Blackbaud will acquire Kintera

This should only come as a surprise to those who thought some other company would soon acquire Kintera. According to Forbes and Kintera's own site, Blackbaud will get Kintera for a price that's higher per share than Kintera's stock was trading recently. It's still a great deal for Blackbaud, who will no doubt bring the best parts of Kintera's content management system to Blackbaud's net community. It's a great deal for most Kintera employees, especially those who create and support the product. It's a great deal for Kintera customers, who now have a stable vendor.

It's also a good thing for Convio customers, who will benefit from some real competition. Convio's a good product, but after they acquired GetActive, they didn't have to sell hard against Kintera, they just had to leave the Wall Street Journal laying around for potential clients to see. Kintera has taken such a beating on its stock price that most of Kintera's own press releases lately have been about that and not about product.

NPA continues to be bullish on online fundraising in general, though we're proudly agnostic about particular platforms.