Tuesday, February 14, 2017

ZestFinance Rolls Out Millennial Underwriting Platform

Los Angeles-based ZestFinance, the fintech startup led by Douglas Merrill, said on Tuesday that it has rolled out a new platform aimed to help lenders better underwrite loans to millennials and others with a limited credit history. The company said its new Zest Automated Machine Learning (ZAML) Platform uses machine learning to use non-traditional credit union to reduce risk of credit decisions. The company said that the platform specifically is aimed at helping financial institutions expand credit to new borrowers, such as millennials looking for financing for their first major purchase or credit card. The company says it uses customer support data, payment history, and purchase transactions to evaluate those customers--and even looks at how a customer fills out a form, navigates through a website, and more. ZestFinance is one of a large number of fintech startups foused on the consumer market, which have started in Los Angeles in the last few years, including Tala, Payoff, Acorns, Lenny, Float, and many others.

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