OakNorth

OakNorth was founded in 2015 by entrepreneurs Rishi Khosla and Joel Perlman after they struggled to secure growth finance for their previous business, Copal Amba. The bank was built to serve established, fast-growing businesses that are often too complex or too small for traditional commercial-bank processes, while funding its lending through savings products.

OakNorth provides tailored debt finance across commercial and industrial businesses, commercial real estate and, in the US, fund finance. It operates as a UK-authorised bank regulated by the FCA and PRA, and has expanded into the US lower-mid-market since 2023.

Its distinctive strength is credit underwriting and monitoring: OakNorth uses its proprietary OakNorth Credit Intelligence technology to combine borrower data, sector analysis, forecasts and scenario analysis. The group also commercialises this capability through ONCI, a separate platform used by commercial banks, giving the firm a useful combination of banking, lending and financial-technology exposure.