Vince Furey tells MPA about the company’s core code base and how that works amid M&A activity
OpenClose, a provider of multi-channel loan origination system mortgage software, offers a comprehensive platform that is completely engineered using the same code base from the ground up. Vince Furey, senior vice president of lending solutions, sat down with MPA to talk about the company and how LOSs are affected by M&A activity in the space.
MPA: Tell me about Open Close.
Vince Furey: We’ve been in the marketplace for a little over 16 years. We were the first .NET-developed LOS application in the marketplace. The system is completely modern. It’s completely browser-based. Our product, we call the Assist series of solutions. (I)n the landscape of the LOS space, you see a lot of situations where a company might be deploying one vendor for their LOS, another vendor for their PPE, another vendor for their analytics reporting, another vendor for their consumer direct efforts. … We kind of take that away into one singular platform off a single-source database. So we support consumer direct, retail, wholesale, correspondent. We have our own proprietary PPE that operates within the LOS, our own proprietary document-management imaging system, business-analytics dashboard reporting module, all completely browser-based, all completely tablet- and mobile-compatible.
MPA: What is your take on M&A activity and its impact on LOSs?
VF: So obviously we are an independent. We are one of the few independents left in the marketplace, because it does seem, especially over the last six or so years, most have been consolidated, in some cases more than once, whether they were acquired, shelved, resold, reacquired. … Lots of our competitors have been acquired … (and) it seems like after they are acquired, in some cases they tend to not be as engaged. We don’t see them as much out there, or they kind of jump in and out. There’s certainly exceptions to that. We saw an acquisition that worked well for a while – but then went through another acquisition, and that’s when things started becoming challenging. But certainly, anytime there is an acquisition of your core operating system, it’s going to create some ripple effect within your organization, whether it be different people you are dealing with, different levels of support, different culture within an organization.
MPA: That’s a good point, because sometimes it’s not just one acquisition. You know they’ll cobble together the best-breed systems. That may be a decision engine and a doc provider – and they may not always talk well together.
VF: Multiple different code bases, different integration languages … and it’s just not very seamless. And in our case, everything operates around the core LOS. But all of our modules … everything is on a single code base. So they are fully combined when deployed, and all off a single-source database.
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MPA: Tell me about Open Close.
Vince Furey: We’ve been in the marketplace for a little over 16 years. We were the first .NET-developed LOS application in the marketplace. The system is completely modern. It’s completely browser-based. Our product, we call the Assist series of solutions. (I)n the landscape of the LOS space, you see a lot of situations where a company might be deploying one vendor for their LOS, another vendor for their PPE, another vendor for their analytics reporting, another vendor for their consumer direct efforts. … We kind of take that away into one singular platform off a single-source database. So we support consumer direct, retail, wholesale, correspondent. We have our own proprietary PPE that operates within the LOS, our own proprietary document-management imaging system, business-analytics dashboard reporting module, all completely browser-based, all completely tablet- and mobile-compatible.
MPA: What is your take on M&A activity and its impact on LOSs?
VF: So obviously we are an independent. We are one of the few independents left in the marketplace, because it does seem, especially over the last six or so years, most have been consolidated, in some cases more than once, whether they were acquired, shelved, resold, reacquired. … Lots of our competitors have been acquired … (and) it seems like after they are acquired, in some cases they tend to not be as engaged. We don’t see them as much out there, or they kind of jump in and out. There’s certainly exceptions to that. We saw an acquisition that worked well for a while – but then went through another acquisition, and that’s when things started becoming challenging. But certainly, anytime there is an acquisition of your core operating system, it’s going to create some ripple effect within your organization, whether it be different people you are dealing with, different levels of support, different culture within an organization.
MPA: That’s a good point, because sometimes it’s not just one acquisition. You know they’ll cobble together the best-breed systems. That may be a decision engine and a doc provider – and they may not always talk well together.
VF: Multiple different code bases, different integration languages … and it’s just not very seamless. And in our case, everything operates around the core LOS. But all of our modules … everything is on a single code base. So they are fully combined when deployed, and all off a single-source database.
Related stories:
Roostify partners with Black Knight to drive efficiency
Quicken Loans, Calyx partner on LOS
