FairPlay Partners With Upgrade in Continued Effort to Ensure Fairness In Lending

Upgrade's proprietary risk modeling will incorporate FairPlay's Fairness-as-a-Service Solutions across all verticals.

LOS ANGELES, Jan. 29, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- FairPlay, the world's first Fairness-as-a-Service™ company, is announcing a new customer relationship with

Upgrade, a fintech company that offers affordable and responsible credit, mobile banking and payment products to mainstream consumers.

Founded in 2020, FairPlay works with financial services companies to provide customizable real-time fairness testing and 24/7 monitoring solutions designed to drive growth, reduce risk, and keep pace with ever-evolving regulatory requirements.

Upgrade plans to use FairPlay solutions to test, monitor, and improve the fairness of its underwriting, increasing positive outcomes for consumers across its credit products.

"In an environment where rapid adjustments in credit strategy are necessary, we're eager to bolster our ability to assess the fairness of data sources and models in real-time and perspectively," said Thomas Curran, Chief Risk and Compliance Officer at Upgrade. "FairPlay provides compliance efficiency as a competitive advantage—and we are thrilled to embed its Fairness-as-as-Service solutions at Upgrade."

"Lenders are most effective when their fairness compliance is rigorous and fast," said Kareem Saleh, founder and CEO of FairPlay. "Upgrade has consistently captured opportunities presented by machine learning, and automation and is consequently diligent about their fair lending compliance. FairPlay is thrilled to work with Upgrade to continue to improve its lending practices."

For more information about FairPlay, visit FairPlay.ai. For more information about Upgrade, visit Upgrade.com.

About FairPlay AI

FairPlay AI is the world's first "fairness-as-a-service" solution helping organizations address algorithmic bias to find more good applicants that primary models miss — all without increasing risk. Built by some of the world's foreknown leaders in AI, FairPlay's technology serves financial institutions, lenders, insurance carriers, marketers, and others, identifying blind spots in their algorithms and providing automated "second-looks" to improve decisioning systems. FairPlay's tools help lenders identify more good loans and increase the fairness of their portfolios, resulting in higher profits and fairer portfolios all without higher risk. For more information about FairPlay and its products, visit FairPlay.ai.

About Upgrade, Inc.

Upgrade has delivered over $26 billion in affordable and responsible credit to mainstream consumers through cards and loans since its inception in 2017. The company is headquartered in San Francisco, California, with an operations center in Phoenix, Arizona, a technology center in Montreal, Canada and regional offices in Atlanta, Georgia and Irvine, California.      

Upgrade is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services are provided by Cross River Bank, a New Jersey State Chartered Commercial Bank, Member FDIC, Equal Housing Lender. Loans and credit lines are issued by Cross River Bank and/or Blue Ridge Bank, a nationally chartered commercial bank, Member FDIC. Upgrade Card is issued by Sutton Bank, Member FDIC, pursuant to a license from Visa U.S.A. Inc. Rewards associated with the Upgrade Card, when applicable, are provided by Upgrade, Inc. More information is available at: https://www.upgrade.com.   

SOURCE Fairplay