Cypress Software Systems Celebrates 10 Years
of Helping Financial Institutions Solve Lending Challenges
NORTH RICHLAND HILLS, Texas – March 29, 2010 – Cypress Software Systems, LP is celebrating its 10-year anniversary in 2010, and has witnessed significant growth since its inception.
Founded by current President and CEO Stephen G. Sargent in 2000, the North Richland Hills, Texas-based consumer and small business loan software provider started with humble beginnings, and has grown to an organization that today supports clients in banks, credit unions and finance companies all across the United States as well as 13 countries throughout the Caribbean.
In his 15 years prior to creating Cypress Software Systems, Sargent witnessed numerous inefficiencies in credit risk management during his lending experience in the banking and finance industry. In 1999, he developed a solution to those problems.
His idea was a user-friendly software solution that would use emerging credit scoring systems to automate a financial institution’s entire loan application process, from point-of-entry to credit report retrieval and analysis, to the final decision.
“It was a bold initiative that some of the larger banking institutions – with their seemingly limitless resources and in-house IT departments – were already undertaking,” he said. “But a cost-effective solution didn’t exist for smaller community banks, and they needed help to compete against the industry giants.”
Sargent shopped his business plan to various venture capital groups, asking for funding to support his idea. In late 1999, he secured angel capital and turned his idea into a company – Cypress Software Systems.
“We operated with no cash flow during the initial product development phase, which carried significant financial risk,” said Sargent. “By the fall of 2000, we had our consumer lending product – Mark IV – ready for beta testing. We didn’t miss a single payroll during that time, which was a huge accomplishment compared to other companies at the time.”
Cypress confronted several obstacles along the way, including initial difficulty forming partnerships and finding early adopters. In addition, the banking industry was very conservative, which yielded long sales cycles. Once the Cypress products were presented and the expertise was seen, the obstacles disappeared.
Despite a small staff, low capital and a challenging market environment, Sargent and his team persevered and quickly led the company to securing clients in 2000. That achievement led to tremendous growth over the first year in contrast to results that many software companies experience during the start-up phase, especially those introducing innovative ideas and products in the financial marketplace.
Cypress gradually expanded its offerings to include a small business lending solution called BizMark, and the company formed its Professional Services Division to help financial institutions take a more holistic approach to enhancing their lending processes. Today, Cypress’ customer base ranges widely, from large regional banks to credit union service organizations (CUSOs) to smaller finance companies.
“The continued loyalty of our current customers, along with the constant and consistent growth we are experiencing, is a perfect illustration of the positive impact that our consumer and small business lending solutions can have on a financial institution’s lending operations – no matter their shape or size,” said Steven E. Croft, senior vice president of Cypress. “Whether it’s a large credit union or single-branch community bank, Cypress is ready to help them map out their lending needs – from operational efficiency to compliance to risk management – and meet those challenges head-on.
“As financial institutions face a murky future of complex economic and regulatory environments, we stand ready to assist them with a wide range of services and technology designed to meet those challenges, while increasing market share and improving the customer experience.”
About Cypress’ Products and Services
Cypress products include Mark IV, a software platform that automates the consumer loan application and decisioning process, and helps institutions with risk management issues. With Mark IV, service associates electronically input application information while interviewing customers. The software then quickly retrieves credit reports, efficiently analyzes the capacity for repayment, and deploys the institution’s loan policies. The result is a quality loan decision that meets all federal requirements, provides the highest levels of risk management available in the industry and ensures consistency within the loan portfolio.
Similarly, the company’s BizMark software processes small business loan applications, enabling lenders to efficiently handle small business commercial credit requests for lines of credit, term loans, corporate leases and corporate credit cards. The software gathers principal and financial statement data; retrieves and interprets consumer and business credit reports; performs ratio analysis; and scores the results.
Cypress’ AppMark product is designed for community banks with assets of $250 million or less, automating all aspects of the consumer loan application process from data entry to underwriting to decisioning. The software is hosted and delivered through Cypress’ application service provider (ASP) network, eliminating the need for Cypress clients to purchase additional hardware, software and IT staff to run and maintain the application.
The company’s Cypress Professional Services Division helps banks, credit unions and other financial institutions optimize their lending processes and deploy technology best practices for Cypress’ products. CPS provides six primary services, including Strategic Configuration Assessment, Technology Assessment, Process Improvement Gap Analysis, Decision Process Optimization, Integration and Customization and Cypress University.
About Cypress Software Systems
Headquartered in North Richland Hills, Texas, USA, Cypress Software Systems LP is a leading developer of automated credit application decision support technology. Cypress provides community and regional banks, finance companies and credit unions with loan application decision and tracking tools equivalent to those used by the largest national lending institutions. Clients, nationwide and in 16 countries, use the company’s flagship products, Mark IV and BizMark, to quickly and consistently process consumer and small commercial loan applications. Cypress Mark IV offers a flexible, risk-based processing approach that includes tracking consumer loan applications from point of entry to point of decision. Cypress’ BizMark loan automation software processes commercial loan requests within a customer relationship management environment. Both products may be licensed in the bundled Cypress Suite and are offered in either an application service provider (ASP) or traditional business model. The company’s product line also includes AppMark, an ASP-only consumer lending solution for community banks with assets of $250 million or less.
Web site: www.go-cypress.comIndustry Blog: "Sixty Seconds With Cypress"Media Contact:Jeff Green
Michael A. Burns & Associates Inc.
(214) 521-8596
greenj@mbapr.com
