The once flourishing Portland startup fintech community has had some unfortunate setbacks, as of late. Acorns, Simple, and Azlo are no longer here. And while companies like Expensify and Bumped continue to grow, we haven’t seen a great deal of activity of up and comers, lately. Until now. Created by startup fintech veterans with more than 60 years experience as a team, we now have a new Portland fintech startup to watch: quin.
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Why a SoCal startup’s $105 million round could have positive ripples in the Portland startup community
In case you haven’t noticed, Portland has more than its fair share of interesting regional offices — often established through acquisition. There are the obvious ones. Like AWS (via Elemental). And ebay (via Critical Path). And Akamai (via Janrain).
With Portland startup Bumped, buying stuff can also have you buying stock
You don’t hear as much about it as I would like, but I love the small and scrappy fintech startup community in Portland. What started with companies like Simple has spawned any number of interesting takes on banking, financing, and investing. Even the cofounder of Acorns—which enables folks to round up purchase prices to invest small increments of money—has a Portland connection. (He graduated from Lewis & Clark.) So you can imagine my excitement when I heard that Giftango founder David Nelsen was getting back in the startup game with a fintech play. And now, it’s come out of stealth. Meet Bumped.
Acorns now and Acorns Later: Portland startup Vault acquired by Acorns
One of the challenges with the Portland startup community has always been achieving exits that generate capital and connections that can be reinvested into the next generation of companies in our community. So it’s always nice to see an exit. But it’s even nicer when that exit is a company founded by a Portland native who is interested in giving back to the community. That’s why I’m happy to announce that Portland startup Vault has been acquired by Acorns.