Ally Outlines Vision for Digital Lending With Clearlane Launch

Ally Financial Inc. today launched the new branding for its multi-lender, digital-financing auto marketplace, called Clearlane, the company announced in a press release.

Clearlane is the new name for the platform formerly known as BlueYield, which Ally acquired in August. Upon launch, Clearlane will still serve largely the same core functions as before — refinancing and direct-auto financing — but the look and feel is more inline with Ally’s “vision” and emphasizes transparency in the buying process, Tim Russi, president of auto finance at Ally Financial, told Auto Finance News.  

However, Ally’s ambitions for the platform stretch far beyond refinancing, Russi said. Over time, the company plans to transform Clearlane into a marketplace for full-service, online financing through both direct and indirect channels, utilizing a number of national lending partners.

“Don’t look at where it is today, look at the capabilities of the platform and the vision we have around what we could do with that platform,” Russi said. “We think it’s an evolving area and there isn’t a perfect answer out there yet. There are a lot of folks in the process of developing [a solution] and our launch of the Clearlane brand and capabilities we have is to say: ‘Hey, we’re in this, we’re investing, and we think we are going to be successful in the long haul.’”

Today there are “over a dozen” lenders participating on the platform beside Ally itself, but that number will change as Clearlane’s functions evolve, he said. The goal is to on-board as small of a lender group as possible, and still accomplish a 90% fulfillment rate, he added. Ally would not disclose which lenders are currently on the platform.  

The company is searching for, and tightly curating captives, banks, credit unions, or other financing partners, so long as they have a diverse “appetite” to serve a wide variety of consumers, Russi said.

“We want to have the best lenders, and obviously captives are major lenders in the marketplace so we’d love to have them on,” he said.

Although BlueYield was originally serving as Ally’s direct lending platform, Russi emphasized that Clearlane is working closely with the dealers to make a platform that transcends the direct vs. indirect labels.

“It’s a questions of where [the loan] is originated and fulfilled, and whether it’s on a direct basis or indirect basis really becomes a variant of the process,” Russi said. “Right now when people hear ‘direct’ they hear ‘not dealer,’ and when they hear ‘indirect’ they go, ‘Oh that’s the dealer.’ Overtime, I imagine those distinctions becomes less important.”