Finovate Alumni News– November 9, 2012

• Bill.com Featured in USA Today.

• Billcom adds open APIs to banking platform.

• Blackhawk Network Announces New Financial Service Products in Canada.

• Startup Central looks at Heckyl, Clari5 and BankBazaar at FinovateAsia.

• VentureBeat considers SecondMarket’s partnership with Angellist.

• M.O. interviews Constancio Larguia, CEO & founder of Weemba.

• SiliconBeat looks at Personal Capital’s 401(k) product.

• Kabbage Becomes Exclusive Funding Provider for Bonanza Sellers.

• Entrepreneur features SigFig.

• American Banker reports: Bill.com Ties Cash-Flow Tools to Banks’ Small Business Software.

• Finextra reports UBank gathers transaction data for spending comparison site.

• Xero to dual list on ASX and NZX.

• ShopKeep POS announces entry into the quick serve market with full kitchen printing capabilities.

• Mashable lists SimpleTuition, ReadyForZero, and Tuition.io as tools to help minimize student loan debt.

• Capital Access Network moves Headquarters to NYC.

• Crowdfund Insider reports SoMoLend Announces New York Expansion.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

Weemba Celebrates 6 Months of Operation, Unveils Operating Stats

Weemba, an online platform that matches borrowers to lenders, reached its first six month mark yesterday. The startup has seen continuous growth, and provides some stats:

Lending platform:

• 2,000 borrowers
• 45 lenders
• 500 loan projects
• Average loan amount of $75,000
• Over 3x increase in number of loan projects since October 2011

Loan types:

• Personal loans: just under 50%
• Home & mortgage: 21%
• Small business: 11%
• Car/motorcycle/RV/ATV: 9%
• Student loans: 5%
• Healthcare: 4%

To learn more about Weemba, watch its FinovateFall 2011 demo.

Finovate Alumni News– February 29, 2012

• Bank Technology News reports HomeDepot now accepts PayPal payments at all 2,000 retail stores.

• Des Moines Register interviews Jordan Lampe, Dwolla’s director of communications.

• BancVue completes sale of $120 million credit card portfolio to First Arkansas Bank & Trust.

• Bill.com introduces CashView.

• ThreatMetrix launches program to report malware capabilities.

• Accounting Today selects Bill.com Receivables for its Top New Products of 2012.

• Diversinet names Dr. Hon Pak as CEO.

• Sallie Mae & peerTransfer partner to facilitate international tuition payments.

• Credit Karma celebrates 4-year anniversary.

• Reuters looks at FINRA and Brightscope to give more information on financial advisors.

• Omaha.com looks at how Dwolla survived the downturn.

• Weemba celebrates 6 months of operation, unveils operating stats.

• Handpoint Headstart wins 2012 Channel Awards.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You

can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

CBS Early Show Features Weemba, Lighter Capital, and Rebirth Financial

Last week, The Early Show on CBS featured three Finovate alumni (see video below). The newscast describes how Weemba, Lighter Capital, and Rebirth Financial are all working to find funding for small businesses.  

All three startups use different approaches to provide small businesses with funding when banks fail to come through:

Weemba

Approach: Serves as a matchmaker for borrowers and lenders
Average loan amount: $27,500
FinovateFall 2011 demo

Lighter Capital
Approach: Lends money based on business earnings
Average loan amount: $150,000

FinovateFall 2011 demo

Rebirth Financial
Approach: Matches borrowers with lenders based on a desired loan amount and interest rate 
Average loan amount: $80,000

FinovateFall 2011 demo

http://cnettv.cnet.com/av/video/cbsnews/atlantis2/cbsnews_player_embed.swf

Source: CBS News http://bit.ly/t2inQG

Finovate Alumni News– January 2, 2012

• Maine Public Broadcasting Network profiles CashStar.

• Sky News features BOKU.

• Ryan Alfred, BrightScope CEO, & Alexa VonTobel, LearnVest CEO, also make Forbes list of “30 under 30”.

• Bank Technology News describes how Bill.com uses capital infusion to build a cash flow dashboard for businesses.

• SecondMarket’s homepage gets a makeover.

• The CBS Early Show features Weemba, Lighter Capital, and Rebirth Financial.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

Finovate Alumni News– December 14, 2011

• The Wall Street Journal lists Prosper, Lending Club, and Weemba as resources for home financing.

• PayNearMe partners with iSend to simplify international gift giving this holiday season.

• Doxo wins Red Herring Global 100.

• Kony Solutions launches KonyOne.

• Credit Karma and Intuit team up to provide credit services within FI-branded environments.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

Weemba Adds 3 Financial Institutions To Its Network of Lenders

Social lending platform Weemba announced today that its network of lenders has expanded:

“New Weemba lenders include Crossroads Financial, Mercantile Capital Corporation and MedChoice Financial/Perform Finance, bringing the total number of lenders in the Weemba community to more than 30.”

In the four months since its launch, Weemba has seen hundreds of loan applications that range from $1,000 to 1 million.

To learn more about Weemba, watch its FinovateFall 2011 demo.

Finovate Alumni News– December 5, 2011

• Fox Business News recommends banking with Simple as a way to counter bank fees.

• The Sacramento Bee reports SafetyPay expands to U.S. marketplace in the airline & travel payments industries.

• GeekWire reports Lighter Capital awards undisclosed amount of cash to HireAHelper.

• Barganeering looks at what sets Personal Capital apart from Mint.com.

• Business Insider explores the differences between SecondMarket and SharesPost.

• Sun Life partners with Kony on claims mobile app.

• eToro soft launches MT4.

• Weemba adds 3 financial institutions to its network of lenders.

• Two credit unions deploy Credit Karma’s tools on their online banking platforms.

• GoalMine to launch holiday gift card trade-in service.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

Weemba Plays Matchmaker For Borrowers

After yesterday’s CNNMoney article portrayed Lendio as a matchmaker, Bank Technology News published an article entitled, “Matchmaker Matchmaker, Make Me a … Loan?” that shows Weemba in the same light.

This article, however, highlights Weemba’s role as a friend to borrowers by treating them more as a partner than a product. Here are Weemba’s borrower-friendly features:

• Potential lenders are screened for predators 
• The borrower decides when to open up communication
• The borrower controls which personal pieces of information the lenders see
• Borrowers do not pay fees, lenders do

It also gave some stats on the startup:

• Loan requests are between $1,000 and $5 million
• 2,000 members
• 32 lenders
• Competitors includes Kiva, Prosper, and Lending Club

City National Bank of Miami has been working with Weemba since launch. 

To learn more about Weemba, watch its FinovateFall 2011 demo.

Finovate Alumni Website Traffic in September

Each month we survey the Web-traffic performance of Finovate alums using data from Web-analytics company Compete. 

Out of 268 alumni, 80 had more than 10,000 unique U.S. visitors in September 2011 and are included in the tables below. Of those, 33 (41%) had more visitors in September than August. Year-over-year, 42 (52%) had traffic increases.

Private Companies

• Seeking Alpha and Cortera had the highest traffic in September with 2.1 and 2.0 million unique visitors, respectively. Cortera also had the highest increase in number of unique year-over-year visits with over 1.5 more visits in 2011 than in 2010.
• Kabbage had the highest percentage growth year-over-year, up 280x.
• Weemba saw the highest monthly growth percentage with more than 7.5 times the number of unique visitors in September compared to August.
• SmartCredit.com had the highest increase in number of unique year-over-year visitors, growing by 126,000.

Source: Compete.com retrieved the week of October 26, 2011

1) The previous month recorded was August 2011

2) Sears Credit Score is powered by CreditKarma.com

3) Truaxis was formerly BillShrink

4) Kasasa is powered by BancVue

Public companies

• CheckFree had the highest percentage growth year-over-year, with over 7 times the number of visitors this year than last year.
• Intuit had a notable increase in number of unique, year-over-year visitors, increasing by 300,000 visits.
• Check Point had the highest month-over-month percent growth, with 41% more visitors in September than in August.

Source: Compete.com retrieved the week of October 26, 2011

1) The previous month recorded was July 2011.

_______________________________________________________

Notes:

1. We reviewed 268 Finovate alumni. Only those with at least 10,000 unique visitors in July are listed. 

3. NM = not measurable

4. t= tie

5. Compete estimates online visitors based on the activity of a panel of more than 2 million U.S. Internet users. It is only an estimate of traffic and may undercount at-work usage.