What Does Intuit Get By Acquiring Mint?

It doesn’t come as a surprise to me that a financial software development company should want to own one of the biggest financial website and blogging networks of the world. Intuit, the software developing firm wants to buy Mint the biggest personal finance website and blogging network for about $ 170 million. I ask why not? The benefits are obviously numerous.

Till now software developing companies have developed software based on their personal idea of how people budget and spend their finances. But by linking with a blogging network and financial website they’ll get to interact with thousands of users worldwide and get to hear their financial stories and that too in record time. With this they can get to know what people feel about their products and their competitors’ products as well. They get to hear it right from the users. Now isn’t that a big advantage?

Mint has a database of about a million people in need of financial services and advice. Intuit can get access to the spending patterns and other fiscal behavior of these people. Meeting so many people personally, collecting such detailed information about their financial assets and personalities is impossible in any other way. This will give the software company an edge over its competitors over user information which it can use to develop new products and services.

Since Intuit is moving online these days, with its Quicken Online and other software, collaborating with Mint will be highly beneficial for its online web services. Interacting with the online users of Mint will give it more publicity and understand the needs of the users better.

Mint, the thriving financial users’ online hub, has no problems in selling information about its members’ spending patterns officially to any third parties. If you are aware Mint allows you to link up with your personal savings, credit cards, investment accounts and any debt or mortgage accounts. All this information might be available to a third party now. Of course, this is an issue of concern amongst many of its members now. But it seems Mastercard has also been doing something like this before.

The Intuit –Mint teaming seems to benefit Mint too because apart from offering advice alone to people on financial matters, the latter can also provide online software solutions to its users. Earlier Intuit has developed Quicken Online as a competitor for Mint but it was no match for the sophisticated features of the latter. It was more about basic financial services. Now with this merger you never know if Quicken will be kept or turned into more sophisticated desktop software.

I don’t know how the Mint users will like this acquisition. Their data being accessed by a third party is not something that many users will appreciate. But on the other hand they’ll get to interact with software developers who’ll be able to come up with better products from their end. On the whole this acquisition is going to be a highly beneficial affair for Intuit.