Baltimore lending software company eOriginal to be acquired by global firm for $280M

Downtown Baltimore digital loan technology company eOriginal is set to be acquired by a division of global information services company in a deal worth €231 million, or $280 million, the companies said on Thursday.

Under the deal, eOriginal will become part of the governance, risk and compliance business of Wolters Kluwer, a 19,000-employee, publicly traded company based in Alphen aan den Rijn, the Netherlands.

Founded in 1996 by Stephen Bisbee, eOriginal makes a products that are designed to allow lenders to create, store and manage digital financial asset documents. eOriginal said it has more than 650 banks and other financial institutions as customers in the U.S., and specializes in areas including auto financing, banking, mortgages and loans to small businesses. The company reports about $37.6 million in revenue in 2020, 95% of which is recurring.

eOriginal has about 100 employees, all of whom are expected to join Wolters Kluwer. The company’s office in the Camden Yards warehouse is expected to remain; Wolters Kluwer already has a presence there, as well. In 2016, eOriginal raised a $26.5 million Series A round, led by Philly-based LLR Partners, and CEO Brian Maddocks came on a year later as Bisbee stayed on as president.

For its part, 183-year-old Wolters Kluwer offers scale, with offices in over 40 countries and customers in over 180 countries.

Within the governance, risk and compliance (GRC) division of Wolters Kluwer, eOriginal’s team will live within a division called compliance solutions, which works with large and small lenders, credit unions, insurers and securities firms. The two companies started a strategic partnership in 2016, and have found their “products are highly complementary and there is a strong cultural alignment between the teams,” a Wolters Kluwer spokesperson said. The acquisition is seen as a strategic “leap forward.”

Now, eOriginal’s technology will be integrated with Wolters Kluwer’s platform, called Expere, which has tools for creating, managing, integrating, testing and deploying documents, the spokesperson said. Going forward, they envision a single platform where clients of any size can originate, close, manage and analyze their loans.

“The acquisition positions us as the leading provider of digital lending solutions, spanning all workflows from loan approval, to document preparation and closing, with compliance certainty,” said Steven Meirink, Wolters Kluwer GRC executive VP and general manager for compliance solutions, in a statement.

In a statement, Maddocks said he believes the combined companies can offer “the right solution, in the right market, at the right time.”

A spokesperson said the eOriginal brand is “valued and admired by customers and the industry” and will “continue to be used as a solution suite brand within Wolters Kluwer Compliance Solutions.”

Formally, Wolters Kluwer signed an agreement to purchase eOriginal parent Paperless Transaction Management, Inc. The deal is expected to close before the end of 2020.