MPOWER Financing, a provider of educational loans to high-promise international and DACA students, announced Tuesday that it raised $25 million from New York investment management firm Tilden Park Capital Management LP to fund the automation of its loan platform and additional hiring initiatives.
The funds will support platform automation and team growth as MPOWER finances thousands of additional international and DACA students at over 350 universities across North America, the company said.
"We're humbled to be working with Tilden Park and will substantially benefit from their capital markets and credit expertise, as well as their global investment experience," MPOWER CEO Manu Smadja said in a statement. "Tilden Park was attracted to MPOWER's strong credit quality and social mission."
The $25 million in fusion adds to the $9 million that MPOWER raised last year and will be invested in further automating MPOWER's digital loan platform, which leverages proprietary underwriting technology to provide a loan decision to students within minutes, the company said.
The money will also help MPOWER grow its team in Washington, DC, and Bangalore, India. The company plans to hire more than 50 employees this year across its engineering, marketing, operations, underwriting, analytics, HR and finance departments.
Essentially, MPOWER works with universities and colleges across the US and Canada to provide financing to students from over 200 countries. Since 2014, it has received more $2 billion in loan application volume on its platform, the company said.
This process helps students build their credit histories and provides them with personal finance education and career support to help prepare for life after school. This is particularly important now, as international students face greater challenges due to the coronavirus pandemic and shifting immigration policies.
Tilden Park is a fixed-income-focused alternative asset manager that concentrates primarily on structured products and mortgages, fixed income relative value and related corporate credit and equity strategies.
Contact Andrew Kessel at andrew.kessel@proactiveinvestors.com
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