- Bilt Rewards is acquiring Banyan to enhance its neighborhood commerce platform with item-level receipt data, enabling hyper-personalized rewards.
- Banyan’s tier three data will allow Bilt to expand into new merchant categories like grocery and gas, automate FSA/HSA reimbursements, and deliver targeted rewards based on residents’ specific purchases.
- Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed and Banyan will continue to operate independently after the acquisition is finalized.
Rent payment rewards program Bilt Rewards is acquiring item-level receipt data company Banyan to enable hyper-personalized rewards. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Bilt Rewards offers a loyalty rewards program and credit card that allows renters to earn points when they pay their rent, building credit with every payment. With no annual fee, the Bilt Mastercard credit card also allows cardholders to earn points on select dining experiences, rideshare purchases, and travel purchases. These points can be redeemed for travel, fitness classes, home decor, and even a down payment on a future home.
“This acquisition represents a major step forward in our mission to transform how residents engage with their neighborhoods,” said Bilt Rewards Founder and CEO Ankur Jain. “By further incorporating Banyan’s item-level intelligence into our platform, we’re able to create truly seamless experiences that drive value for both our members and our network of over 40,000 neighborhood merchants. This is about making commerce more meaningful, more personalized, and more rewarding exactly where people live.”
Since it was founded in 2019, Banyan has analyzed more than 20 billion receipts and processed hundreds of billions of dollars in spending. Bilt Rewards will use Banyan’s item-level receipt data, also known as tier three data, to improve its neighborhood commerce rewards platform by enabling hyper-personalized rewards.
Some of the new capabilities that Banyan’s tier three data capabilities will unlock include:
- Extending Bilt’s FSA/HSA program to more neighborhood merchants by automatically identifying potentially eligible purchases, and filing for FSA/HSA reimbursement.
- Enabling neighborhood merchants to offer personalized rewards on home essentials when Bilt members move into a new neighborhood.
- Allowing consumer packaged goods companies to offer targeted rewards when residents purchase specific products at neighborhood merchants.
- Helping Bilt to expand into new merchant categories beyond dining, fitness, and pharmacy to include grocery, gas, parking, and more in order to create a comprehensive neighborhood commerce network.
“Our expansion with Banyan allows us to bring neighborhood commerce to life in ways that weren’t previously possible,” added Jain. “We’re creating an ecosystem where the barriers between earning and using rewards disappear, and where the value of being part of our network increases dramatically for every participant.”
Logistically, Banyan will continue to operate independently after the acquisition is finalized. Founder and CEO Jehan Luth will remain at the helm while helping Bilt to enhance the neighborhood commerce ecosystem. New Jersey-based Banyan most recently demoed at FinovateSpring 2022.
Tier three data is often considered the holy grail for data aggregators like MX, Finicity, and Yodlee because it offers insight into exactly what consumers are buying, and not just where they are spending. This is valuable when it comes to analyzing consumer spending at big box retailers such as Walmart, Target, and Costco, where a single transaction could contain anything from vitamins to electronics. Understanding specific, product-level spending allows financial services, merchants, and marketing platforms to create personalization strategies that include hyper-targeted offers and ultimately drive engagement and increase conversions.
However, the rise of e-commerce and AI-driven analytics has reshaped the demand for tier three data. That’s because ecommerce merchants already collect structured purchase data, eliminating some of the guesswork that traditional financial data aggregators rely on. The real value lies in combining AI with receipt-level data to create automated marketing and loyalty solutions that leverage machine learning to help merchants and marketing service providers analyze transaction patterns, predict future purchases, and deliver personalized promotions in real time.
PayPal, which launched its Smart Receipts tool earlier this year, is a prime example of this. With Smart Receipts, merchants can embed AI-powered personalized offers directly into digital receipts, ensuring that consumers receive targeted promotions based on their actual purchases. Unlike traditional receipt scanning apps or rewards programs, Smart Receipts dynamically adjusts offers after the transaction to suggest relevant products, cross-sell complementary items, and drive repeat purchases.
