coding." Wix bought Base44 for $80 million, and agreed to possibly pay even more through 2029, depending on how well Base44 performs. It did not detail which metrics it will be tracking in that respect. Base44 will not be merged into Wix but will instead remain a distinct product and business, the company confirmed. It doesn't expect the acquisition to be felt in its 2025 bookings and revenue, too. "We expect to incur approximately $25 million in retention bonus payments paid to Base44 employees in 2025 as part of the above initial consideration paid on the transaction, which will be excluded from non-GAAP and free cash flow (FCF) results," the press release reads. According to Similarlabs, Base44 has more than 40,000 users, making it a rather popular solution among web app builders, particularly those looking to bypass conventional development hurdles. It comes with built-in services like database management, user authentication, email, analytics, storage, hosting, and even domain/DNS setup. It has a drag-and-drop interface, as of recently also supported by a conversational AI chatbot. In recent times, Wix has been aggressively adding Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) across its suite of products and solutions. In December 2024, it demonstrated AI Site-Chat, a feature designed to serve as a virtual agent for customers. In January 2025, it released Business Launcher, an AI-powered tool designed to help entrepreneurs create new business initiatives, from concept to execution, and a few months later, in May, it introduced the Wix Model Context Protocol (MCP) Server, which enables users to generate code through AI assistants such as Claude, Cursor, and Windsurf. "This acquisition marks a pivotal milestone in Wix's commitment to transforming creation online," said Avishai Abrahami, CEO and Co-founder of Wix. "Maor and his team at Base44 bring cutting-edge technology, strong market penetration, and visionary leadership that seamlessly align with Wix's dedication to enabling users at all levels of expertise to express their intent while intelligent agents manage execution. " For Maor Shlomo, CEO of Base44, there isn't a better fit than Wix. "Wix is probably the only company that can help Base44 achieve the scale and distribution it needs while maintaining, if not accelerating, our product velocity," he said. "Our market is massive. It has the potential to replace entire software categories by enabling people to create software instead of buying it. Wix's DNA - its customer obsession, innovation, and speed - perfectly aligns with ours, and its scale will catapult Base44 forward at exactly the right time." You can read this insightful blog post from Avishai Abrahami to learn more about the acquisition and Wix's AI vision. Given all the buzz around vibe coding, I was expecting Wix to jump into the space in some way, shape, or form in the coming months. Although the world's biggest website builder isn't the first through the 'vibe' party door, Hostinger launched its own vibe coding platform called 'Horizons' back in February of this year, that doesn't mean it is behind. By acquiring Base44, Wix has skipped a stage of major development, helping it unlock an industry leading product without having to go through the often problematic early iterations. Given Wix's commitment to becoming an all-in-one platform for businesses, I am surprised by the decision not to integrate Base44 into the Wix platform. I asked Wix if you would need a separate membership for Base44 - you will - although there is currently a free plan available so you can give it a go without having to pay for yet another subscription. The press release didn't mention any plans to add the Base44 platform to Wix, I suspect that may be in the pipeline, but when that might be is unclear.

Wix acquires AI coding startup Base44 for $80M

Israeli developer Maor Shlomo sold his six-month-old vibe-coding startup, Base44, to Wix for $80 million in cash, Wix announced Wednesday. Base44, which was bootstrapped, experienced rapid growth before the acquisition. While not a "solo unicorn," as Base44 had eight employees, the sale has generated discussion regarding the potential for highly productive individuals to create valuable companies using AI. Of the $80 million, $25 million will be distributed among the eight employees as a retention bonus, according to Wix. Details of the bonus distribution were not disclosed. Base44 reportedly grew to 250,000 users within six months and reached 10,000 users in its first three weeks. Shlomo shared on X and LinkedIn that the company was profitable, generating $189,000 in profit in May, even after covering the costs of LLM tokens. Shlomo, age 31, stated on LinkedIn upon the public launch of Base44 that it was conceived as "a moonshot experiment -- helping everyone, technical or not, build software without coding at all." He also told Israeli tech news site CTech that the project began as a side venture. The company's expansion was primarily driven through word of mouth, with Shlomo sharing updates on LinkedIn and Twitter. Base44 is a vibe-coding platform that allows users to create applications by entering text prompts. The platform manages database, storage, authentication, analytics, and integration. It also supports email, texting, and maps and has plans to incorporate more enterprise-grade security features. Shlomo was previously involved with Explorium, a data analytics company backed by Insight Partners. His brother is a co-founder of Token Security, an AI security startup that recently raised $20 million. Base44 secured partnership agreements with Israeli tech companies, including eToro and Similarweb. Shlomo chose to use Anthropic's Claude LLM through AWS, citing cost-per-performance advantages over OpenAI models. Following this decision, Amazon invited Base44 to demo at an AWS event in Tel Aviv last month. "Crazy f***ing journey so far," Shlomo posted on LinkedIn when announcing the acquisition. He cited scalability as a reason for the sale: "The scale and volume we need is not something we can organically grow into... If we were able to get so far organically, bootstrapped, I'm excited to see our new pace now that we have all the resources in place." Wix's acquisition of Base44 provides them with a profitable LLM vibe-coding product, complementing their existing no-code website building platform. It was noted that OpenAI paid $3 billion for Windsurf, which was founded in 2021.

Israeli coder Maor Shlomo sells six-month AI startup Base44 to Wix for $80M in landmark all-cash deal

Israeli coder Maor Shlomo sold his six‑month‑old, self‑funded startup Base44 to Wix for $80 million in cash. The deal, announced June 18, marks a striking example of how AI and "vibe coding" are empowering individuals and not just big teams to build the next generation of software At 31, Shlomo isn't new to success. Fresh off his AI analytics venture, Explorium, which raised around $125 million and was backed by Insight Partners, he started Base44 as a side project post-IDF reserve duty in late 2024. "It began as something I'd tinker with," he told CTech. By January, it had coalesced into a legit company. Base44 lets anyone create full-featured web and mobile apps simply by describing what they want, no code, no developer team required. Users draft "prompts" like they would chat with ChatGPT, and Base44 handles authentication, databases, analytics, email, and even maps In May alone, it generated a $189,000 profit, impressive, given high LLM token costs. The traction was rapid, 100,000 users in weeks, scaling to over 250,000 within months. Partnerships with eToro and Similarweb followed, and AWS spotlighted Demo Day invites On LinkedIn, Shlomo shared early struggles and tips, "Push to production 13 times a day stability is not perfect, but good enough," he wrote Wix, known for no‑code website tools, aims to fold Base44 into its offerings without disrupting its identity. Shlomo, now a Wix employee, assured users on X that "nothing changes too much , better support, faster product velocity, B2B features." Wix confirmed an additional $25 million retention bonus for Base44's eight-person team As Shlomo told Calcalist, "Wix is probably the only company that can help us scale and distribute globally without slowing down our development." Base44's rapid rise and impressive sale price have been the talk of the vibe-coding community.