BankTech Ventures, a strategic investment fund and ecosystem serving community banks and bank technology entrepreneurs, announced today its investment in SOLO, a collaborative data collection platform transforming underwriting. SOLO identifies the path to any financial product or outcome, fostering open dialogue and collaboration between banks and customers and turning underwriting into an ongoing, proactive and transparent system. Developed alongside BankTech Ventures’ network of community banks, SOLO’s platform enables secure, streamlined data collection and activation, empowering banks to make more efficient and proactive underwriting decisions.
“SOLO’s unique ability to address the present needs of banks and their customers, while still building for the future, is what sets them apart,” said Carey Ransom, Managing Director at BankTech Ventures. “This investment signals a shift in how banks become more efficient and scalable in their lending, particularly for banks adapting to new standards of data governance within digital lending.”
Underwriting is a historically manual and costly process at many banks, providing a static, one-time snapshot of a consumer’s or small business’ creditworthiness. Both expensive for banks and frustrating for customers, current processes make it difficult for banks to offer competitive products and clearly outline the steps a consumer may take to achieve a financial goal or product qualification.
SOLO developed its data ingestion platform to streamline financing timelines with frictionless applications, data collection powered by consumer permissioned account integrations, on-demand decisioning, continuous 360-degree underwriting capabilities and proactive product matching without requiring multiple application rounds. By creating a “record of truth” for each consumer, SOLO allows users to own their credit data, while banks query the data they need in real time, optimizing both efficiency and customer experience. The result is a shared language of credit, eliminating the back and forth between customer and banker to put all parties on the same page at first introduction.
“Our mission is to foster collaboration and trust across the financial ecosystem, turning data-sharing and data collection from a tedious task into a reusable asset that establishes instant credibility to open doors,” said Georgina Merhom, founder of SOLO.
SOLO is currently undergoing FCRA compliance, with plans to operate as a Credit Reporting Agency by early 2025. By offering a “collaborative credit bureau” model, SOLO aligns with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) mission to advance open banking with the newly published 1033 rule. SOLO transforms credit scoring from static to a dynamic, context-aware evaluation system, enabling users to engage various stakeholders in building a more comprehensive credit profile.
For more information, visit solo.one. To learn more about BankTech Ventures, visit banktechventures.com.
About BankTech Ventures
BankTech Ventures identifies and invests in leading bank technology companies and is deeply entrenched in community banking to ensure its companies work effectively and efficiently with banks to deliver maximum value and impact. BankTech’s unparalleled ecosystem is designed to deliver compelling innovation with community banks at the center of it all – bringing together bankers, industry organizations and tech founders to work collaboratively to accelerate innovation in banking. Follow BankTech on LinkedIn and X. For more information, visit https://www.banktechventures.com/
About SOLO
SOLO is the collaborative credit bureau transforming how credit data is collected and activated. Developed alongside a network of community banks, the SOLO data ingestion platform syncs data from various sources, giving lenders control over calculations and interpretations to shift the burden of verified financials off the consumer while mitigating the risks of unreliable self-reported information, fostering accuracy and trust in decision-making. SOLO empowers lenders with the ability to offer frictionless financing experiences while maintaining data accuracy, complying with evolving standards, and managing operational costs. To learn more about SOLO, visit solo.one.
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