Written by: Lisa Matthys
Intuit Inc., known for their tax preparation and financial-management software (Quicken), agreed to purchase Mint.com for $170 million on September 14th, 2009. Launched two years ago, Mint.com is a free online service that allows consumers to track their expenses and investments. The service is able to pull information from users’ checking and savings accounts, investments, loans, and other financial data and compile charts and graphs to show spending habits and trends. Mint.com also hosted advertisements with ways to save on personal finances based on consumers’ individual data. Mint.com had received approximately $17 million in venture funding, with investors such as Shasta Ventures, Benchmark Capital, and First Round Capital. Prior to the acquisition, Mint.com competed with Intuit’s Quicken Online and was growing rapidly with more than 1 million consumers. By buying its competitors (Mint.com, and previously Paycycle in June 2009), Intuit is eliminating potential threats within their competitive environment. With Intuit’s acquisition, Mint.com will be the primary personal finance web site, and Quicken Online will be aimed at customers who use the Quicken desktop software. Financially, the transaction has cut earnings for the year ending in July by 2 cents a share, but Intuit feels that there will be no material effect on earnings in fiscal 2011.
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