The LSE Directory / Alternative data
Affinity Solutions is a New York based data and analytics company that aggregates permissioned, bank-direct credit and debit card transaction data and converts it into consumer purchase insights. Its core dataset draws on more than 150 million credit and debit cards linked to roughly 95 to 100 million consumers, covering 86 billion-plus transactions and over 4 trillion dollars in spend across more than 5,300 tracked brands in the United States and United Kingdom, with up to five years of transaction history. Data is delivered through customizable dashboards, direct data feeds, secure data clean rooms and API access, and processed through its proprietary Comet platform, which cleanses, unifies, anonymizes, tags and enriches raw transaction records into purchase profiles usable across the marketing lifecycle, from planning and audience targeting to in flight campaign optimization and sales lift measurement. The company's stated differentiator is that its data is deterministic and bank-verified, actual completed purchases, rather than proxy signals such as clickstream data, foot traffic estimates, survey panels or receipt scanning apps. It positions itself as the only provider offering purchase data broken out by demographic, geographic and lifestyle segment at this scale. Its customer base spans four groups: brands and media/advertising companies using the data for campaign targeting and measurement, retailers and quick service restaurant chains for competitive benchmarking, banks and financial institutions building cardholder loyalty and engagement programs, and, notably for an investment audience, consulting firms and investment groups using the transaction data to ground market research and due diligence in observed consumer spending. The company was founded by Jonathan Silver, a Wharton graduate and former McKinsey consultant, who remains Founder and CEO; the surrounding leadership team includes a Chief Operating Officer, a Chief Technology and Information Officer, a Chief Commercial and Marketing Officer, a Chief Product Officer and a Chief Growth Officer. Affinity operates from New York City with an additional Silicon Valley office. Since 2019 the company has used Structural Capital as a debt financing partner, with the original facility upsized twice, in 2021 and in 2022, which Structural describes as accompanying a period of profitable growth and positive free cash flow at Affinity; reported third-party figures on prior equity funding rounds vary significantly between data aggregators and could not be independently confirmed in this research pass, so no funding total is stated here. In 2023 Affinity expanded its retail-intelligence footprint on two fronts: it launched a consumer purchase insights solution on the Snowflake Marketplace in June, and in November it partnered with the National Retail Federation to launch the CNBC/NRF Retail Monitor, a monthly retail sales tracker built on its real-time card transaction data that is released roughly a week ahead of US Census Bureau retail figures and is featured on CNBC. It also co-developed the Consumer Insights Studio with the National Retail Federation and Pyxis by Bain and Company, a dashboard product combining its transaction data with NRF and Bain expertise for retailer clients.
