Square Inc., the financial technology company known best for its slick iPad transactions, said Thursday that it had provided $2 million in funds to Austin’s Novo Dia Group to ensure that participants in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) can use their benefits at farmers’ markets without interruption, according to FERN’s latest story, published in collaboration with the Washington Post. The investment also gives Square a window into the lucrative market for SNAP benefits, worth $63 billion annually.
The cash infusion is Novo Dia’s third since last July, when FERN reported with the Post that it would end its service, touching off a panic in the local agriculture and farmers’ market community. At the time, the company’s software platform Mobile Market + was in use at 1,700 markets across the country and accounted for 40 percent of all SNAP transactions at farmers’ markets.
You can read the full story at FERN.