Orion First has surpassed $3 billion in assets under management. This milestone comes shortly after reaching its previous benchmark of $2 billion in 2020.
The assets under management consist of small business commercial loans and leases for which Orion provides servicing, portfolio management, collection and backup servicing duties for clients ranging from federally regulated banks to captive and independent finance companies.
“We are seeing the benefits of substantial investments in technology, people and processes. We are able to adapt and grow with our clients, who are among the fastest growing in the industry,” says Quentin Cote, executive vice president of Orion. “We’re proud to partner with these successful companies and believe Orion’s growth is a key part of that success.”
Orion’s success may also be due in no small part to its business model. Unlike other servicers, Orion only services commercial portfolios. It views consumer portfolios as a distraction from this core focus. By allocating its resources entirely to a narrow (albeit deep) segment of the industry, Orion is able to offer more specialized expertise to its clients, and a better customer experience tailored specifically to the small business owner.
Additionally, Orion is foremost a primary servicer, with backup servicing making up less than 13% of total contracts under management. Servicers whose portfolios contain substantially more backup contracts than primary pose a risk to clients, as their operations can be strained if lenders begin to falter and they need to convert backup portfolios to primary servicing.
“There’s a transformation in the way borrowers expect to interact with their lenders,” says Cote. “They want to interact on their own terms. Orion has developed an industry leading borrower portal to empower the borrower. Additionally, data and analytics are playing a critical role in portfolio performance—what was once the art of lending is now the science of lending-and that’s where we’ve been investing. Our clients are able to make portfolio optimization decisions with increasing speed and confidence.”
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