MoneyDesktop has acquired MoneyReef, a financial management application company focused on mobile. It is MoneyDesktop’s second acquisition in eight months. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
MoneyDesktop, named Best of Show at FinovateSpring 2012, integrates directly into online banking and payment platforms, providing account aggregation and personal financial management platform to financial institutions, which then offer those tools to customers.
MoneyReef, which was recently awarded a winner of the 2012 Communication Arts’ Interactive Annual Awards, develops mobile financial tools.
“What we were missing, MoneyDesktop absolutely has. I don’t know if we would have reached our full potential without this merger,” MoneyReef President Jason Cragun tells me.
MoneyDesktop has partnerships with 25 of the 55 major online banking and core payment network service providers in the U.S. and has 313 financial institution clients. Cragun says their “excellent path to market” was a major consideration in the deal.
MoneyReef was “about 95% there with the mobile product,” and is now revamping the app to work with MoneyDesktop’s backend. Cragun says the two companies are playing to each others’ strengths, as MoneyDesktop hadn’t broken into the mobile space yet. The app will roll out to customers through major financial institutions, piggybacking off of MoneyDesktop’s strong distribution.
Cragun said the two companies, which are less than two miles apart in Utah, weren’t only building the same technology but have the same long-term vision. Considering how MoneyDesktop has been “cornering the market with financial institutions,” Cragun says he had to ask himself, “Can I beat a company in my backyard at what we’re going after?”
Both Cragun and MoneyDesktop CEO Ryan Caldwell talked about a shared vision for the future of personal financial management as a driving factor for the acquisition. Caldwell specifically pointed at MoneyReef’s “insane passion” and talented team.
Caldwell says MoneyDesktop is always considering acquiring more companies, as many in the space have good products and could benefit from MoneyDesktop’s superior distribution. He adds that they are looking at acquiring one specific team right now, which he declined to name.
Four of MoneyReef’s eight-person team will be joining MoneyDesktop’s 71 person team, including two of the three co-founders.
Caldwell says MoneyDesktop will roll out iPhone and iPad apps “within the next month or so.” Cragun says an Android app will follow “in the future,” declining to specify a timeline.
MoneyDesktop has passed on this exclusive (gasp!) video of the iPad app:
Do you know how hard it was to write this whole post without writing “MonkeyDeskop?” I wish my desk had a monkey.
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