Frankfurt, October 2013. Minkabu, Inc., successfully operating renowned platforms such as minkabu.jp and caiku.com with approx. 4 million monthly unique users combined, has acquired sharewise GmbH, operator of sharewise.com, thereby establishing the leading global platform for investment-related social media.
„sharewise and minkabu are the perfect fit. We are already working on the combination of our technical platforms to provide our users an even more attractive and broadened service offering as soon as possible.“
– Stefan Nothegger, founder & managing director of sharewise
„sharewise definitely expands the potential of our group to realize the next generation social finance platform.“
– Ken Uryu, founder & CEO of minkabu and new CEO of sharewise
„We are very happy to have found our ideal partner Minkabu to reach the global targets of sharewise earlier than expected and we are looking forward to offer our services to more international clients.“
– Michael Mellinghoff, managing director of sharewise
The company will combine the successful features of both platforms and maintain both brands for its continuing expansion. As of today, the combined company is active throughout Asia (China and Japan) and Europe (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and United Kingdom). Minkabu plans to use the brand sharewise globally for the further expansion of its platform, for example in Southeast Asia or North/ Latin America and other countries/regions.
Corporate Finance Partners – now ACXIT Capital Partners – acted as the exclusive M&A adviser to sharewise GmbH and its shareholders.
sharewise GmbH with offices in Munich and Frankfurt, went live in 2007 and operates community websites in 5 different languages focusing on stock recommendations of private investors, making the wisdom of the crowd on stocks transparent. The virtual stock picks of the Top100 form the basis for sharewise products like the first crowd-sourced stock newsletter and the sharewise community fund, a mutual fund whose portfolio allocation follows these top picks. (www.sharewise.com)
Minkabu, Inc., headquartered in Tokyo, was founded in 2006 and launched its service in 2007. As of today, the company operates the largest social media platforms for investors in Asia „Minkabu“ and „Caiku“ and launched its mobile app in 2012. Core functions of the platforms are unique real-time financial information generated by crowd analysis (stock picks by massive investors) and automated analysis (unique algorithms running valuation, comparison and correlation analyses and generating real-time stock price diagnoses). By combining these two unique tools, Minkabu’s goal is to provide live investment ideas for every stock listed financial instrument (including stocks, FX, CFD, commodities and futures). Minkabu is expanding its market coverage globally and transforming itself from a social media operator to a next generation financial information provider. (www.minkabu.jp)
ACXIT Capital Partners is a leading international corporate finance and investment advisory firm for mid-market clients and entrepreneurs in Europe and beyond. Since 1998, we offer our clients comprehensive corporate finance advisory services including M&A and capital markets advisory as well as restructuring, debt and strategic advisory. As an independent, privately owned firm we maintain offices in Frankfurt, Berlin, Munich, Zurich, Vienna and Hong Kong as well as strong alliances in China, India and the USA.
To date, we have completed more than 350 transactions with a total deal/financing volume of approx. EUR 17bn. Our clients are corporations, family-owned businesses, entrepreneurs, financial sponsors and family offices. While our home market is in the German speaking region, most clients are international and transactions cross-border. (www.acxit.com)
ACXIT Capital Holding GmbH
Siesmayer Carrée
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60323 Frankfurt am Main
Germany
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E-mail: press@acxit.com
Dr. Ingmar Ackermann, Managing Partner
E-mail: Ackermann@acxit.com
