Whether or not they consider it “transformation,” a growing number of organizations that provide equipment leasing and finance (ELF) are investing in digital tools and digital processes. In fact, the Equipment Leasing and Finance Association (ELFA) has identified digitization as a Top 10 trend.
When you think about digitization, you might think in terms of applications – installing an eSignature solution, for instance, or processes – such as enabling electronic signing of contracts. But there’s another aspect of digitization that’s vitally important yet easily overlooked, and that’s ecosystem.
Ecosystem involves all the stakeholders up and down the ELF lending process chain, including lessees, lessors, manufacturers, bank and nonbank lease and loan originators, warehouse lenders, custodians, servicers, and purchasers. Increasingly, these players are digitally connected. If your organization doesn’t have the right technology to plug into that ecosystem – especially a comprehensive eContracting and eAsset management platform – you risk losing out on a range of digital advantages.
By understanding and investing in the functionality to connect with the digital ELF ecosystem, your organization can gain numerous advantages: higher speeds, smoother processes, avoided costs, better customer experiences, and new capabilities to help grow your business.
eAsset Breadth and Depth
An effective platform for eContracting and eAsset management must offer breadth and depth of features. It should enable you to digitize the end-to-end leasing and finance process, from document prep and eSignatures, to eContracting and eVaulting, to securitization and sale of assets into the secondary market.
By digitizing the process end to end, you gain operational efficiencies and economies of scale that take both cost and friction out of your operations. You’re also equipped to deliver superior experiences to borrowers and equipment lessors at the beginning of the process, and to custodians and investors later in the life of the loan.
In addition, your eContracting and eAsset management solution should enjoy broad acceptance by the marketplace. Look for a technology provider that can point to a large number of high-value transactions, as well as credit ratings by leading ratings agencies.
Likewise, seek out a solution recognized by and integrated with warehouse lenders, custodian banks, and servicers. It should offer open APIs for smooth integration with the systems and processes of these key participants in the ELF ecosystem.
Such ready integration will also drive acceptance by investors and accelerate sales into the secondary market. The result is faster monetization and greater liquidity that delivers primary-market advantages to your organization.
Integration With eContracting Point Solutions
If you’re like many ELF companies, you’ve already begun your digital journey. You may have invested in point solutions for process steps like eSigning or eVaulting.
A good eContracting and eAsset management platform will let you continue to leverage these existing investments if that makes the most sense for your organization. In other words, your solution should be flexible enough to support your unique digital strategy.
For instance, you should be able to consolidate all your digital lending and leasing processes on a single platform, if you prefer, to achieve consistency and economies of scale. At the same time, you should have the option to seamlessly integrate with leading eSignature applications, connect to popular RON providers, or instantly and automatically store your eChattel in a third-party eVault.
As a real-world example, eOriginal® worked with Pawnee Leasing, a provider of equipment leasing and financing, to automate its leasing processes. We enabled Pawnee to originate and execute contracts in minutes, securely store post-signature documents and streamline processes throughout the financial-asset lifecycle.
Pawnee implemented eOriginal eAsset® Management to support origination and lifecycle management of lease contracts. For the eSignature step of the process, Pawnee chose eSigning capabilities from DocuSign.
After Pawnee brokers generate contract documents, their customers use DocuSign to electronically sign them. Post-signature, eOriginal eAsset Management programmatically stores the eChattel in a secure eVault. The eVault maintains the authoritative copy of the Digital Original®, with easy access to a tamper-evident audit trail. The solution then enables Pawnee to identify, audit, pool, collateralize, and securitize the eChattel, all electronically.
The flexibility of eOriginal Asset Management enabled Pawnee to easily integrate the DocuSign solution into the process. The broad industry recognition of the eOriginal platform also meant that Pawnee’s financial institution, Royal Bank of Canada, accepted Pawnee’s eChattel and the digital management of its financial assets.
In today’s market, ELF success requires increasing digitization. It also depends on integration with the digital ELF ecosystem. An effective eAsset management platform will enable you to achieve both.
