German fintech Vivid Money buys Pile’s treasury solution
Berlin-based fintech Vivid Money has acquired fellow German fintech Pile and its treasury solution as it looks to expand its Vivid Business offering for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) launched at the start of the year.
Vivid Money snaps up Pile’s treasury solution
The mobile banking platform announced the launch of Vivid Business in January to combine corporate and personal financial management into one app. Complete with business accounts and a corporate card offering, the division seeks to extend Vivid’s reach to German start-ups and SMEs specifically.
Touted as “the first treasury solution for SMEs across Europe”, the acquisition of Pile and its treasury capabilities is expected to bolster the Vivid Business offering with simplified money transfers, consolidated account functions and automated financial reporting.
The integration of the solution into Vivid is to be actioned in two phases. Pile’s customers will initially be given the opportunity to “transition to Vivid’s wide range of services”, according to the two companies. This will be followed by an integration period involving “parts of the treasury offerings, such as Pile’s popular multi-banking feature” being added into Vivid’s product portfolio.
The exact timeline of this second phase has not been disclosed at this time.
Operationally, Vivid states that the Pile team, consisting of 10 members, will “accompany the transformation process”, with the opportunity to join the financial platform “in the long term”.
Jessica Holzbach, who founded Pile in 2022 (after co-founding business banking start-up Penta in 2016), is to serve as an advisor to Vivid “in the coming months to ensure a smooth transition”.
Writing about the deal on LinkedIn, she says that although Pile was founded with “high ambitions”, the company’s progression had “turned out different than initially planned”.
“While Pile developed a powerful and innovative product, its true potential can only be realised as part of a bigger financial platform,” her post continues.
In a statement, Alexander Emeshev, co-founder of Vivid, adds that the acquisition “provides the perfect foundation for expanding our business segment and allows us to offer our joint customers a broader and deeper product range”.
