Customers Bancorp hires team to lend to tech, venture-funded clients

Customers Bancorp in West Reading, Pennsylvania, launched a national technology and venture banking group to kick off the new year.

The $19.1 billion-asset Customers, a branch-light and tech-focused banking company, said Monday its new team offers loans and other financial products designed to meet the needs of tech and venture-funded businesses in all stages — early, growth and late-stage. The team assesses risk on overall run-rate revenue as well as customer base, product adoption, total addressable market and overall capitalization.

The new group “specializes in creating financing structures and offering the portfolio management services that venture capital, growth equity and private equity firms require,” Sam Sidhu, president and CEO of Customers Bank, said in a press release.

Sean McGah and Bobby Bryant, managing directors, joined Customers to lead the new team. McGah has a background in providing senior venture debt facilities to both independent and sponsor-backed technology companies. He previously worked at Cambridge Trust Co. and TD Bank. Bryant is a commercial lender who has worked with software, health care tech, venture capital and private equity-sponsored businesses. Earlier in his career, he worked at Bridge Bank, Comerica Bank and at TD Bank.

The announcement is part of a broader national expansion plan announced in 2021.

Customers said last May it would open commercial and private banking offices in major cities across the country.

In an interview last year, Sidhu said the bank had a list of 25 possible markets to enter. It began last year with new banking teams in Dallas and Orlando, Florida, while also building out its relatively small presence in Chicago. Bankers in those markets provide treasury management solutions and commercial loans for companies with $5 million to $100 million of annual revenue.