COVER FEATURE
Techno man
As chief executive officer of Mortgage Brain for the past 10 years, Mark Lofthouse has a lot of achievements to his name. The downturn did bring its challenges, but he is confident about the future, with more innovation, investment and acquisitions planned
BY NATALIE THOMAS
When interviewing Mark Lofthouse, chief executive officer of Mortgage Brain, at the company’s headquarters in Bromsgrove, Worcestershire, you can’t help but be struck by the fact that his office is covered in pictures charting his success as a mountaineer. He’s climbed the peaks of Scarfell Pike in Cumbria and Mount Kilimanjaro – which is apt as when it comes to uphill struggles, Lofthouse and Mortgage Brain certainly faced one last year with the firm’s battle to acquire its arch rival TrigoldCrystal. The close relationship between the two firms has previously been the subject of much press speculation. They have been married off numerous times over the past 10 years in the financial trade press. But in December 2010 they confirmed the rumours and Mortgage Brain revealed it was in discussions with the board of TrigoldCrystal to buy it for £6.8m. So was it the 2007 credit crisis that finally forced Trigold - Crystal’s hand in marriage? “The combined revenues of Mortgage Brain and TrigoldCrystal had both contracted,” says Lofthouse. “Mortgage Brain customers were more mainstream and didn’t specialise in adverse markets, whereas TrigoldCrystal had a large specialism in the adverse market – so accordingly we didn’t see the same decline.” Following a shock engagement it looked like the union was a done deal, but in March 2011 the Office of Fair Trading referred the acquisition to the Competition Commission, making it too expen - sive for Mortgage Brain to pursue – the planned acquisition had already cost it £418,000. The OFT believed the merger had the potential to significantly lessen competition in the mortgage sourcing market. “There was always the risk the OFT might say no on the basis
that competition would be reduced, even though both firms are small in OFT terms,” says Lofthouse. “Our belief was that putting the two together would have driven costs out of the business and enabled us to deliver more to brokers – but we are where we are.” It must have seemed like history repeating itself when earlier
this year the OFT said it was going to investigate Mortgage Brain’s planned acquisition of point-of-sale system MortgageStream, which it later approved.
MORTGAGE STRATEGY April 9, 2012 “We didn’t have any fears the OFT would go the same way as
TrigoldCrystal,” says Lofthouse. “The combined market share of ourselves and MortgageStream is in the region of 14%. Obviously you never know whether it is going to go through or not, but we were always hopeful.”
HAPPY BIRTHDAY With or without TrigoldCrystal, there’s no denying that Mortgage Brain now plays a dominant role in the mortgage sourcing market. When Peter Nice, one of the founders of Mortgage Brain, built
a sourcing system for his estate agent wife 25 years ago, he couldn’t have imagined it would go on to be used by thousands of brokers. Mortgage Brain celebrates its 25th birthday this month and its
founders have much to be proud of. Despite the costly trials and tribulations of last year, the firm still increased its turnover by 4% in the year to March 2011 to reach £6.1m – no easy task in a market with dwindling broker numbers. Lofthouse has been the driving force behind the technology
firm for the past 10 years. He joined Mortgage Brain in 2002 from Assureweb to head the firm when its founders Nice, Mike Green and Barry Louvel sold it to a consortium of lenders in 2001. The company was bought by Nationwide, Halifax and Alliance & Leicester for around £4.8m in May 2001, with additional shareholders – the Royal Bank of Scotland, Northern Rock and Barclays – coming on board in December 2001. The company still has six owners, though some are under a
slightly different guise, with A&L becoming Santander and Halifax now subsumed within Lloyds Banking Group. Lofthouse joined shortly after the lenders bought their stakes.
His remit was to make the firm the best provider of technology to mortgage brokers and to establish a common trading platform. The task has been no mean feat by any stretch of the imagination.
FROM DAZ TO MORTGAGES Having studied chemical engineering at the University of Manchester, Lofthouse is not an obvious candidate for a career in the mortgage market.
21
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32