Brighten Home Loans appoints new CTO

Australian non-bank lender Brighten Home Loans (Brighten) has confirmed that Craig Thompson has been appointed as its first chief technology officer.  

Prior to commencing the role earlier this month, Mr Thompson was the head of technology for the ASX-listed financial services group, MA Financial Group, working across its asset management, corporate advisory and lending divisions. Mr Thompson began his time with the MA Financial Group in 2014 where he was responsible for the development and delivery of MA Financial Group’s IT strategy, transformation program and technology road map. 

He began his new role with Brighten on 4 October and is now responsible for “strengthening and growing Brighten’s innovative digital lending capabilities”. 

Brighten managing director Scott Kelly said that he believes the addition of Mr Thompson will help strengthen the lender’s digital platform, while also driving efficiency and further supporting its broker network. 

“Brighten is delighted to be welcoming Craig Thompson to our growing leadership team of industry experts,” Mr Kelly said. 

“Known for being a highly adaptive, results-driven, and innovative technology leader with expertise in developing and implementing IT strategies, Craig’s strategic approach supports Brighten to offer our brokers and customers a superior service proposition assisted through our innovative technology capabilities.”

Mr Thompson said that one particular aspect of Brighten that appealed to him was that the non-bank lender was “not encumbered by the obstacles that entrenched banks face when it comes to legacy systems and processes”.

“The possibilities to develop on existing digital initiatives that Brighten has implemented to its broker and aggregator network, enhancing what’s already an incredibly compelling market offering,” he added.

The inclusion of Mr Thompson, as well as the new technology-focused leadership role, follows the August announcement of Brighten partnering with the mortgage tech platform Simpology as a means to integrate the ​​e-lodgement tool, Loanapp, into its proprietary loan origination platform. 

It also comes after the non-bank lender confirmed the inclusion of new roles earlier this year. 

In August, the non-bank announced that it had created a new role for its credit team. 

In April, Brighten also confirmed it had created and filled the new role of white-label channel manager. 

[Related: Brighten teams with mortgage tech]