Anyway, the surprising fact is that it took so long for Intuit to sell QuickBase, which is a development environment that gets some use in heavy-duty companies. The words "development environment" and Intuit never seemed to go together and Smith referred to the decision enabling the companies to better serve "needs of our respective, but distinct, customers." How distinct is shown by a phrase on the QuickBase section of the Intuit website: "Used by more than half of the Fortune 100." Could any product have a user base that is farther from QuickBooks? My memory tells me that when Cook visited the office at which I was worked in the late 1990s, he gave a passionate pitch about QuickBase. Demandforce, which provides marketing for small business, is a more recent deal. Intuit purchased the company for $424 million in 2012. That is a more complex process than selling software, online or otherwise.
INTUIT SELLING QUICKEN, Q-BASE, D-FORCE Featured
Intuit plans to divest the product that gave birth to the company, Quicken. The company revealed its plans in this week's fiscal 2015 conference call in which CEO Brad Smith said Intuit will also sell Demandforce and QuickBase. "Quicken is a strong, healthy business and remains America's No.1 personal finance software," Smith said. But he noted it is a desktop package "that does not strengthen the small business or tax ecosystems." Intuit displays the kitchen table at which Scott Cook conceived the first thought that led to Quicken after his wife complained about trying to balance her checkbook. I wonder if the buyer has to take it. (Just kidding.)
