22seven founder leaves Old Mutual

Users of the budgeting and investing app 22seven were notified this week by the founder of the app that he and some of his key staff would be parting ways with Old Mutual, the owners of the app, following Old Mutual’s decision to “bring 22seven closer to home”.

Old Mutual bought the app from 22seven in January 2013, but retained the original team that had developed the product. Since taking ownership of the app, Old Mutual has done away with the subscription fee, making the app free to users.

The first of its kind in South Africa, the app regularly pulls in data from all of your bank accounts, loans and investments, to give you a detailed analysis of your spending and saving patterns.

An email from 22seven founder Chris Davel to users this week stated that since Old Mutual bought 22seven almost four years ago, “we have continued to run independently, with our own separate offices and staff.

“The support and independence they gave us enabled us do what we originally set out to do: to help people do better with their money.

“Old Mutual has decided to bring 22seven strategically closer to home, in terms of their digital business. They have some extremely capable people working on their future digital plans, which means that I, co-founder Kenny Inggs and some of our staff won’t be part of 22seven’s future.”

Davel says users can be assured that nothing will change in terms of technology – notably the secure partners, support services, data security, privacy and ethics.

“22seven will continue to maintain the same security standards and partners, to adhere to the current Privacy Policy, and to honour the Data Ethics Manifesto,” he says.

Raymond Berelowitz, the director of customer solutions at Old Mutual, says the financial services provider is keen to explore ways in which the app can help consumers manage their money more effectively and achieve their financial goals “as part of a digitally enabled financial planning process”.