PayPal buys &#39;contextual commerce&#39; startup Modest

PayPal buys 'contextual commerce' startup Modest

PayPal has bought Modest, a 'contextual commerce' startup run by two former senior tech leads on Barack Obama's re-election campaign. Financial terms of the deal have not been disclosed.

Chicago-based Modest was founded in 2012 by Obama for America CTO Harper Reed and lead engineer Dylan Richard.

The company has developed a mobile commerce platform that lets merchants create a customised store, integrate stores with other apps and use buy buttons to sell, to give them the "ability to offer an end-to-end experience that makes selling on any platform easier and simpler".

Reed, Richard and their small team will join Braintree, the Chicago-based outfit PayPal acquired for $800 million in 2013.

In a blog on the acquisition, PayPal's Bill Ready, who was Braintree CEO, cites the example of Buyable Pins on Pinterest, which Braintree powers, as an example of the kind of contextual commerce Modest will help with.

"This means we will be able to offer merchants a complete commerce solution (payments and order management) to help them add contextual commerce channels to the ways that they sell to their customers," writes Ready.

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