Unitus Community Credit Union Deploys JUDI.AI to Scale Small Business Lending

Portland, Oregon-based credit union commits to funding $5 million in small business loans over the next three years to women-owned, minority-owned and veteran-owned businesses. 

VANCOUVER, BC, CANADA, October 31, 2024 — JUDI.AI, a leading SaaS small business lending provider for community lenders, announced today that Unitus Community Credit Union, a $1.7 billion credit union in Oregon, has successfully gone live with its AI-enabled small business lending platform. 

Historically focused primarily on mortgage lending, auto lending and commercial real estate, Unitus identified a significant opportunity to lend more to local businesses, but needed a more efficient process. To that end, the credit union recently went live with the JUDI platform after a rapid two-month implementation. 

“Small business is a high impact, yet underserved segment,” said Brian Devereux, Chief Lending Officer of Unitus Community Credit Union. “Credit unions have the willingness, directive and ability to serve small businesses as well or better than local banks.” 

“Small businesses are often less experienced at creating financial statements, which can make credit underwriting a challenge,” continued Devereux. “With JUDI.AI, we now have the ability to lend efficiently to small businesses based on cash flow data, with an easy experience for both members and staff.” 

“When it comes to streamlining business lending, we advocate starting small to get up running quickly,” said Gord Baizley, CEO of JUDI.AI. “The Unitus team has really embraced that line of thinking and is a tremendous partner to work with – we’re excited to help them reach their goals.” 

About JUDI.AI 

Small businesses are the backbone of our local communities, but 40-50% of small businesses rank access to capital as their top challenge. Although the economics of small business lending have historically been untenable, mission and profit are no longer mutually exclusive in the digital world. Born and incubated inside a fintech lender, JUDI.AI enables community-based financial institutions to provide a fintech-like experience for small business loans. Combining the speed of consumer lending with the right amount of rigor from commercial lending, our AI-enabled platform uses a unique cash flow-based underwriting approach to eliminate the friction typically associated with small business lending. JUDI.AI pledges 1% of our equity, revenue, time and product to charities of our customers’ choice. To learn more, visit www.judi.ai. 

About Unitus Community Credit Union 

At Unitus, we’re dedicated to improving lives in the communities we serve. As a member-owned local credit union, we invest in people by doing the right thing. Through partnerships with nonprofit organizations, we provide support for community groups through volunteerism and financial donations. Our 105,000 members count on us to serve them and their communities; our 300+ employees share that passion for service. Learn about the local impact Unitus makes by visiting unitusccu.com.