ShopBack acquires finance management platform Seedly

E-commerce start-up ShopBack has fully acquired Seedly, a personal finance management platform. This is ShopBack’s first acquisition after its US$40 million funding announcement in November 2017. The agreement sees the exit of Seedly's founders, team and investors. Seedly will continue to run as an independently branded standalone platform.ShopBack helps users make purchase decisions while Seedly helps users make financial decisions. Both companies do that through community and technology. Together, the two claim that they are able to help users pave the way to making lifestyle decisions, from airfare to insurance. The partnership also provides knowledge transfer as ShopBack takes Seedly's expertise in developing the personal finance vertical and ShopBack providing Seedly with its expertise in cross-country expansion.Behind the acquisition is ShopBack’s interest in expanding its financial products and community vertical. Through Seedly, it gains access to a strong and unbiased personal financial brand with an active community. At over 350,000 and growing unique monthly traffic, Seedly hopes to become a key platform for Millennials to tap on to access financial products in Singapore and the region. The company had witnessed how the perception of personal finance has changed. Customers are opting for a more nuanced approach, doing their own research to figure out which products are best for them instead of just being sold.“With a common vision to enable smarter decisions in the shopping and financial verticals, we believe that Seedly and ShopBack’s aspirations complement each other,” Tee-Ming Chew, CTO and co-founder of Seedly, said.Launched in 2016, Seedly helps users make smarter financial decisions with its budgeting app which allows its 40,000 users to sync up their financial accounts and better manage their cash-flow. Last year, Seedly introduced a new community feature which allows users to crowd source knowledge from peers before making a financial decision. According to a press statement, the feature saw over 300% growth in users in the past six months.“While our app helps users better understand their individual lifestyle expenditure, there was an opportunity for a more collaborative approach to managing their finances,” Kenneth Lou, CEO and co-founder of Seedly, said. “Our community is a platform for users to interact with peers and experts to get unbiased information in the personal finance space – everything from daily savings to deeper topics like insurance, investments and property.”