With lenders Just Cash Flow, iwoca, YouLend, Optimum Finance and FIBR already integrated, Funding Options claims that this new platform will be a highly efficient channel for customer acquisition and by the end of 2021, the business finance marketplace expects to have over 30 lenders fully onboarded.

Further, Funding Cloud boasts speed, certainty, and reduced friction for lenders, having reached a new record of 20.614 seconds from loan application to credit approval, with the previous record being 2 minutes and 56 seconds.

Using data analytics, open banking APIs and artificial intelligence, lenders maintain control of the process and are presented with a single journey through a lender portal that delivers instant decisions. Funding Cloud also creates a comparable lending score for every business and borrowers that do not match lender criteria are provided with free insights into their financial health.

Simon Cureton, CEO of Funding Options comments that the fintech firm’s mission is to deliver a platform that powers holistic SME solutions and can match businesses to the best funding options. “This builds on the significant scale we have, both in terms of our SME acquisition flow and distribution to our lender partners. Whilst our initial priority will be in getting more lenders transitioned onto the new platform, longer term it will enable a host of SME data driven services to be sourced through digital journeys. COVID-19 has shone a huge spotlight on the SME lending ecosystem and Funding Cloud (™) coupled with our market leading acquisition flow, has the power to transform the SME finance landscape.”