Rakuten Rewards
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Rakuten Rewards (), formerly known as Ebates, is a cash-back and shopping rewards company. Its revenue comes from
affiliate network An affiliate network acts as an intermediary between publishers (affiliates) and merchant affiliate programs. It allows website publishers to more easily find and participate in affiliate programs which are suitable for their website (and thus ge ...
links. Members of the site click through affiliate links before shopping at a retailer's site. Once the member makes a purchase, Rakuten Rewards receives an affiliate commission from the retailer which is then shared with the member. The company publishes links both on its website and through a browser extension as well as a mobile app.


History

Rakuten Rewards was founded as Ebates in 1998 in
Menlo Park, California Menlo Park is a city at the eastern edge of San Mateo County within the San Francisco Bay Area of California in the United States. It is bordered by San Francisco Bay on the north and east; East Palo Alto, Palo Alto, and Stanford to the south; ...
, by two former deputy district attorneys, Alessandro Isolani and Paul Wasserman. Funded by the
venture capital Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which ha ...
firm
Foundation Capital Foundation Capital is a venture capital firm located in Silicon Valley. The firm was founded in 1995, and in 2012 managed more than $2.4 billion in investment capital. History Foundation Capital was founded in 1995. The firm raised its sevent ...
, Ebates.com was launched on 3 May 1999, offering up to 25% cash back from about 40 online retailers. In September 2014, Ebates was acquired by the Japanese e-commerce company
Rakuten () is a Japanese technology conglomerate based in Tokyo, founded by Hiroshi Mikitani in 1997. Centered around Rakuten Ichiba, its businesses include financial services utilizing financial technology, as well as digital content and communicati ...
for US$1 billion. In 2019, the Ebates brand was phased out and replaced with Rakuten Rewards.


Acquisitions


Services/tools


Logos

File:Ebates Logo 2017.svg, 2017 File:Ebates Logo 2018.svg, 2018 File:Ebates Logo 2019.svg, 2019 (US, before renaming) File:Ebates.ca Logo 2019.svg, 2019 (Canada, before renaming) File:Rakuten Global Brand Logo.svg, 2019 (US and Canada, after renaming)


References

{{Rakuten American companies established in 1998 Internet properties established in 1998 1998 establishments in California Companies based in San Mateo, California Rakuten 2014 mergers and acquisitions American subsidiaries of foreign companies