Wesabe Closes $4 Million in Series A Funding Led by Union Square Ventures

Wesabe, a personal finance start-up, today announced that the company closed a $4 million Series A round, led by Union Square Ventures (USV). An early-stage fund based in New York, USV's best-known deals include investments in FeedBurner (acquired by Google) and de.licio.us (acquired by Yahoo!). O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures, the lead seed round investor in Wesabe, also participated in the Series A round.

The company plans to use the funding to expand product development and marketing.

In November 2006, Wesabe launched a Web-based financial management tool that gives members a better understanding of how they spend, and links them to a community dedicated to helping each other get more for their money. Wesabe aggregates and analyzes financial transaction data from members' bank and credit card accounts, and delivers customized, money-saving tips based on members' actual purchases.

"What really sets Wesabe apart from traditional financial management tools is its rich peer-produced content and ease of use," said Brad Burnham, USV partner. "We were also attracted to deep experience of the founders, and their unrelenting focus on serving a growing community of members."

Wesabe has the world's largest member-owned financial transaction database of its kind, which is currently tracking more than $500 million in transactions. The company has member rankings for more than 75,000 merchants, and 1.5 million tags (category labels, such as "groceries," "phone," etc.) applied to merchants. Wesabe supports banks in 30 countries, and provides automatic currency conversion for 36 currencies.

"With this funding, we'll be able to add new features at a faster pace and start really putting our massive transaction database to work for our members," said Jason Knight, CEO and co-founder of Wesabe. "In addition, this round will allow us to introduce Wesabe to more people and explore partnership opportunities."

Wesabe also announced that Burnham has joined the company's board of directors. Other members of the four-person board are: Tim O'Reilly, founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media;

Source: Wesabe