Since launching our Technology Finance department in the middle of last year we've been up and down the country visiting many of our broker partners
Since launching our Technology Finance department in the middle of last year we’ve been up and down the country visiting many of our broker partners and attending various functions including the CRN, Leasing World, NACFB and Leasing Life award ceremonies. We were delighted that our innovative technology financing product was shortlisted for a product innovation award at two of those events.
Launching into a well-established market can be quite a challenge. However, the team has a lot of previous experience working in the technology market and this has given us a great insight into what brokers are looking for from a funder. I think this gave us a real head start when speaking to some of the principals of the brokers with which we’ve partnered.
The feedback we’ve received about our funding of software and service agreements has been particularly strong. Historically, finding a home for some of these types of funding requirements has been difficult. Most funders are unwilling to offer any real funding solutions and the end user is either left to fund the requirement from their own cash flow or forced to delay the project until appropriate funding avenues can be found.
Given that we understand this market very well, United Trust Bank’s Technology Finance agreement can cover all of these requirements. This ranges from services only agreements that cover all aspects of the technology services spectrum (installation, multiyear support contracts, configuration and consultancy) to software subscription agreements and hosted ‘As a Service’ solutions that can be anywhere from six months to three years.
We’ve had some great examples of how we’ve assisted our partners to finance their clients’ requirements, especially those businesses where it wasn’t economical to finance small, ad-hoc IT expenditure over the financial year. Instead we were able to provide retrospective IT project finance for equipment that had been purchased over an extended period of time. In many cases, the preference of the businesses would have been to pay for the equipment as it was being used, but the piecemeal nature of the equipment acquisition meant that they couldn’t. Our facilities consolidated these purchases into one technology finance agreement without depreciating the assets – and put the cash back into the business – allowing them to pay for the goods as they had initially intended.
The IT financing market continues to perform well and is growing every month. Here at UTB, we will continue to provide our innovative facilities to our valued broker partners and are looking to add some new products to the range throughout 2016.
Attributed to Kevin Flowerday, Head of Technology Finance at United Trust Bank
Keywords: Bridging Finance, Commercial Finance, Bridging Lender, Commercial Lender, Alternative Finance, United Trust Bank, Technology Finance, Kevin Flowerday, NACFB,