Liquidity Ventures, the strategic tech innovation fund set up by the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, has completed its fourth transaction this year with an investment in big data company Powerlytics.
The Powerlytics platform analyses anonymised financial information from publicly available US government sources - such as IRS tax returns and data from the US Census and Department of Labor - and reconstructs it into financial statements that provides a granular view of household and business economic activity. The data can be fine-tuned to help drive business and investment strategies by providing economic and marketing insights, benchmark and market sizing information.
The investment in Powerlytics comes hot on the heels of a punt last month on payments network Dwolla, an earlier bet on self-destructing messaging app developer Wickr, and its first investment in a mystery data encryption company.
On the interest in Powerlytics, Liquidity ventures MD Mark Fields says: "CME Group recognises the significant opportunity for big data to revolutionise the financial services industry. In surveying the market, it became clear to us that Powerlytics has a strong value proposition and we are excited to support their growth."
Powerlytics says it will use the funding to accelerate product development, strategic alliances, client services, sales and marketing.
As part of the agreement - for which financial terms have not been disclosed - Mark Fields will become an observer to the Powerlytics board of directors.