Polly, a product and pricing technology firm with some prominent industry veterans on its board, has signed on as the latest sponsor of the new CapitalW Collective, a nonprofit advocacy group for women and others in an influential segment of the mortgage business.
The company, which notably has
Polly's decision to sign on adds to the new capital-markets advocacy group's efforts to establish more of a broad and influential base of sponsors and other supporters that can support the buildout of career development resources and a pending speakers bureau.
"A true pioneer in the mortgage capital markets, Polly has been instrumental in transforming analysis, accuracy and automation within mortgage technology," said Amy Creason, one of the CapitalW Collective's founders, in a press release.
Polly staff supporting CapitalW include: Jackie Studdert, executive vice president; Cheryl Messner, chief customer officer; Samantha (TyRiver) MacKendrick, head of marketing; Melanie (Simmer) Power, senior product manager, and Drew Martinez, a capital markets tech manager.
The five women will help with CapitalW initiatives as mentorship and education.
Adam Carmel, founder and CEO of Polly, issued a press release statement calling the group's work "powerful and important."
Polly joins an initial group of companies that have agreed to become CapitalW Collective partners, including Mortgage Capital Trading, Agile Trading Technologies. Law firms Katten and Sheppard Mullin also are working with CapitalW, as are two larger trade groups, the Mortgage Bankers Association and The Mortgage Collaborative.
A number of individuals in the business also have signed on to support the nonprofit, including
The CapitalW Collective has been working with other existing groups like the MBA and The Mortgage Collaborative but is filling an underserved niche.
"The Mortgage Bankers Association already has a large women's organization called mPower but when we asked if there was a group focused on mortgage capital markets they validated our idea," Leslie Winick, co-founder and president, told NMN in
Creason, a former director in single-family sales at Freddie Mac; and Winick, who also is chief strategy officer at Mortgage Capital Trading, co-founded the CapitalW Collective with Pat Peters, a senior vice president in warehouse administration services at SitusAMC.
CapitalW aims to be complementary to other industry organizations and also to the work of colleagues of all genders, who are investors to join as the group, which seeks to "educate, elevate and empower" those who work in this part of the market.
"We are not here to overlap with what other trades and entities provide to the customers and members, but rather a unique educational option that is very targeted in this field," Jones said in an earlier interview.
