Opcity, one of Austin's fastest-growing startups, is being acquired by a News Corp subsidiary for $210 million, the companies announced Wednesday afternoon.
Move, Inc., which operates realtor.com, will become Opcity's owner. Opcity will continue to operate as a stand-alone company, and CEO Ben Rubenstein will retain his title.
The deal puts a punctuation mark on the meteoric rise of Opcity, a real estate tech startup that came out of stealth mode in May 2017 with a $27 million Series A round of funding from Palo Alto-based Icon Ventures, Toronto-based Georgian Partners and Austin's LiveOak Venture Partners. The company was founded by Rubenstein, a co-founder of Yodel, and Michael Lam, a former VP of corporate strategy and M&A at Citigroup.
“This is a natural fit. Both realtor.com and Opcity share a common purpose of simplifying a consumer’s home buying journey, while helping real estate professionals connect and close more transactions,” Rubenstein said in a news release. “Together, we’ll provide an enhanced consumer experience and more choices for brokers and their agents to grow their business.”
Opcity has found a niche in using machine learning and real estate data to more effectively connect home buyers, home sellers and real estate agents. It has more than 5,000 brokerages and 40,000 agents using its product for referrals and other leads.
Meanwhile, real estate tech is booming, as evident by huge investments by Keller Williams and the rise of several fast-growing real estate tech startups in Austin and beyond. News Corp says its digital real estate services are its fastest growing segment, with Move's real estate revenue growing by 20 percent in the past year.
“This acquisition will help us bring buyers, sellers and agents together with as much simplicity, efficiency and choice as possible," Ryan O’Hara, CEO of Move, Inc., said in the release. "The addition of Opcity to our portfolio will align with our strategy to enhance the experience of consumers, while providing our industry partners with more opportunities to connect with clients and grow their businesses.”
The startup was a winner of Austin Inno's 50 on Fire awards and Tech Madness competition. Its founders were also awarded EY's Entrepreneur of The Year 2018 Award in the emerging tech category. And it was a 2017 Austin Chamber of Commerce A-List winner.
LiveOak Venture Partners co-founder Krishna Srinivasan said it was exciting to see the company's fast rise.
“The company went from our seed investment to a really sizable business and strong exit all in 24 months – probably the fastest we have ever seen and the direct result of some incredible execution on so many fronts by the team led by Ben Rubenstein and Michael Lam," he told me via e-mail.
