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Plano-based tech and philanthropy company YourCause sells for $157 million

YourCause was founded by Matthew Combs, now its CEO, in 2007 after he was moved by a documentary about children in war-torn Uganda.

Plano-based YourCause, which makes software that encourages employee volunteering and giving, announced Thursday that it's been acquired by another social good-related company for about $157 million.

The 155-person company will become part of Blackbaud, a Charleston, S.C.-based company that provides software for social good-related companies and groups such as schools, nonprofits and faith communities. YourCause and its employees will remain in Plano, founder and CEO Matt Combs said.

YourCause was founded by Combs in 2007 after he watched a news program about children in war-torn Uganda and heard a young boy speak about the brutality he witnessed.

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"I’m a father myself, and I was thinking how different our worlds are and that inspired me to want to help him," he said.

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But when he went online, he struggled to find a related charity. He decided to build a website — YourCause.com — that listed 1.5 million registered charities and let users donate instantly to any of them. It also generated a personalized pitch that a person could share with friends or family to encourage them to donate, too. At the time, he said, he said he hoped it'd become "the MySpace of causes."

Combs said the company tried, and failed, to get traction in the first six months. The website didn't get enough traffic. It couldn't attract advertisers. He didn't want to profit off the donations.

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Instead, he went to Dallas-based AT&T and got a "Yes" when he pitched a new idea: AT&T and other large companies could share the service to empower employees and help fund good causes.

YourCause counts Fortune 500 and small companies among its clients. Its software makes it...
YourCause counts Fortune 500 and small companies among its clients. Its software makes it easier for companies to track employee volunteering and giving.(Courtesy of YourCause)

YourCause became a subscription-based software service used by Fortune 500 companies and small businesses, including AT&T, Samsung and Dell. Its enterprise software helps engage employees in volunteering, giving and sustainability initiatives. Companies can use the software to track the number of volunteer hours that employees log and the dollars they donate. It includes features that make it easier for them to collect grant applications from nonprofits, match employee donations or reward employees for their volunteer hours.

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YourCause says it processes more than $245,000 in donations every business hour and has tracked more than 30 million volunteer hours.

The company's growth has been buoyed, in part, by the growing number of companies who have looked to social good as a way to attract employees and build a strong workplace culture. And shoppers are paying attention to companies' track record, too. A majority of young millennials surveyed by Accenture this holiday season said they were seeking out companies that shared their values when they bought gifts.

Combs said he also credits the passion and hard work of his employees.

YourCause was recognized in 2015 as one of the Top 100 Places to Work. The Dallas Morning News-sponsored competition is based on anonymous employee surveys by research partner Energage (formerly called Workplace Dynamics). In the surveys, YourCause employees praised the company for its sense of purpose and its fun work environment that includes an open office, pingpong tables and team lunches and outings.

Combs said he saw Blackbaud as an ideal fit, since it has primarily focused on software for nonprofits and YourCause has focused on software for for-profit enterprises. The acquisition will bring those two specialties together. Going forward, he said he'd like to add features that make the software more seamless, such as making it easier for a donation on a charity's page to automatically appear in the employee portal.

YourCause is the latest acquisition for Blackbaud, a 3,400-person company. It bought JustGiving, a London-based crowdfunding company, for $121 million in 2017 and Smart Tuition, a cloud solution that processes tuition payments, for $190 million in 2015.