Conventional wisdom is that Intuit's acquisition of the personal finance Web service Mint will mean the end of the line for the company's standalone software app, Quicken. Upstart Mint, which is being acquired by Intuit for $170 million, has a personal finance product more in line with the times, with a younger demographic, a working business model, and a passionate CEO, Aaron Patzer, who's slated to take over the Quicken product line at Intuit once the acquisition closes. It doesn't look good for the old desktop app, Quicken.
It's a shame that we think of Quicken that way, but it's Intuit's own fault that we've gotten here. The product, according to Intuit legend, started at founder Scott Cook's kitchen table in 1983 as he watched his wife struggle with paying bills. The original Quicken, little more than an DOS-based checkbook and register, over time became an ambitious personal finance suite that handled budgeting, retirement planning, loans, public equities and employee stock options. It became more capable but also more complex, harder to use, and much harder to get started with.
Mint got access to investment data a year ago.
(Credit: Mint.)More importantly, as Julie Miller, director of corporate communications for the consumer group at Intuit told me, "Quicken made its way through the organization. We shuffled the Quicken business around. That had a direct effect on the quality of the product." You can see the effect on CNET's own reviews. Users hate Quicken. Few products have user reviews scores as low: none of the variations of of Quicken from recent years have user reviews garnering more than 1 and a half stars out of 5. (Our official reviews score the products higher.)
Another reason that Quicken suffered: Intuit shifted its focus away from the flagship product to new moneymakers, in particular its small-business product, QuickBooks, and its tax software and service, TurboTax. As Miller says, "There were decisions made over time that had the unintended consequence of putting the Quicken business where it was starved for focus and resources."
Finally, though, the light began to dawn at Intuit. Miller: "Our thinking was too limited. We weren't thinking beyond the desktop solution. The way we grow this, we realized, was to look for acquisitions."
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This week, I'm joined by CNET security expert Elinor Mills in a discussion with Mint CEO Aaron Patzer, whose personal finance site is being acquired by Intuit. We grill Patzer on why he sold the company, the future of Quicken, and the security of online financial data.
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I really enjoyed recording this podcast. We had the start-up CEO of the moment in to talk about why he sold his personal finance company, Mint, to Intuit--the company he built Mint to compete with in the first place.
Also, Elinor grills Patzer on the security safeguards in his system. Patzer tells us getting access to Mint data is like initiating self-destruct on the Starship Enterprise: You need three people to give their individual passwords at the same time or no go. Play the podcast for the full content, and for our show notes, including some bonus content from a post-show discussion, keep reading.
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Financial software maker Intuit has signed an agreement to acquire personal finance service Mint.com for $170 million.
"With this transaction, Intuit will gain another fast-growing consumer brand and a highly successful Software as a Service (SaaS) offering that helps people save and make money," Intuit CEO Brad Smith said in a statement Monday. "This move will enhance Intuit's position as a leading provider of consumer SaaS offerings that connect customers across desktop, online and mobile."
TechCrunch reported the deal Sunday night, citing unnamed sources.
Mint, a start-up launched two years ago that tracks personal finance data, became a CNET Webware 100 winner in 2008 and again in 2009. It was also the 2007 winner of the TechCrunch50, which kicks off once again Monday in San Francisco.
Mint's features have apparently helped it attract a younger, more diverse demographic than Intuit's Quicken Online. Mint founder and CEO Aaron Patzer told CNET News last year that 40 percent of his company's users are women. He claimed Quicken's demographic was still "85 percent men." Assuming that's true, it would appear that Intuit can significantly expand its base with the Mint acquisition.
When the deal is made final, Mountain View, Calif.-based Mint will become part of Intuit's Consumer Group, which includes both Quicken and TurboTax. Patzer will become general manager of Intuit's Personal Finance group.
Although Mint and Intuit's Quicken Online are direct competitors, Intuit said it plans to maintain both products. According to Intuit, they serve "separate and equally important purposes."
The acquisition is expected to become final in the fourth quarter, pending regulatory review.
Living close to the edge.
(Credit: Intuit)Intuit has just released a handy, free iPhone app to accompany its free online financial service, Quicken Online.
Unlike the software version of Quicken, a feature-laden financial management app, Quicken Online and its Quicken Online Mobile companion app (get it here--iTunes store link) are really only designed to help you get a view into your cash flow. The main screen of Quicken Online Mobile shows you how much cash you have access to before your next payday, and it shows how you're doing against any monthly budget numbers you have set up.
You can also add new cash transactions from the app; credit card transactions get picked up automatically when the service connects to your financial institutions for updates.
Glitzy features include a cash position graph that shows up when you rotate the phone to the landscape orientation, and a location-aware ATM finder.
One big advantage of Quicken Online Mobile over competitor Mint (mobile app review) is that Quicken lets you set up a PIN password screen in front of the app, if you wish; Mint relies on you setting up a password on the iPhone itself, which would be fine--unless you like to run your iPhone without a password. (Mint does let you disable access to your iPhone app via your account page on the Mint Web site, though.)
This is a good app for keeping tabs on your cash. So's Mint, security issue aside. If you use either Quicken Online or Mint on the Web and have an iPhone, do be sure to check out their mobile apps.
Rotate your iPhone for a different view of your account.
(Credit: Intuit)Intuit, makers of the accounting product QuickBooks for small business, and the consumer accounting apps Quicken and TurboTax, today announced a cleverly-named "stimulus package" for its small business products.
The program, Small Business United, consists of reduced-price services or extended trial periods on online apps. For example, the Inuit Online Payroll services is now free for six months ($9.95 a month thereafter). Intuit-hosted small business Web sites are now free for a full year ($4.99 a month afterward).
"Grant" = "Prize." But money's money.
More interesting than the effective price drops on Inuit small business products is the competition the company is running to share small business tips. Considering the economy today, sharing advice on making through is a great idea. All tips are visible on the site. The community helps to vote on the best ideas (the mechanics are exactly clear). Fifty-five winners receive prizes ("grants") ranging from $5000 to the $25,000 grand prize, in addition to Intuit products and services. It's not exactly like the constraint-free bailouts banks are getting, and small businesses do have to sing for their supper, but money is money, and we appreciate the spirit of these awards.
Less appreciated by many (like me) is Intuit's continued lack of a bailout for consumers using its paid software app, Quicken. The company still "sunsets" its annual versions of Quicken, forcing users to upgrade to newer versions. Often, these annual releases are not mature on launch and cause users new problems. I'd like to see the stimulus package extend down to this product. Our society is entering a buy-and-hold era with consumer goods like appliances and cars. It would be nice if software vendors respected this as well.
Managing your money online has become much easier with the help of services that monitor your bank accounts and other financial information. I've found five sites that do a fine job of providing information and data to help you make more informed financial decisions.
Buxfer
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Buxfer offers a simple tool for managing your money online. And since it lacks in-depth assessment into your financial health, it's great for beginners.
Buxfer allows you to link your credit card and bank accounts to the site. If they belong to a major institution like Bank of America, the site asks you if you want it to synchronize the accounts for you. If so, it will then ask you to input your bank username and password and indicate how often Buxfer should synchronize.
Where Buxfer really shines is in its simplicity. The service features easy-to-understand tabs that provide step-by-step instructions on how to add accounts, see reports, and create budgets. In fact, creating accounts and budgets takes just a few minutes to complete. That said, Buxfer's reports leave much to be desired and they generally tend to offer simple information--revenue, expenses, and balances--instead of more important data like estimates and projections. I should note that projections are available, but only in the premium version of the service.
Buxfer is simple and responsive. If you're looking for something basic, it's a great place to start.
Geezeo
If you want some extra help beyond tracking your financial information, Geezeo does a fine job. But much like Buxfer, it fails to provide extensive data to keep you exceptionally informed.
Geezeo is easy to use, which makes it appealing to beginners. After signing up for an account, users can add bank account information, as well as credit cards, loans, and investments. Geezeo will track all the changes in those accounts once added. Armed with that information, Geezeo creates a budget for you and sets goals to see how well you're managing your money. The site also generates reports to help you see where you stand financially. But much like Buxfer, those reports are too simple to offer in-depth and most importantly, actionable information.
But it's Geezeo's community that the company touts. Aside from providing financial information, Geezeo lets you connect with other users and ask them for financial advice. Users can also create groups where like-minded individuals can discuss financial goals, and for harder questions you can ask Geezeo "Experts" for help. Most of the time, those tips are generic, though.
Geezeo is a fine service if you want to connect with others during your financial planning. And since it's free, it's probably worth trying for a little while, at least.
Mint
Mint is a fine service that takes aim at Quicken Online. But unlike Quicken, it doesn't provide the kind of depth that you would expect from a full-featured money management tool.
Similar to its competitors, Mint allows you to input account and credit card information, as well as create a personal budget and manage investments. Its core function is to look at your spending habits and recommend offers that will help you save money. If you have a high-interest credit card, or you're spending too much on a bill, Mint's advertising network will find offers from partners and suggest you sign-up for the respective service. If you do, Mint gets a small portion of the revenue generated from that switch.
Mint will automatically capture financial information from more than 3,500 financial institutions, which makes it a handy tool to keep your accounts up to date. And just like its competitors, it can send alerts to your mobile phone to tell you when to pay a bill. That said, Mint requires you to give it your account information to track your financial data. Although it's a trustworthy site, I just can't bring myself to entrust that information to a small firm.
Quicken Online
Like Mint, Quicken Online is targeted at those who don't require complex financial tracking services. That said, Quicken Online will still do some heavy lifting and it does a fine job of monitoring and forecasting your financial picture.
Forecasting is Quicken Online's most compelling feature. On the service's main page, it shows what's left in your bank account, your risk of overdraft, your risk of a low balance, and the expected spending you will incur in the next 30 days. It derives that forecast from your bank accounts, investments, and other financial data. As long as all that information is accurate, Quicken will probably be right most of the time.
Quicken Online boasts a "Where am I spending?" page, which files all your spending into different categories, like groceries and electronics, to give you a full view of where your money is going. It then allows you to set goals to see if you can rein in spending.
Although Quicken Online is the most capable finance tracking software I used, it's not nearly as powerful as its desktop counterpart, and real power users probably won't find enough value to justify using it. But for the average person who has a mortgage, an investment account, and a couple bank accounts, it's worth using. Especially now that it's free.
Wesabe
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Much like Geezeo, Wesabe employs the wisdom of its community to help you monitor spending and get advice on how to pay off debt sooner, while saving more money.
Just like the competing services, Wesabe lets you drop in your bank information, then starts tracking that data. It examines how you spend your money and helps identify areas where you could tighten your belt by providing tips from its community. For example, when Wesabe recognizes when you purchase groceries, it provides you with a list of tips from other users on how to save money for your next trip to the store. It also finds ways to pay off debt sooner by looking, once again, toward the community for help.
Unfortunately, Wesabe doesn't offer much more than that. It provides basic goals and tips wherever you turn, but if you want investment advice or more capable financial monitoring it's not ideal. Wesabe is aimed more at the beginner than anyone else.
Scott Cook demos new TurboTax for Mac at MacWorld.
(Credit: Rafe Needleman/CBS Interactive)I spied Scott Cook, a founder and former CEO of Intuit, which makes Quicken and Quickbooks, at his company's Macworld booth, giving demos just like any booth worker.
That's curious--you don't see big company billionaires mingling with consumers in a frenzied trade show environment too often (although you should). So I snared him for a quick interview about his booth duty and the plans for Intuit overall.
Regarding hanging out with The People, Cook simply said that it's a great way to get customers to talk to him for free (versus paid surveys, I assume) and that it's good to hear what you are doing wrong (as a Quicken for Windows user, I could give have given him an earful, but time was short). He also likes to see how his team presents to customers.
On Intuit's overall strategy, Cook says Intuit is pursuing a strategy based around online and mobile access to financial data. U.S. consumers spend $7 billion a year in overdraft fees, he says, and there's no excuse for that when your phone could alert you when you're about to overextend yourself. Thus: Quicken Beam, Quicken Online (which recently got a refresh), and an online version of the small business app Quickbooks. There's also an online version of TurboTax, which will compute and file your federal taxes for free. State returns are extra, though.
Quicken Mobile gives you quick visibility in your basic financial position.
(Credit: Rafe Needleman/CBS Interactive)At the same time, Intuit seems to be renewing its commitment to standalone apps, or at least to the Mac.
Quicken for Mac is being retired in favor of a newly built financial management app called Financial Life, now in a very early public beta. It looks, at first glance, like a nicely designed version of Quicken, simpler to get in to than the company's traditional software. (On Windows, Quicken 2009 looks like a typical upgrade for Intuit from Quicken 2008: a few new features, but according to user reviews, lacking needed reliability improvements.)
Yet despite Cook's mission to offer holistic financial suites for its users, Intuit is not yet delivering on integration between its products. For example, if you use Quicken Mobile to update your Quicken Online account, that data won't make it into your Quicken software installation on your personal computer. And data files cannot be shared between Mac and Windows installations.
Personal finance site Mint is getting a useful SMS query capability: You send the word "Bal" or "balance" to short code 696468, and it will send back the balances of your bank and credit accounts. Simple. And potentially useful if you're out and want to know if you have money to pay for or charge an item.
Intuit has a nearly identical feature for its now-free Quicken Online app, called Quicken Beam. Like Mint's SMS query feature, it will send your balance data if you text the word "Bal" to the Quicken short code 636363. Beam actually does a bit more, showing you the five most recent transactions posted to each account.
Being able to access basic account data from a mobile phone is a useful feature, and I'm glad to see these popular services layering in this utility.
Intuit has finally dropped the subscription fee on Quicken Online, its Web-based financial software that competes with Mint, Geezeo, Buxfer, and Wesabe. The company is still selling, as completely separate products, software versions of Quicken.
When I last covered Quicken Online in December 2007, my biggest complaint was its price. In a market with free (and very good) competitors, there was just no reason to pay for Quicken Online. This is a smart move on Intuit's part. But while Intuit Online is a solid service, the online competitors keep getting better, too. It's unclear to me that Intuit's history will translate into market share in this competitive market.
Intuit is also still preparing to release its iPhone app that accesses Quicken Online data, as I wrote in December. No word on when that ships.
High customer support costs and an angry customer base (check out the user review scores for Quicken and Money) make standalone financial apps like Quicken and Microsoft Money questionable product lines for their makers, and when the online services take hold I will expect their demise. Devoted Quicken users like me, though, will need more capabilities (like bill paying and support for complex investment transactions) before we can make the transition, and the public at large has yet to be convinced that these online financial data storehouses can be trusted.
A quick snapshot of your cashflow (2007 version of Quicken Online)
(Credit: Intuit)See also: Quicken Beam: Your finances made cute.
There's more online financial news coming tomorrow morning from the Finovate conference. Check back here.
Beam's SMS report can be useful to keep on top of your accounts and to spot fraud.
Intuit has just launched a useful but limited little financial tracking utility for your mobile phone: Quicken Beam. You tell it about your financial accounts, like your bank and your credit card, and then it will alert you when balances reach a certain point. You can also send it a text message and it will message you back current balances or recent transactions. There's a mobile Web version for iPhones.
Beam has the benefit of being simple, but it is not deep. It will tell you about only your last five transactions in an account, and it doesn't offer personal financial trend data, like Mint does.
Mint, for its part, can send you SMS alerts, but you can't request information from it via SMS, and there's still no mobile Web site for the service.
Another useful way to get information about your accounts when you're on the go: the PageOnce iPhone app.
Beam is free, though, which is unusual for an Intuit app; even Quicken Online (which competes with the free Mint), costs $2.99 a month.
Oh yay! I'm broke!
Related: Why Mint works.
