The Ups & Downs Of Quicken And How It Survived The Market

 In the medieval world, or should we say in the Mesopotamia period, precisely in 9000 BCE, temple heads were used to keep records of food, cattle, and other donations by writing them on damp clay tablets.

These tablets were stored in storage rooms and were required when the village/temple heads used to audit at specific intervals. A few centuries into industrialization, temples became head of villages, and paper & ink replaced clay tablets.

Using paper sure had its advantages, and we still use it in our modern-day schools and offices. However, we have seen exponential growth in the world’s population in the past centuries. In 4000 BCE, the world’s population reached 800,000, and by today’s standards, only the UK has a population of 800,000, and if we go a step extra, in 2021, the current world’s population is 7,874,965,825.

To count data of such a vast population, we might have to cut down the entire world’s forest to make enough paper for everyone. But we don’t have to do it because we have Quicken.

Quicken is an advanced personal management program that empowers individuals to manage their finances and business affairs.

Intuit has been in the finance management industry since 1983, and from its fantastic line of accounting products comes Quicken, a sophisticated personal management tool for individuals. However, Quicken is no longer a part of Intuit, as the company sold the software to HIG. Capital in 2016 for $19 billion of equity capital under management.

As a former subsidiary of Intuit, Quicken offers its services for Windows and Mac operating systems. It provides many services and options like creating a custom budget, investment tracking, and small business management. Let’s dive deeper into Quicken and see how it impacted the financial management world.

A brief history about Quicken

Back in 1983, Intuit released two versions of Quicken for Apple II and MS-DOS. There were some major problems with Mac’s former version and new versions’ calibration in the initial run. Due to incompatible issues, users shifted from Mac to Windows, and surprisingly, the DOS version of Quicken was compatible with the newer Windows operating system. This factor alone carved a new path for Quicken, and Intuit gained an international reputation in the financial management sector.

In the late 90s, Apple revamped their Mac computer and developed backward compatibility for their OS 9. People reconnected to Apple, and the company became the second-largest PC manufacturer for the decade. As a result, Quicken continued its services for Intel-based Macs in August 2009.

Despite all the hype, PowerPC lost Quicken support as its users suggested that it was not suited for Mac (intel) and OS X. However, in 2010, Mac computers controlled a fair share of the US market.

Especially the new Mac OS, which gained international traction from software & hardware professionals. Finally, in the same year, Intuit revamped the software from scratch and created a new version called Quicken Essentials for Mac (QEM). And the later versions of Quicken followed the same architecture used in the Quicken Essentials. By then, Mac users enjoyed Quicken on their computer systems, and Intuit continued its reign in the finance management market with Quicken as their flagship product.

However, Intuit sold Quicken to HIG. Capital on March 3, 2016, for $19 billion of equity capital under management. Since 2016, HIG. Capital has been handling Quicken as the sole owner of the software.

Note: As of 2021, Quicken does not operate or provide support in the UK. But you can still download some versions of Quicken. For more information, you visit Quicken’s official website.

Conclusion

Quicken had a rough start, and almost every Mac user left the platform because of its inconsistency and limitations. Some users still ignore Quicken and choose its rival programs like QuickBooks, Zoho Finance Plus, Xero, Sage Intacct, and many more. But we cannot forget the legacy of Quicken and how it managed to survive against all the odds.

According to Forbes, Quicken has an active user base of 2.5 million users, and since its release, more than 17 million people have used the software for managing their finances. Recently, Quicken moved to a cloud-based operation and gained a subscriber growth of 40% in 2019. We can only see what Quicken has to offer in the future, and we are sure that Quicken will come twice as strong in the next update. 

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