Deal activity is picking up in the fintech space as smaller startups that had great promise are being scooped up by the big boys. This M&A activity is expected to accelerate as the market starts to feel the impact of the Coronavirus. We will see the big players such as Paypal, the banks, Visa and Mastercard will be leading the way:
A surge in deals began just as the contagion was spreading. In January Visa announced it would pay $5.3 billion to purchase San Francisco’s Plaid, a tech platform connecting bank accounts to apps, and in February Intuit said it would pay $7.1 billion for Credit Karma. The coronavirus pandemic—and the business disruptions it is causing—will quicken the pace of transactions over the next year. Already, Motif, a 10-year old stock investing fintech backed by Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan that was once valued at $440 million, announced that it would shutter and sell its tech and intellectual property to Charles Schwab. Some like Motif and On Deck will end up in shotgun weddings, but others will find happy marriages of convenience.
Microsoft’s massive acquisition of LinkedIn offers some interesting opportunities. Below Reid Hoffman discusses the potential synergies, including real integration with Microsoft Office.
But there’s also real potential to overreach and create real problems as well. LinkedIn has stagnated a little in recent years, and perhaps this will inject new life into the platform. It’s certainly a must-use platform for many professionals and recruiters.
Give Mark Zuckerberg credit – he realized Facebook was behind when it came to mobile and he forced his company to adapt quickly. It’s reminiscent of Bill Gates coming to terms with the web back in the 90s.
When Ev Williams launched Medium, we had high expectations give his track record with Blogger and Twitter. The video above has a great interview of Williams by Kevin Rose as they discuss the path he took to Silicon Valley and entrepreneurship.
There’s been plenty of hot air lately over the notion of whether we have another tech bubble on our hands. Like most topics these days, much of this is driven by the need to talk about something to fill airtime and drive clicks.
