1) We didn't compare directly, but our aim is to squeeze as much performance out of hardware as possible to minimize cloud cost. If we are not the best at this right now - we are going to be the best.
2) We are VC funded with 24 months runway. The product is Open Source Apache 2.0 and will remain as such forever. Any future commercial offering will use open source product as a library.
On point 2, I hope you have a good monetisation strategy. I’m a bit wary of new open source databases that don’t have a solid strategy for when their funding runs out, too many times have projects been more or less abandoned after funding ran out, despite being open source (eg Rethinkdb), so I’m rather wary of relying on something until it’s been well established. (Although even basho eventually shut down despite being well established...)
1) How does this compare to BlazingDB/MapD/etc, especially in queries on <some benchmark> per $ per hour on AWS?
2) I don't see a way to give you money. What ensures that QuestDB will be around in the future if I architect my data pipelines around this product?