September 11, 2023

Companies are constantly maturing and evolving and often times things reach a point where the processes, policies, and practices that got them there need to be revamped to help them reach their next stage. Sometimes this stems from growth in the team's size, other times it's the result of fundamental changes in the business. Still, the theme above all else is a willingness and desire to adapt and change.

September 5, 2023

As we get closer to the day when we have the multi-market software suite ready to launch, we've been putting in the work to ensure we find the right anchor client to go to market with first to help us get our legs underneath us. An anchor client like this should ideally meet certain criteria:

August 28, 2023

As we head into Labor Day weekend and the last weekend of summer, I wanted to express how proud I am of each and every one of you for what we've accomplished not just this year but this summer alone. It's been an incredible few months and the pace at which we're getting things done (deals, releases, fixes, clients onboarded, investors acquired, and more) is at a level of which the company has never seen before.

August 21, 2023

We're not one to waste time, that's for sure. Fresh off our broker dealer approval, we managed to launch and close a new offering that simply wasn't possible before. Limited partnership (LP) interests in funds are the first of many new asset classes we can expand into, allowing our investors to become institutional investors in the truest sense of the word.

August 14, 2023

Finally, two years after we first kicked off the discussion around becoming a broker dealer, we officially have our application approved. To say this was a journey is an understatement - the amount of times we had to explain what we do, outline how our business operates, answer the same questions again and again, and then re-explain all over to another group who needed the same explanation but worded differently, was an exercise in persistence like nothing we’ve ever seen before.

August 7, 2023

Heading into our board meeting last week, there was cause for concern. AUM has been stagnant, we missed on our revenue targets as a result of the broker dealer delays, and software revenue still needs time to be realized. And yet the sentiment all throughout the meeting was one of optimism and momentum. There's an undertone of growth and opportunity that this company has not felt in years.

July 31, 2023

Another quarter is in the books heading into our Q2 board meeting this week and we have a lot to be proud of despite the headwinds facing the business, from delays in broker dealer approval to challenges with getting more institutional capital on board. Despite all this, we managed to top revenue forecasts after backing out the broker dealer servicing fees. The acceleration from here, though, becomes all the more challenging.

July 24, 2023

Before this year, we had focused most of our efforts on acquiring accredited investors as we had a strategy that had proven itself effective through digital ad campaigns and other means to get them on board. As we had seen in the past though, in times of market volatility, accredited investors become more fearful and they tend to invest less or pull out altogether.

July 17, 2023

It’s been a fantastic few weeks for our marketplace as the volume of deals coming to market has been happening at a rapid pace. Credit to the Underwriting and Commercial teams that have been working on overdrive to clear out this backlog and pipeline that we have. In the past week alone, we’ve launched three new borrowers, one of which was with an inaugural underwriter, closed on one new deal with a new underwriter, and have likely two more borrowers on deck for next week, one of which is for another new underwriter. 

July 10, 2023

A bit of a departure from the usual weekly email but when Paul Graham (founder of Y Combinator, one of the top startup incubators in the US) writes something, it's usually worth pausing and taking the time to read. In his latest piece, "How to Do Great Work," he shares his perspective on what anyone needs to do to be successful in any field. Some key takeaways that were most impactful for me and directly applicable to what we're building here below:

July 3, 2023

Over the past week we've inadvertently stumbled into meetings with prospective underwriters who are intrigued by our value proposition for the white labeled solution. Discussions that were supposed to be about partnerships in some way shape or form have led to demos of the product.

June 26, 2023

The next few months will be incredibly exciting as we begin to push through key improvements on our own internal workflows, deliver on the first pass of multi-market functionality, and get real feedback from real beta clients who can give us the first glimpse to where we're headed and what we need to do next to provide a comprehensive software solution.

June 20, 2023

As we've built up 4 years of track record and knowledge about how private credit transactions work from start to finish, we've been able to whittle down one by one all the major tasks that we have had to do manually. Whether it's chasing down signatures for subscription documents, confirming investment requests, sending out compliance attestations, the list is lengthy but these were all the things we knew we had to build in order to run an efficient and effective marketplace.

June 12, 2023

It's an interesting time in technology as we've seen AI come at full force to the point where it almost feels like that's all anyone can talk about. To its credit, it has done an incredible job at bringing a sense of wonder as we are in awe at its potential. Still, we're very much in the early innings and it's a technology that has delivered uneven results.

June 5, 2023

Building a company with longevity can often be compared to getting a massive freight train to move. You’re adding cars to the train by building all the components of the product and you’re priming the engine by putting in place all the operational structures it takes to scale. Every little win, every small success, and the gears start to turn but it’s still slow going early on. The train crawls forward inch by inch and all the effort being put into it doesn’t seem to compare to the results.