US-based leading financial services company Robinhood Markets has agreed to buy fintech startup Say Technologies for $140 million in an all-cash deal.
According to the company statement, Say’s software, which allows corporate shareholders to exercise their right to vote proxies and ask questions of management, will be made available to Robinhood as part of the deal.
The announcement comes less than two weeks after Robinhood made its public trading debut. “Together, we’ll find new ways to expand what it means to be an investor through new products and experiences that democratize shareholder access,” Robinhood said in the blog post.
“Say was built on the belief that everyone should have the same access to the financial markets as Wall Street insiders,” the company further added.
New York-based Say, founded in 2017, has built a communication platform that crowdsources questions from retail investors and enables them to connect with the firms they invest in during annual meetings, earnings calls, and other events.
Furthermore, Say Technologies provides shareholders proxy-voting and polling services. According to media sources, its platform was used during Tesla’s earnings calls.
“We share a common goal of eliminating the barriers that keep people from participating in our financial system,” Robinhood Chief Product Officer Ms. Aparna Chennapragrada commented in a blog post.
Robinhood has tried to win over individual investors with a marketing slogan of “democratizing finance.” The company announced a new platform in May that allows individual investors to buy shares in initial public offerings.
As per the reports, “The company had an underwhelming market debut late last month, but the stock has since seen a wild rally and was up nearly 50 percent from its IPO price as of the last close.”
