'Big Data' at work - Intuit's new QuickBooks Capital

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Intuit has announced a new lending product to help small businesses get the capital they need to succeed. Powered by more than 26 billion QuickBooks data points and third party data sources, the QuickBooks Capital credit model provides a powerful view of a small business’ borrowing capacity.  This product release is just one of a series of innovation announcements leading-up to QuickBooks Connect being held in San Jose, November 15-17.

QuickBooks Capital is an innovative lending product designed to help small businesses get the capital they need. Building on Intuit’s history of using cutting-edge data science and artificial intelligence, QuickBooks Capital has developed a breakthrough credit model to help small businesses overcome the barriers they have traditionally faced in accessing small loans. QuickBooks Capital delivers:

  • The ability for a small business to use their own QuickBooks data to get full credit for their business performance, historical and ongoing.
  • A streamlined and transparent application process that is embedded within QuickBooks so that small businesses can access funding right inside their daily workflow, just as they need it.
  • New opportunities for small business growth -- 60 percent of QuickBooks Capital customers would likely not get a loan elsewhere, and 46 percent have never even applied for a loan before.

QuickBooks Capital empowers Small businesses to use their own QuickBooks data to provide an automated, comprehensive view of what’s happening with their business, including:

  • Free cash flow: QuickBooks provides a comprehensive picture of cash flow because in addition to the core accounting app including payroll and payments, small businesses also connect their bank accounts and credit cards, as well as other third party apps to get a full picture of their business.
  • Future income: QuickBooks data allows small businesses to get credit for open invoices, work in progress, total inventory, and ongoing projects.
  • Relative performance: Because there are more than 2.3M QuickBooks users, QuickBooks makes it easy to understand how a small business stacks up against others like them.
  • Trends: QuickBooks makes it easy to understand a small business within the context of individual business trends (seasonality and growth), as well as market trends.

Rania Succar, head of QuickBooks Capital at Intuit said, “The QuickBooks Capital credit model is delivering powerful results for small businesses -- getting capital into the hands of so many credit-worthy small businesses that otherwise felt stuck.”   Succar went on to say, “We are particularly proud to be innovating for young businesses because they are critical to the future success of the economy, but very under-served by the options available in today’s credit market.”

While the traditional process of applying for credit is full of friction that many times 'swamps' the ability of small businesses to get loans, QuickBooks Capital removes all of the friction from the application process, in effect offering 'life-saving' financing for many small businesses.

Small businesses that qualify for the offering can access funds from a new “Capital” tab right inside QuickBooks, where they can always see how much they are eligible to apply for based on the latest developments in their business. The working capital loans currently offered range up to $35,000, with a term between three and six months.

The product also emphasizes transparency by always displaying annual percentage rates (APRs) to borrowers. Other than interest cost, there are no origination fees or prepayment penalties.

For more information about QuickBooks Captial small business financing see their website and/or check out this video on how QuickBooks Capital can work for you.