To our clients, our partners, and the people who make this industry run:
A hundred days ago, I stepped into the role of being the CEO of Dark Matter, at a pivotal point in time for our mortgage industry, where technology is changing people’s expectations from their software providers. There are many open questions in people’s minds about the impact of AI, both regarding the positive ROI we should expect, as well as the impact on people’s lives and jobs. Personally, as a technologist, who over the last decade have spent my time immersed in deeply understanding the mortgage industry, its people, the process and challenges faced by those who facilitate the most important transaction in most Americans’ lives, I felt ready for the responsibility.
How did I spend the first 100 days? With you. Our customers, our partners, and our teammates at Dark Matter. In your offices, at conferences, on advisory calls, in person and getting to know each of you and your businesses. One thing has been very clear. What you are looking for are technology partners, not just vendors. You are looking for a trusted innovation partner who is invested in your success, brings a customer-first mindset to every interaction, and helps you navigate the transformation that AI enables, to benefit and scale from it, while bringing your people along. The AI transformation cannot be one that leaves people behind but uplifts us all. The transformation is one that facilitates the shift from “doing” manual work, to “reviewing” work done by AI, to provide an amazing customer experience, while lowering the cost of origination. Such a transformation allows your organization to scale to the next level, without leaving people behind. This is my mission at Dark Matter, to help you achieve this vision, and this is the standard you should judge us by.
I love the pace at which technology is evolving today. The investment in AI from all the frontier labs is accelerating the pace of innovation everywhere. What’s possible today, was not possible even a year ago. Which AI models should we use? When is it appropriate to build our own proprietary models? When to use open source? How does one avoid being locked into one model provider, while optimizing for the best cost and performance? These are questions we work with every single day at Dark Matter, as we work towards bringing product innovation to every aspect of the mortgage lifecycle. We are building AI agents that assist the borrower in their application, autonomous agents that handle tasks in the background, and AI agent assistants for Loan Officers, processors, underwriters and closers. All of this while keeping the important tenets of explainability and auditability. Without these, AI is cool but would not be applicable in our regulated industry. What should all this unlock? It should free up your teams to use their judgement and creativity towards growing your business.
The work we are doing is resonating with those who are looking to partner with someone who will lead their organizations into the future. Two lenders in the recent weeks have chosen the Empower LOS and our Aiva Intelligence platform as their solutions of choice, to run their retail, Home Equity, wholesale and correspondent lending businesses. Citizens Bank Home Mortgage, an existing customer of Dark Matter also recently made the choice to switch to our Point of Sale platform, recognizing the capabilities, deep integration with the LOS, and the direction in which Dark Matter’s innovation is headed. This is only the beginning. The numerous lenders I continue to spend my time with, affirm that the direction Dark Matter is headed in, is the right one.
You might wonder what has changed within Dark Matter which is enabling this pace of innovation. It is the team, and the belief that every employee at Dark Matter has, that what we are doing is bigger than just ourselves. Our customers and partners need us to innovate on their behalf. They need us to be their competitive advantage, and this inspires us every single day. We are all aligned behind this one mission to help the mortgage industry achieve more.
Clarity, a sense of urgency, and accountability are the words we run this company on, and they are not decoration. Clarity means you hear from us clearly, openly and honestly, including when the news is not what either of us wanted. But it also means we will work openly through it together. Accountability and a sense of urgency means we hold ourselves to a high standard for our clients and for this industry, and we move quickly to deliver against it. We own our actions and the outcomes. A roadmap item is finished when you are getting value from it, and until that happens it stays ours. Those are the terms I hold our leaders to, and the terms I hold myself to first. I do not believe a title wins an argument. The best idea has to win, no matter who it comes from on my team. That is how we operate inside these walls and it is how I want us to operate with you.
What we are building next is the part I am most eager for you to see. We restructured our product organization around it, brought in senior people with deep experience in this business, and we are expanding our sales team to match. Dark Matter is growing in headcount and growing in ambition. Our entire focus is on innovation and serving our customers. We are moving quickly and we are moving carefully. Your priorities belong on our roadmap, and your voice belongs in how we build. Tell us what you like and what you need next – there’s a good chance it’s already on our roadmap.
Thank you for trusting us with your business, and for the conversations that shaped these first hundred days. The next few months are going to be good ones. I will be at the major conferences this fall, and if you can find the time, I would be glad to sit down with you, whether you are a client, a partner, or someone who simply wants to understand what we are building.
Vikas Rao
Chief Executive Officer, Dark Matter
Vikas Rao is CEO of Dark Matter Technologies. He can be reached at Vikas.Rao@dmatter.com