Think of it as Shark Tank with a credit union spin, and it’s just been renewed for another season.
The 2025 Innovation Series from CreditUnions.com and Callahan & Associates is underway. Every year since 2018, this series has offered a select group of suppliers 10 minutes each to impress an audience of credit union decision-makers. It’s simple: Each vendor pitches its offerings and attendees vote on their favorites.
The Innovation Series was a hit from the get-go and continues to grow in popularity. This year’s focus areas include financial wellness, member experience, lending, digital, analytics, and member engagement.
Read on for more from this year’s lending finalists Abrigo, Alogent, Enable Technologies Inc., and Ranqx. Plus, make sure to join us for the Innovations In Lending webinar. Register today!
Abrigo
Describe your innovation.
Abrigo Small Business Lending is a robust innovation for credit unions, transforming the member business lending process to drive efficiency, growth, and community impact for members. With cutting-edge automation, AI-powered decisioning, and a powerful ecosystem of partners, Abrigo empowers credit unions to overcome traditional barriers in member business lending.
What opportunity or challenge does it address?
Most credit unions rely on either manual origination steps or very rigid automation systems that don’t support most member business loan realities. Abrigo Small Business Lending is different – it provides an automated workflow for efficiency but also an easy off/on ramp when human oversight or intervention is needed. Its AI-powered transparent loan scoring provides deeper insights, ensuring smarter, faster lending decisions.
How does it increase member value?
Credit unions are often community-focused and aim to support the financial well-being of their members. Offering member business loans can help attract and retain members who are business owners or entrepreneurs, as well as foster economic growth. Abrigo’s Small Business Lending solution delivers exceptional value to credit union members by providing faster, smarter, and more accessible funding when they need it most. Abrigo’s innovative solution streamlines the experience through a simplified loan application, including 1071 data collection, automation, and AI-powered decisioning. The solution’s AI-driven loan scoring goes beyond traditional financial metrics, even for those who may not have extensive credit histories.
Further enhancing the member experience is Abrigo’s ecosystem of partners, which simplifies essential processes such as credit pulls and deposit and Treasury account opening. These capabilities not only reduce friction for small business members but also provides a seamless, end-to-end lending experience with additional offerings to deepen member relationships. With this solution, credit unions are equipped to more efficiently serve members.
What differentiates this innovation from competitors?
What sets Abrigo Small Business Lending apart is its proven ability to deliver measurable outcomes for credit unions empowering small businesses to thrive. Credit unions have the flexibility to incorporate manual steps into the automation process when needed, with loans seamlessly returning to the workflow once the manual step is complete. By enabling faster loan approvals — often within hours instead of days — Abrigo ensures borrowers gain quicker access to critical funds. This heightened efficiency strengthens relationships with members and fosters long-term growth. In a rapidly evolving financial landscape, Abrigo Small Business Lending positions credit unions as leaders in small business lending by integrating AI-driven decisioning, digital workflows, and proactive risk monitoring, enabling them to overcome traditional barriers, enhance member experiences, and stay competitive.
Alogent
Describe your innovation.
AccuAccount simplifies loan management from application to servicing, offering integrated exception tracking, and automated loan review and approval processes. The platform helps lenders streamline document collection, improve efficiency, and reduce paper with a person-centric design. With flexible imaging options and automated exception tracking, AccuAccount speeds up exception resolution, while its streamlined reporting keeps stakeholders informed with quick access to data.
What opportunity or challenge does it address?
Credit unions, often focused on personal finance, may lack the commercial lending tools to manage complex loans and administrative workloads.
AccuAccount offers intuitive imaging for digital document management, built-in exception tracking, automated workflows, and integration with 30+ cores, e-sign products, and loan origination systems. These features help streamline the lending process, reduce administrative burdens, and provide a scalable solution for credit unions. With the help of Alogent’s subject matter experts, credit unions can determine system requirements and ensure a smooth implementation, getting up and running quickly.
How does it increase member value?
Implementing AccuAccount streamlines the lending process, improves loan quality, speeds up application-to-approval times, and enhances exception tracking, resulting in faster, more efficient member services.
- Intuitive imaging: Digitize and organize credit and loan documentation with AccuAccount in an intuitive environment, offering a comprehensive view of member relationships.
- Built-in exception tracking and reporting: AccuAccount makes it easy to track document, policy, and other exceptions for members and their accounts. With automated reporting, users receive exception data to their inboxes on a regular basis. AccuAccount can also remind employees of important tasks—such as taking action on expiring UCC financing statements — to prevent exceptions before they occur. Additionally, the “Notices” function allows credit unions to email members directly, requesting documents and streamlining the process of receiving information from them.
- Automated workflows: Electronic routing of commercial loan files reduces the chance for misplaced and overlooked documents and creates a scalable workflow that can be repeated in accordance with a credit union’s lending policy. Lenders, underwriters, and management benefit from immediate access to data without waiting for inter-office mail.
- Integration capabilities: Imaging, tracking, and automated workflows are vital components of efficient commercial lending; however, core systems, LOS, eSign, and other tools play an important role, too. AccuAccount interfaces with 30+ systems to help build a highly integrated commercial lending ecosystem with the fastest access to business intelligence.
What differentiates this innovation from competitors?
AccuAccount is the only loan-imaging solution on the market that offers integrated exception tracking with automated exception reporting. With an integrated audit capability, AccuAccount works with any core banking solution.
Enable Technologies Inc.
Describe your innovation.
Enable has built a state-of-the-art loan origination platform (LOS) with a modern point of sale (POS) experience that automates lending and deposit originations for consumers and businesses. We offer a single buying experience for loan and deposit products across digital, branch, call center, and indirect channels. Enable’s deep configuration allows for the launch of tailored product and bundle offerings which can help community financial institutions drive growth while lowering costs and risks. Our open, API-first platform future-proofs these institutions, enabling seamless adoption of applied AI and emerging technologies to enhance processes and drive continuous innovation.
What opportunity or challenge does it address?
No solution today offers a unified approach to lending and deposit originations for consumers and businesses. Our modern platform enables credit unions to compete with large banks and fintechs by offering a modern member and banker experience and automating internal processes. By standardizing policies for disclosures, credit decisions, KYC, and maximizing member data reusability, credit unions enhance efficiency and reduce member acquisition costs. This boosts profitability and improves members’ digital experience. Eliminating fragmented system risks and experiences, our solution strengthens member trust and positions credit unions for scalable, long-term success in a competitive market.
How does it increase member value?
By allowing members to digitally self-onboard a complete relationship (loans, deposits, and additional services), Enable elevates the member experience to rival modern e-commerce. We deliver a seamless and consistent experience across all channels — whether in-branch or digital — thus reducing friction in expanding the adoption of products and services that better meets member financial needs. Members gain greater transparency and visibility into processes, equipping them with clearer insights and control. Additionally, our platform enables tailored offerings, particularly for small businesses, providing them financial solutions that meet their unique needs.
Fundamentally, by consolidating multiple systems into a single, unified platform, credit unions can lower costs, simplify vendor management, and streamline compliance. This not only enhances operational efficiency but also ensures institutions can easily and dynamically adapt to evolving regulatory requirements that often change, ultimately delivering a more responsive and member-centric experience.
What differentiates this innovation from competitors?
We’re a modern point of sale (PoS) and loan origination system (LOS) that unifies borrower experience and loan processing. Unlike legacy or newer LOS systems with limited PoS functionality, we integrate loan originations and deposit account opening into a single onboarding process—an industry first.
Our highly configurable LOS offers unmatched flexibility, reducing vendor reliance and streamlining implementation and maintenance. Refreshingly different from rigid legacy platforms or modern ones requiring system integrators, our solution promotes self-driven customization. Additionally, in-branch bankers use the same intuitive platform, becoming fully productive in days, not months, so they can focus on better serving members’ full relationship needs.
Ranqx
Describe your innovation.
A fully digital SMB working-capital lending platform that allows SMBs to go from application to decision in five minutes. Our platform connects directly to accounting systems and builds a P&L, connects to databases, and pulls tax returns, etc. No more uploading documents and loan officer manual calculations.
What opportunity or challenge does it address?
Speed to deliver an SMB loan and work required on the credit union side. Our solution removes all manual work from the credit union and the SMB.
How does it increase member value?
Decision in five minutes versus up to two weeks.
What differentiates this innovation from competitors?
Our ability to build a P&L and balance sheet directly from the accounting software versus the business having to upload them and upload tax returns.
