PEXA Group Limited (PEXA), have just announced the acquisition of Smoove plc (Smoove), effective today, 19th December 2023.
Glenn King, Managing Director and CEO of PEXA, said:
“PEXA and Smoove share the common goal of simplifying and enhancing the home moving process through digitalisation. The acquisition will help both companies significantly reduce transaction times, while simultaneously removing the pain points across the process.
I am excited to welcome the Smoove team to the PEXA Group. This acquisition will further assist PEXA in bringing its world-leading technology to the UK market. Smoove’s position in the UK market will allow us to build additional scale and depth, while allowing the PEXA product suite to reach more customers.”
Joe Pepper, PEXA’s UK Country Head, commented:
“We look forward to working together with the team at Smoove to provide innovative products and services that will help address the many detriments suffered by UK consumers due to the UK’s fragmented, inefficient conveyancing processes.
Smoove has built a customer-focused technology and services business with a multi-channel distribution network that spans mortgage brokers, banks, building societies, estate agents and direct-to-consumer websites, which we will benefit from as we broaden our UK presence.”
PEXA foresee that acquiring Smoove will help deepen their presence in the market by providing access to:
- More than 75 conveyancer firms through Smoove’s conveyancer platform, in addition to another 2,100 firms through Smoove’s role arranging panels for lenders across the UK market;
- Remortgage flows equivalent to 7% of the UK market and sale and purchase flows across the Smoove platform that are equivalent to 3% of the UK’s sales1;
- Opportunities to cross-sell the PEXA platform to panel firms of Smoove (which provides access to volumes both on and outside of the Smoove platform); and
- Important relationships with key Smoove customers such as Lloyds Banking Group, which Smoove has been supporting since 2007.
Glenn King, added:
“We expect there to be a number of benefits in combining Smoove’s established relationships and capabilities with PEXA’s existing operations. These include opportunities to cross-sell Optima and PEXA UK’s remortgage offering to Smoove customers, opportunities to cross-sell PEXA UK’s sale and purchase offering in the future, and opportunities to leverage Smoove’s multi-collaboration toolkit to enhance PEXA’s product suite.”
Jesper With-Fogstrup, CEO of Smoove, said:
“PEXA Group has a proven track record of successfully digitising the conveyancing industry in Australia. This aligns with our strategy in the UK and we look forward to marrying PEXA’s impressive experience with our deep local knowledge to transform the home ownership experience in the UK. This is an exciting opportunity for Smoove and we will focus on ensuring a smooth transition for customers, colleagues and all stakeholders in the coming months.”
More information on how these two will be integrating, will be published next year.
