Kabbage Acquires Orchard

Following speculation, Kabbage officially announced today that it has entered into a “definitive agreement” to acquire Orchard, a financial technology and analytics company that provides data to lenders and investors.  

“I’m most excited about the people [at Orchard] because, while they’ve built this amazing technology, it takes a long time to get the right people in place,” said Kabbage co-founder Kathryn Petralia. “And they’ve built a great culture and great company of talented individuals who I think really understand the industry…and can help us get to where we’re trying to go.”

Kabbage and Orchard have enjoyed a working relationship for some time already, Petralia told AltFinanceDaily. (Kabbage has been a client of Orchard).

More than 20 employees from New York-based Orchard will move to Kabbage’s New York office, including two of its founders, Matt Burton and David Snitkof. The company was founded in 2013 by Burton and Snitkof, along with Angela Ceresnie and Phil Rosen.

Burton previously worked at Google and Snitkof previously worked at Citigroup and American Express.

“Like most businesses, we often listened to interesting offers, but never found the best fit. Until Kabbage,” Snitkof said of its decision to be acquired by Kabbage. “Everything from their mission, technology focus and culture is aligned with Orchard. [And] there are really interesting innovations we can do together by combining our data science platforms.”

Kathryn Petralia, co-founder/COO, Kabbage

Orchard has a proprietary technology platform that simplifies mass-data analysis and Kabbage has a forecasting and predictive analytics engine that strengthens its automated underwriting platform. Together, they hope to create an even stronger platform that helps small businesses access capital quickly and efficiently.

“Integrating our two data science platforms will take time, but we’re excited for what’s to come,” said Snitkof.

Almost ten years old, this is Kabbage’s first acquisition. Asked if the company is “on a buying spree,” Petralia said no, but also acknowledged that they are now in a position to make acquisitions, like Orchard, that can help them build their business faster, as long the acquisition makes sense.

Founded in 2009, Kabbage is headquartered in Atlanta and has provided over $4 billion to more than 130,000 businesses.

Todd Stone was a reporter for AltFinanceDaily.