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 The WSJ looks at angel investing via SecondMarket.
- BOKU announces mobile payments partnership with U.S. Cellular.
- In 4Q 2012, peerTransfer partnered with 51 schools. Over 25% of international students in the U.S. can pay their education expenses using peerTransfer.
- TSYS announces partnership with Priority Payment Systems.
- Jim Offerdahl appointed as new Bazaarvoice CFO.
- Credit Agricole is the first bank in Portugal to provide contactless cards. See their demo at FinovateEurope in February!
- Keynote offers free mobile testing via DeviceAnywhere.
- American Banker reports: Iowa Bank Creates Digital Identities from Fingerprints & Photos using TASCET's Financial ICONN software.
- VentureBeat reports BBVA pools $100 million fund to invest in fintech startups. Come see BBVA's live demo at FinovateEurope.
- Credit.com announces "best balance transfer card" as part of Best Credit Cards in America series.
- TrueOffice announces $3 million raised in Series A financing. Catch their demo at FinovateEurope in February.
- Access Development launches "Savings Across America" customer incentive product.
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.
- Android Does takes a look at the latest update to Pageonce Money & Bills app.
- ACI Wordwide announces winners of its Excellence Award for 2013.
- Forbes considers Movenbank's view of online reputation. See Movenbank demo live at FinovateEurope February 12 and 13.
- The Des Moines Register takes an inside look at Ben Milne's thoughts on the future of Dwolla.
- SafetyPay announces record growth: Number of transactions in 2012 increased 149% over 2011, the dollar value of transactions increased by 88.5% in 2012 over 2011.
- BBVA announces mobile RDC for iPhone. Come see BBVA demo its new tech at FinovateEurope in London.
- Lending Club issues the 100,000th loan on its lending platform.
- Credit.com's "Credit Cards" app now available on Google Play.
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.
 Late last year, Experian announced that it had developed a web-based searchable database to help plow through consumer credit data. And now, fellow Finovate alum, Credit.com has put the database to use. IntelliView uses a representative, 10% sample of Experian's database, which tracks more than 200 million customers in the United States. IntelliView allows searches and queries based on several categories: - bank cards
- retail cards
- automotive loans
- first mortgages
- second mortgages
- home equity lines of credit
- personal loans
Credit.com used the web-based query analysis software to create a list of the top 10 states in terms of highest average bank card balance in the third quarter of 2013 (the last quarter for which data was available).  The data for IntelliView is the same as that used by Experian-Oliver Wyman Market Intelligence Reports, which accesses Experian's aggregated quarterly consumer credit data. The service is available by subscription from Experian. See Experian's latest Finovate demo here. Credit.com's most recent demo at Finovate is here.
 We recently looked back at Finovate's Best of Show Awards archives and wanted to share the list of the 41 award-winning companies. Here's the Best of Show history that stretches back to 2007, the inception of Finovate:
Held October 2, 2007
Mint: Online PFM for individuals
Held April 29, 2008
First ROI (now BancVue): Develops products and services for community financial institutions
Jwaala: Provides software solutions to help financial institutions compete
Zecco: Online stock and options trading
Zopa: P2P lending network
Held October 14, 2008
Credit Karma: Provides a free and easy way for consumers to understand, monitor and monetize their credit profile
Mint: Online PFM for individuals
Neosaej's MoneyAisle: Platform where banks compete in live auctions for an individual consumer's business
Held April 28, 2009
BillShrink (now Truaxis): Provides a free cost-savings tool that saves consumers money on everyday bills
SimpliFi: A web service that allows anyone to create and update their own financial plan
Held September 29, 2009
BancVue's Kasasa: national checking/ savings account brand for community financial institutions
Credit.com: Provides free interactive tools, education, and unbiased comparisons of quality financial products and services
Yodlee: Provides personalized financial solutions to financial institutions
Held May 11, 2010
Expensify: Online and mobile expense report platform
oFlows (Purchased by Andera in 2011): Multichannel paperless solutions for account openings
Wikinvest: A platform for investors to share trading tips
Held October 4-5, 2010
Betterment: Investment account for savings management
BillShrink (now Truaxis): Loyalty rewards provider
Bundle: Provides socially informed money management for individuals
Dynamics: Produces and manufactures intelligent powered cards
oFlows (Purchased by Andera in 2011): Multichannel paperless solutions for account openings
PayNearMe: Cash transaction network for the underbanked
SecureKey: Token-based authentication technology
Held February 1, 2011
eToro: Social investment network
Finantix: Provides sales and advice solutions for financial services
Meniga: Online PFM for financial institutions
Held May 10-11, 2011
BancVue: Develops products and services for community financial institutions
BankOns: Mobile app offering consumers real-time savings at local merchants
Dwolla: Online, mobile, and social peer-to-peer payment platform
oFlows (Purchased by Andera in 2011): Multichannel paperless solutions for account openings
Mitek Systems: Provides apps for smartphones that allow users to deposit checks and pay bills via their devices' cameras
PayNearMe: Cash transaction network for the underbanked
Wikinvest: A platform for investors to share trading tips
Held September 20-21, 2011
BillGuard: People-powered antivirus for bills
Dynamics: produces and manufactures intelligent powered cards
eToro: Social investment network
FamZoo: Online "virtual family Bank"
FeeFighters: Platform that simplifies the process of choosing a merchant account provider
oFlows (Purchased by Andera in 2011): Multichannel paperless solutions for account openings
Personal Capital: Online financial advisor helping people manage their investments
Held February 2, 2011
Dynamics: produces and manufactures intelligent powered cards
eToro: Social investment network
Nutmeg: Online investment manager that democratizes saving and investing
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.
Each month we survey the Web-traffic performance of Finovate alums using data from Web-analytics company Compete.
Out of 268 alumni, 75 had more than 10,000 unique U.S. visitors in August 2011 and are included in the tables below. Of those, 41 (55%) had more visitors in August than July. Year-over-year, 45 (60%) had traffic increases.
Private Companies
- Seeking Alpha -- the most-trafficked in August with 2.5 million unique visitors -- also had the highest increase in number of unique month-over-month visits with 300,000 more visits in August than in July.
- Budgettracker.com saw the highest monthly growth percentage with more than 6.5 times the number of unique visitors in August compared to July.
- Betterment had the highest percentage growth year-over-year, up 88x.
- Cortera had the highest number of unique year-over-year visitors, growing by 1.5 million.
Source: Compete.com retrieved week of October 3, 2011 1) The previous month recorded was July 2011
Public Companies - Fiserv had the highest month-over-month percent growth, with 50% more visitors.
- CheckFree had the highest percentage growth year-over-year, with over 5 times the number of visitors.
- S1 also had a high percentage growth year-over-year, doubling its visitors.
Source: Compete.com retrieved the week of October 3, 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.
Each month we survey the Web-traffic performance of Finovate alums using data from Web-analytics company Compete.
Out of 255 alumni, 59 (23%) had more than 10,000 unique U.S. visitors in July 2011 (see tables below). Of those, 19 (32%) had more visitors than in the previous month and 25 (42%) were flat. Year-over-year, 26 (44%) had an increase, 10 (17%) were flat, and 23 (39%) were down.
Private Companies Notable successes: - Seeking Alpha had the most traffic in July with more than 2 million unique visitors.
- eToro saw the highest monthly growth percentage with 3 times the number of unique visitors in July compared to June.
- Bundle had the highest increase in number of unique month-over-month visits, with 450,000 more visitors in July than in June.
- eRollover had the highest percent year-over-year traffic increase, with 260,000 more visitors from last July.
Source: Compete.com retrieved week of August 15, 2011 1. The previous month recorded was May 2011 2. Sears Credit Score is powered by CreditKarma.com 3. Kasasa is powered by BancVue
Public Companies Notable successes: - PayPal had the highest number of U.S. visitors in July, with more than 30 million visitors.
- Jack Henry & Associates saw the highest monthly growth with twice as many visitors in July than June.
- Wipro Technologies had the highest year-over-year growth, with 3 times as many visitors this year compared to last year.
- FIS Global and Online Resources also doubled their traffic compared to last year.
Source: Compete.com retrieved the week of August 15, 2011 1. The previous month recorded was May 2011. _______________________________________________________ Notes: 1. We reviewed 255 Finovate alumni. Only those with at least 10,000 unique visitors in July are listed. 3. NM = Not measurable 4. 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.
Bobber Interactive  Tech Flash interviewed Eric Eastman, Bobber Interactive's CEO, on how the gamification of money management aims to help Generation Y better manage their money. Link
BrightScope BrightScope released a report detailing the top 12 small-cap funds in America's 401k plans. This report is part of a series that provides insight into the top funds and managers in the retirement marketplace. Link
ChargeSmart Discover is offering an instant rebate to customers who pay their utility bills using a Discover Card on ChargeSmart's website. Link
Check Point Software Technologies - Check Point enhanced its Software Blade Architecture by releasing R75.20, a comprehensive approach to security that includes a URL filtering Software Blade, SSL inspection, and data loss prevention. Link
- The Wall Street Journal discussed Check Point's ZoneAlarm SocialGuard that helps parents protect children on Facebook in a non-intrusive manner. Link
Clairmail Clairmail announced record growth this quarter, with more than a 60% increase in bookings from last quarter. Link
Clovr Media  - BostInnovation stated that Clovr Media is changing the way consumers collect loyalty rewards through its Card-Linked Ads that allow consumers to access rewards by clicking on an advertisement. Link
- Mass High Tech's weekly Startup Watch listed Clovr Media as one of five startups to follow. Link
Credit.com EQuicknews listed Credit.com as a free way to check your credit score with no strings attached and highlighed the Credit Report Card feature. Link
doxo The Appvita blog profiled doxo, noting insider tips and practical uses, such as comparing bills on a month-to-month basis. Link
Dwolla Bank Technology News looked at the players in the mobile payments space and listed Dwolla as a formidable competitor. Link
EDO Interactive  EDO Interactive received $20 million in Series B funding to grow its Prewards platform that enables advertisers to offer digital deals and incentives that consumers redeem by using their existing credit, debit, or prepaid cards. Link
eToro eToro began a trading contest for users with both demo and live trading accounts. Traders who accumulate the greatest gains will win each round. Link
eWise eWise added Renasant Bank to its customer base, providing Renasant customers access to Secure Vault Payments, an alternative payment method. Link
Expensify - Expensify added a new feature that provides QuickBooks users a way to easily identify billable expenses to add to invoices. Link
- The Kitsap Peninsula Business Journal listed Expensify as one of ten business apps for empowering your inner geek. Link
Kony Solutions  Tower Group, in its Review of North American Consumer Mobile Banking Technology Vendors, ranked Kony Solutions among the top mobile banking technology vendors. Kony excelled in the feature/function and customization categories. Link
Lending Club TechCrunch highlighted Lending Club's announcement of $25 million in Series D financing from Union Square Ventures and other existing investors. Link
Lendio Lendio added Cardinal Bank to its network of lenders providing clients with more options in finding equipment loans, business lines of credit, acquisition financing, commercial real estate, SBA 7(a) and SBA 504 loans. Link
Mitek Systems Mitek Systems launched Mobile Imaging Cloud Service that captures, extracts, and routes information contained in documents. The service helps app developers create smartphone and tablet apps that use a camera input function. Link
Monitise Monitise Asia Pacific launched its mobile banking, payments, and commerce services in Indonesia and signed a joint venture agreement with PT Astra Graphia Information Technology, an information and communication business. Link
On Deck Capital  On Deck Capital raised $19 million of its own in a Series C round of funding. Link
RobotDough RobotDough founder, Wilton Risenhoover, revealed why he started RobotDough and how it works. Link
SafetyPay SafetyPay received a Payment Services Directive License to provide cross-border payments throughout Europe strengthening its position in that market. Link
SecondMarket BostInnovation used SecondMarket's alternative investments platform to discover top Boston companies. Link
Striata  Baton Rouge Water Company selected Striata, along with payment services company Western Union, to provide email billing with integrated electronic payment service. Link
The Receivables Exchange Treasury & Risk profiled The Receivables Exchange, describing the process companies use to sell their receivables on the online platform. Link
TradeKing TradeKing launched a $100 bonus for new customers who open an account by August 31, 2011. Link
Wonga Smarta interviewed Wonga director, John Moorwood, about Wonga's growth over the past 12 months. Wonga is now issuing over 1.5 million short-term loans. Link
Xero Xero released Xero Touch, its new accounting app for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch. Link
Each month we survey the Web-traffic performance of our alums, using data from Web-analytics company Compete to review the sites they operate. Out of 255 alumni, 62 (24%) had more than 10,000 unique U.S. visitors in May 2011 (see tables below). Of the 62 reviewed, 25 (40%) had fewer visitors than in the previous month and 28 (45%) saw a decline year-over-year. Private Companies
The 44 private companies are as follows: Notable successes: - Cortera saw the highest number of unique U.S. visitors in May, with almost 2 million hits.
- HelloWallet experienced the greatest month-over-month growth, with more than four times as many visitors.
- Betterment saw its traffic increase an impressive 38 times from May of last year.
Private Finovate Alumni With More Than 10,000 Unique Visitors in May 2011 
Source: Compete.com retrieved June 29, 2011
Public Companies
The 18 public companies are as follows: Notable successes: - PayPal experienced the highest number of U.S. visitors in May, with over 32 million visitors.
- TransUnion Interactive saw the highest month-over-month growth with more than two times the number of visitors in May than in April.
- Sybase 365 experienced the highest year-over-year growth, with its traffic up almost 80% from last year.
Public Finovate Alumni With More Than 10,000 Unique Visitors in May 2011
 Source: Compete.com retrieved June 29, 2011 _____________________________________________________________________________ Notes: 1. We reviewed 255 unique sites. Data was unavailable or irrelevant for 201 sites because: - They had been acquired.
- They were no longer available online.
- They were not covered by Compete for various reasons (including some that were not U.S. domestic companies).
- The number of unique visits was too small to be considered accurate.
- They were subdomains of larger websites.
2. Numbers have been rounded to three significant digits. 3. The charts include companies that did not have measurable traffic in May 2011, indicated by "N/A." 4. Compete draws its information from the online 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.
Here are the news headlines posted this week on Twitter (follow our feed here).
MoneyAisle appears in Kiplinger's Retirement Report (print only). The story appears in the June issue and explains the new "auto loan search" features at MoneyAisle. More from MoneyAisle at http://bit.ly/FINOVATE671
BBVA Compass Bank replaces West Bank as SmartyPig's banking partner. BBVA Compass is the 15th largest bank in America. http://bit.ly/FINOVATE672
Kapitall unveils "search by brand" feature. The new search helps investors to identify the parent company of their favorite brands. http://bit.ly/FINOVATE681 or www.kapitall.com
SecondMarket CEO Barry Silbert interviewed by Dan Rather [vid]. See more on SecondMarket's management of "illiquid assets." http://bit.ly/FINOVATE691
MoneyAisle featured in Wallet Pop. Read more about shopping for an auto loan from MoneyAisle at http://bit.ly/FINOVATE692.
SmartCredit.com featured on the Oprah Winfrey Show. See SmartCredit.com at work with Oprah and Jean Chatzky as part of the "Debt Diet" series on the program. http://bit.ly/FINOVATE693
Ebay recognizes Outright.com as most innovative app. Outright.com received an award for most innovative application at the Ebay developer's conference. http://bit.ly/FINOVATE6101
MPower Ventures in the running for Business Week's "Most Promising Social Entrepreneurs." Twenty-five companies are finalists. Read more at http://bit.ly/FINOVATE6102 or www.mpowerlabs.com.
Micronotes raises another $1.6 million in funding. Yahoo Business reports on the startup's fund raising success. http://bit.ly/FINOVATE6103
TransFS.com helps merchants shop for better credit-card processing. TransFS claims that user merchants can save up to 40% by shopping around for merchant services. http://bit.ly/FINOVATE6111 Billeo expands merchant directory. Billeo users can now pay their bills online with more than 10,000 merchants. http://bit.ly/FINOVATE6112
Peer-to-Peer lender Prosper.com seeks regulation as a lender to avoid SEC. Prosper has asked to become regulated as a lender to ease the regulatory burden of being regulated as an investment firm. http://bit.ly/FINOVATE6113
 Fast Company Magazine released its annual list of the 50 most innovative companies for the year. In addition to the top 50, the most innovative firms in a wide range of categories, including the financial sector, were named. We are happy to see that five Finovate alumni made the cut.
 1. FiLife. Not only was it the first on the finance category list, FiLife was the only finance company to make it on the overall Top 50, joining Facebook, Amazon, Google, and IBM. FiLife was ranked #27, placing it above Microsoft and Twitter. FiLife provides a social site for financial advice and discussion (Finovate2008 video here).
 2. Intuit. Runner-up Intuit, with a rich portfolio of products including Quicken, Quickbooks, TurboTax and now Mint.com, was described as "the new leader in online money management." (Finovate2009 video here.)
3. Yodlee. The leading provider of aggregation services to banks and PFMs was cited for its
 FinAppStore, announced at Finovate2009 (Finovate2009 video here).
4. Triodos. A Dutch bank that backs organizations that create social, environmental, or cultural value.
5. Enterprise Community Partners. An investment company working to fund affordable housing.
6. Itaú Unibanco. This Brazilian bank is the largest financial conglomerate in the southern hemisphere.
7. Credit.com. Provider of free credit information and advice. The article notes that Credit.com won Finovate2009's Best of Show (Finovate2009 video here).
8. Vancity. Canada's largest credit union and funder of community-benefit initiatives.
 9. Simplifi. A personal finance and investment advice website. The article mentions Simplifi scoring Best of Show at FinovateStartup 2009 (FinovateStartup 2009 video here).
10. Vittana. An education-funding startup financed by small donors in the US, Germany, and Sweden, providing the first student loans ever to Peru, Paraguay, Nicaragua, Mongolia, and Vietnam.
Fast Company Lists Ten Most Innovative Financial Companies.
(Note: The article uses a screenshot from Credit.com)
Here are the news headlines we posted recently on our Finovate Twitter feed (follow it here).
Acculynk and EFT Networks Establish Advisory Council -- Acculynk and partner EFT Networks have established the Internet PIN Advisory Council. The council brings together members of EFT's business network, including ACCEL/Exchange, Alaska Option, Credit Union 24, PULSE and SHAZAM. The function of the council is to establish the processes, procedures, rules and best PIN practices for PaySecure, Acculynk's software service for online debit payments. http://bit.ly/cxlCLv
CashEdge Launches Integration Kit - CashEdge has launched a new Integration Kit, making it easier for financial planning, customer relationship management, and portfolio management application providers to simplify the addition of aggregation services into their applications. http://bit.ly/9aSYKv
Credit.com in Money Magazine's Top 20 Websites & Fast Company's Top 10 Most Innovative Companies -- Credit.com has been listed at #7 among Money Magazine's top 20 best money websites. Other companies on the list include Mint.com, BillShrink, and Morningstar. Credit.com has also been included in Fast Company's Top 10 Most Innovative Companies list, where it ranks #7 in the finance category. http://bit.ly/cPzRT6
Mint.com Offers New Support Forum -- PFM Mint.com is implementing a new user support forum, supported by San Francisco company Get Satisfaction. The forum provides a support resource for Mint's nearly 2 million users. http://bit.ly/bg2FYW
Online Resources Launches iPhone App for PeoplesBank -- Online Resources launched a new iPhone app that provides mobile banking services to customers of PeoplesBank. The Massachusetts bank has $1.5 billion in assets and has been a client of Online Resources since 1999. http://bit.ly/bckTX3
SecondMarket Secures Second Round of Venture Capital -- SecondMarket, which provides a market for illiquid assets, has received $15 million in its second round of venture capital. The funding was provided by Hong Kong-based Li Ka-shing Foundation and Singapore-based Temasek Holdings (through its Dunearn Investments subsidiary). Each invested $7.5 million. http://bit.ly/bclL0J
SeerGate and Integrated Banking Technology Introduce Online Banking System -- SeerGate and Integrated Banking Technology have joined to launch SeerGate's Secured Lock System, a secure platform for real-time online banking transactions. IBT will include the Secured Lock platform among the outsourced service offerings it provides to financial institutions in the US and Canada. http://bit.ly/97bzXu
Sparkroom Partners with eBureau -- Sparkroom has announced a partnership with eBureau, a provider of information services for online marketers. The companies will work together to provide technology solutions to help advertisers and lead generators manage online consumer leads. http://bit.ly/c2Woj7
ThreatMetrix Partners with CyberSource -- Online fraud prevention company ThreatMetrix has partnered with CyberSource to provide advanced device identification systems for fraud detection. CyberSource provides more than 200 fraud detection tests and services, while ThreatMetrix offers systems for digitally profiling devices and their online behaviors. http://bit.ly/9w3SXH
Yodlee Officially Opens FinApp Store -- Yodlee has opened its FinApp Store, a platform where certified developers can create financial apps and distribute them to users of Yodlee-based PFM products. The FinApp Store supports both free and pay applications. Yodlee is also making its Software Development Kit available to FinApp Store developers, allowing them to work with the Yodlee data infrastructure. Yodlee demoed the store at Finovate2009. http://bit.ly/cWolZR
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