A Fireside Chat with Upstart’s CEO, Dave Girouard
发布时间 2023-01-04 02:10:27 来源
摘要
Dave Girouard, Co-Founder & CEO at Upstart , believed that young people were "potential rich yet cash poor"—and that dynamic caused them to make poor financial decisions for themselves and the economy as a whole. There had to be a better way to provide people with affordable access to credit, on reasonable terms, when they needed it. Using AI and machine learning provided that new way forward. In this episode, Dave shares how the company came to be and how Upstart provides transformative access to credit for all. We discuss: The problem statement for Upstart and the choice to venture into unsecured consumer loansThe application of AI in the credit processThe choice to partner with financial institutionsAdding value in auto, small business, and mortgage loan spaces
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中英文字稿 
You're listening to leaders in lending from Upstart, a podcast dedicated to helping consumer lenders grow their programs and improve their product offerings. Each week, hear decision makers in the finance industry offer insights into the future of the lending industry, best practices around digital transformation, and more. Let's get into the show.
大家好，欢迎收听Upstart的“领先的贷款领袖”播客节目。本节目致力于帮助消费信贷机构扩大业务并提升产品服务水平。每一周我们都会请金融业领袖分享对借贷行业未来的洞见、数字化转型的最佳实践等。现在，让我们开始节目吧。
Welcome to Leaders in Lending. I'm your host, Jeff Keltner. This week, we're going to re-air one of our previous episodes from 2022. In fact, our most popular episode this year, which is my conversation with Upstart Founder and CEO, Dave Gerard.
欢迎来到《贷款领袖》。我是主持人杰夫·凯特纳。本周，我们将重新播出我们2022年的一集节目。实际上，这是我们今年最受欢迎的一集，讲述了我与Upstart创始人兼首席执行官戴夫·杰拉德的对话。
Dave and I dive into the problems he saw in the financial space that caused him to leave Google and found Upstart. Why really the big bet of Upstart is the belief that AI is going to transform the entire AI lending experience and really the entire industry and what that looks like where it's headed.
Dave和我深入探讨了他在金融领域看到的问题，这些问题迫使他离开谷歌并创立了Upstart。Upstart的真正大赌注在于相信AI将会彻底改变整个借贷体验，甚至是整个行业，并且这个行业未来的样子是什么样子。
We dive a little bit into where Upstart's come, where we started how we got here, but I think equally importantly, what the future holds and why the big bet I think really is still on the possibility of AI completely transforming the entire lending ecosystem. I think we believe that it now as much as we ever have and so this conversation retains all of its relevance.
我们稍微深入一下Upstart的起源，从哪里开始以及我们是如何到达这里的，但我认为同样重要的是，未来会带来什么以及为什么我认为AI彻底改变整个贷款生态系统的可能性仍然很大。我认为我们相信这一点，现在和以往一样，所以这次谈话仍然具有所有的相关性。
So please enjoy my conversation with Dave Gerard.
所以请享受我的与戴夫·杰拉德的谈话。
Dave, thank for joining us on the podcast today. I appreciate your making the time.
Dave，感谢您今天加入我们的播客。我很感激您抽出时间。
Great to be here, Jeff.
非常高兴在这里，Jeff。
This will be an interesting one for me because you and I know each other pretty well versus many of my guests that I don't know as well. But I really wanted to start the conversation with your life pre-upstart and like, walk me a little bit through how you ended up in, it feels like at two interesting places, at interesting transition points and cloud computing at Google back in the early 2000s and then in Fintech right now, you kind of find good points in the wave to ride them.
这对我来说会很有趣，因为你和我很熟，相较于我不太认识的其他客人。但我真的想要先聊一聊你创业之前的生活，可以带我稍微了解一下你是怎么到了这两个很特别的地方——早期的谷歌云计算和现在的金融科技行业，你好像总是找到这个领域的好时机。
Yeah, I mean, I guess to go back to the beginning a little bit, I mean, I grew up outside of Boston in a suburb. Born in the 60s, grew up in the 70s and 80s. So I'm a lot older than most of the founders until a convales for sure. But my parents for like first in their families to go to college, they have that sort of, you know, move to the suburbs is the greatest thing you can do and get a job and work your way, etc.
是啊，我想，我们回到一开始，我的意思是我在波士顿郊外的一个郊区长大。我生于60年代，在70年代和80年代长大。所以我比大多数创始人要老得多，直到灵魂复兴为止。但是我父母是家里第一批上大学的人，他们有那种，你知道，搬到郊区是你能做的最好的事情，找到一份工作，努力工作，等等。
So like the whole motion of entrepreneurism, if that's a word, wasn't really honestly in my vocabulary or family or DNA whatsoever. It was really about just sort of that more traditional path of a career and, you know, went to a great college and ended up coming out to California in the early to mid 90s and of course landed in technology.
所以像创业主义的整个运动一样，如果这是一个词的话，它真的完全不在我的词汇表、家庭或DNA中。这更多地关乎传统职业生涯的道路，你知道，上了一所好大学，最终在90年代初至中期来到加利福尼亚，并且当然掉落到了技术领域。
And I've been here ever since 28ish years out here. So I quickly gravitated. I mean, I studied computer science, computer engineering in college. I wasn't destined to be a programmer for my life. But I was certainly kind of enamored with the potential for technology and so, you know, that's what got me out to Silicon Valley. I had a stinted apple like way back when, you know, another startup that wasn't my startup, but you know, had some startup experience and then landed, you know, quite a few years now in 2004 at Google.
我在这里已经待了28年左右，所以我很快就被吸引了。我的大学专业是计算机科学和计算机工程，我并不是注定要成为一名程序员一辈子。但是我对技术的潜力非常着迷，所以我来到了硅谷。我曾经在苹果公司短暂工作过，还有过一些创业经验，然后在2004年加入谷歌，至今已经有很多年了。
And that was a little fortuitous. It wasn't yet public. So nobody quite knew what to make of Google, you know, until they saw the numbers, and they knew what to make of it. It's hard to think back to when Google was an unknown quantity of like, is this a good call to join or not? But that's what it felt like back then.
那有点偶然。当时它还不为公众所知。所以，直到看到数字，他们才知道如何评判Google。很难想象以前Google是个未知的变量，你不知道是否该加入。但当时就是这种感觉。
Yeah, I remember like driving there to go to an interview and thinking, wow, these people work for Google. I'd never met someone who works for Google because it was quite small and it was just this really search engine that was getting to be famous, but still wasn't really clear, you know, what exactly was going on in those buildings. And so anyway, I was very fortunate to have landed there just at the right place at the right time and spent eight years there building what is now called Google Cloud.
我还记得开车去面试的时候，想着哇，这些人都在谷歌工作。之前我从没见过谷歌的员工，因为当时公司规模还很小，只是一个逐渐出名的搜索引擎，但是还不是很清楚那些大楼里到底在干什么。所以我很幸运地在合适的时间到了这里，度过了八年的时间，在这里打造了现在被称为Google Cloud的服务。
You know, didn't call that then, but it was the cloud applications like Gmail and Google docs, etc. As you know, well. And so that was kind of like a nice pioneering thing with some of the challenges being that Google had this crazy runaway business, advertising business, that in some sense, as you know, so we always had to compete with in terms of resources and attention and hard to be the little brother, little sister to one of the greatest financial innovations in the history of mankind, which would be the Google advertising system.
你知道的，当时没有这个叫做云应用的词汇，但就像Gmail和Google文档一样。你知道的，那些是一个不错的创新。但我们也经历了一些挑战，因为Google有一个疯狂的广告业务，我们必须与之竞争资源和注意力，就像你知道的，很难作为一个小兄弟或小姐妹，站在人类历史上最伟大的财务创新的旁边。那就是谷歌广告系统。
Yeah, that is maybe the greatest business innovation in history, just the way that thing prints and continues earnings call. It seemed to continue to go well.
哦，可能这是历史上最伟大的商业创新，就是那个东西打印并持续进行收益电话。它似乎一直都很顺利。
Yeah, it just doesn't even stop.
是啊，它根本停不下来。
So now, tell me about the decision to leave because I remember, I mean, I left and I used to tell the joke that my mother-in-law, you hired me into Google, you hired me out and she thanked you for one of the two because it was kind of like the place you believed, right? It was the thing we wanted over on the upstart.
那么，现在请您告诉我离开的决定是怎么样的，因为我记得，就像我离开时说的那样，我的婆婆曾经开玩笑说：你被谷歌雇进来，现在又被雇出去了，她感谢你其中的一项，因为这个地方是你信任的，对吧？这是我们想要的东西，比起其他刚刚起步的公司来说。
But, you know, and I remember when I left, you had already started upstart, you had some, you know, sense of where you're going and that felt like maybe a crazy decision, but you were you were leaving, you know, maybe the greatest place in the world to work as people like to point out to me with like nothing but an idea and some hope that somebody would give you some money. That seems like a huge leap, what got you to the point of saying this is something I want to go do?
“然而，你知道的，我记得当我离开时，你已经开始了Upstart。你有一些想法，知道自己的未来方向，这或许听起来有点疯狂，但你仍然要离开那个被人们盛赞为世界最棒的工作场所，只带着一份想法和希望别人会给你资金。这看起来是一个巨大的飞跃，是什么让你决定要去做这件事？”
Yeah, you know, I had been there for eight years. The apps business had grown into, you know, about a billion dollar revenue run rate and all the way along, as I said, it was kind of a secondary, frankly, business for Google. And I always thought once you get to 100 million, once you get to 200 million, once you get to a billion, you know, it's kind of all of a sudden be the center of the universe there. And of course, it was just you just keep it up with the advertising business. So anyway, it was a great success. I mean, it's actually heartwarming to me that it's so big today and they're carrying it for it's more than a 20 billion dollar run rate business.
是的，你知道，我在那里呆了八年。应用业务已经增长到了约10亿美元的年收益率，一直以来，正如我所说，这对于谷歌来说只是一种次要的业务。我总是认为一旦你达到1亿、2亿、10亿，你就会突然发现它成为了宇宙中心。当然，它只是伴随着广告业务不断增长。无论如何，这是一个巨大的成功。我觉得今天它变得这么大、已经成为了超过200亿美元年收益率的业务对我来说确实让人振奋。
And so it's really, it would have been very saddening if they had just sort of written that off after I left. So in any case, you know, having been there eight years, I kind of always wondered, you know, it went really well for me there. But was it, was it me or was it Google, you know, could anyone have walked in there to those doors in March 2004 sat down and just started turning knobs and built a great business because Google just had such core strength. So part of it was, you know, I wanted to prove it to myself. Part of it was, look, I was there for eight years. I could stuck around for another eight, but, you know, is this the last cool thing I'm going to do with my life? I'm going to take a shot at something different. And I'm not sure I ever imagined I could leave Google and do something cooler better than what I had done there. But that's, you know, I fortunately, I had made some money. So I had the financial freedom to do it. And my wife was behind it. So, you know, when you're in Silicon Valley for 20 some odd years, at some point you decide you want to be a founder and you want to try that. And I do recommend you don't wait until you're 45 years old to do that, generally speaking. But that's, that's what I did.
所以，如果他们在我离开后就这样忽略了这件事，那确实会让我非常悲伤。无论如何，我在那里待了八年，一直在想，那么顺利是因为我还是因为谷歌的缘故。任何人在2004年三月走进那扇门，坐下来开始动手构建一个伟大的业务，谷歌都拥有如此强大的核心实力。所以我想证明给自己看看。而且，我在那里待了八年。我本可以再待八年，但这是我人生的最后一个酷炫的事情吗？我会尝试做一些不同的事情。我不确定能否离开谷歌并做得比我在那里做得更酷，做得更好。但我很幸运，我赚了些钱，所以我有财务上的自由去实现它。我的妻子也支持我。当你在硅谷待了20多年，总会有一天你决定成为创始人并尝试一下。一般来说，我建议你不要等到45岁才这样做。但这就是我所做的。
Well, if that's your advice for me, I'm running out of time. Well, you're pretty much a founder here. So close. So tell me about the initial, like, what was the problem? I feel like most founders more than falling in love with the product that they have or an idea, it's like, it's a problem in the world that is the thing that drives them to say, hey, this is the thing I've got to fix. Right. What was that problem as you saw it when you were sitting at Google and you said, hey, this is the thing I'm going to go and as my shot is a founder to take a shot at doing this, like, this is what I want to go try and fix.
那么，如果那是你对我的建议，我就时间不多了。嗯，你基本上是这里的创始人。如此接近。那么告诉我一下最初的情况，什么是问题？我觉得大多数创始人不仅仅是爱上了他们的产品或想法，而是世界上存在的问题，这是驱使他们说：“嘿，这就是我必须解决的问题的事情”。对吧。当你坐在谷歌时，你是怎么看待这个问题的，你说：“嘿，这就是我要去尝试解决的事情，作为创始人，这是我要去做的事情。”
Yeah. You know, I'm not a purist to say like the only way to be a founder is to have an idea that you're obsessed with and fixed and you can't, you know, there's a lot of people that say, this is the only way to do it. That's the only way to do it. I guess for me, like, I got the idea of starting a company would be cool and ideas were coming night and day to think about it. I just, I just got an open mind to look for things that could be interesting companies for a period of time. You know, I literally started thinking about the notion I had a really nice Canon SLR camera. I really hated how I had to like take it home and connect it to my computer to get the photos out. And I was like, maybe I could have like a SD storage that was actually a Bluetooth sort of device. It could stick it instantly on my phone. I literally wrote this down in like a Gmail draft and said, you know, so think about a Bluetooth, you know, SD card for a, for a nice camera. And, and then the next thing after I wrote it is like letting people borrow from their future income. And it was just randomly through some serious conversations where it just kind of became clear that young people are kind of potential rich in cash poor. And that sort of potential rich in cash poor situation made them sort of make decisions that ultimately weren't awesome for them. We're not awesome for the economy. And so it really was just fascination with access to capital and access to credit how it worked. And you know, it didn't immediately lead to what upstart has become, but that was really this thread I started to pull way back then.
是的，你知道，我并不是一个纯粹主义者，说创业的唯一方式就是有一个你痴迷且固定的想法，你无法摆脱，有很多人会说，这是唯一的方式。只有这种方式。对我来说，我觉得创立一家公司的想法很酷，而且我一直在想有哪些能成为有趣公司的事情。我对此持开放的心态。你知道，我开始考虑的是我有一个非常好的佳能单反相机，我真的很讨厌必须把它带回家，并连接到我的电脑上才能把照片取出来。我突然想到，也许我可以有一个SD储存设备，它实际上是一个蓝牙设备，可以立即把照片导入我的手机。我当时就将这个想法写在了一个Gmail草稿中，说，你知道，考虑一下一个单反相机的蓝牙SD卡。然后我写下来的下一个想法是，让人们借用未来的收入。通过一些严肃的对话之后，我突然发现年轻人潜在的财富与现实生活中的贫困状况之间的矛盾，导致他们做出了对自己或对经济都不利的决策。所以，我真的很着迷资本和信贷的获取方式。虽然这并没有立刻指向Upstart的成立，但这确实是我早年开始深入研究的一个线索。
Interesting. And how did you go from, you know, young people with potential, you know, I like that phrase more potential than access to credit is an interesting concept. But how do you go from that to unsecured lending? I mean, that's like, you know, there's a lot of things you could do that almost feels like student lending in some way is the thing that you're going to say, how do I like enable people to pursue their dreams education seems like the thing or, you know, certificate programs of boot camps or in that kind of space.
有趣。那么，你们是怎么从有潜力的年轻人走向无抵押贷款的呢？我觉得"更多的潜力而非信用"是个有趣的概念。但是，你们是怎么做到这一点的呢？这就像做很多事情一样，几乎感觉像是学生贷款是你要考虑的东西，你会说，如何帮助人们追求自己的梦想，教育似乎是最好的选择，或者参加证书课程或者编程训练营等类似的领域。
And you ended up over a series of times on like unsecured consumer debt, which is just not the obvious place. Talk to me about how you got there.
你最终陷入了一连串的消费贷款问题，这并不是显而易见的地方。告诉我你是如何走到那里的。
Yeah, you know, I think when you started a company, you had this thing drawn up on the whiteboard that you're fascinated with and you love. And in our case, it was what became to be known as income share agreements. It was similar to alone, except you could, you would essentially pay back as a fractional what you earn instead of a by a defined interest rate. And so it was this very novel concept.
你知道的，我觉得当你创建公司时，你会在白板上画出你着迷和热爱的东西。对我们来说，就是后来被称为收入份额协议的东西。它类似于贷款，不同的是你在偿还的时候，实际上是以一种分数来支付你所获得的收入，而不是按照一个明确的利率。因此，这是一个非常新颖的概念。
I mean, it had been kicked around sort of in the University of Chicago School of Economics kind of thing for a long time. But we were, I think the first company to really make a go of it as a platform. And but the reality, of course, is, you know, that whiteboard meets the cold reality of the world. And it's the outcome is not always pretty.
我是说，这个想法在芝加哥大学经济学院这样的地方已经被讨论了很长时间了。但我们是第一家真正把它作为一个平台推动起来的公司。然而，现实情况是，白板上的想法会与这个世界的冷酷现实相遇，并不总是美好的结果。
And effectively, we chased this kind of business model for about a year, bit more than a year. And, you know, kept trying to turn the knobs and see what we could do to make it work. But ultimately, it wasn't kind of scale. It wasn't going to be a successful company. We didn't have them much cash left. And so we, you know, toward the end of 2013, decided to move toward a much, a product that existed in large scale, which is a consumer loan.
我们追求这种商业模式大约一年多，不断尝试调整，想方设法让它行之有效。但最终它并没有获得推广。这样的公司不可能成功。我们没有多少现金留下来。所以我们决定在2013年年末，转向销售量大的消费性贷款产品。
The real insight that ended up making it a success was, you know, Paul, my co-founder had built a model to predict what somebody was likely to earn over their career. That was the price and income share, right? You have to figure out like, yeah, what they can make on that thing. So we had a model that would predict, you know, given everything it knew about you, what you're likely to earn over the next decade or so.
实际上让公司获得成功的真正点子是，你知道的，我的联合创始人保罗建了一个模型，可以预测某个人在他们的职业生涯中可能赚多少钱。那就是价格和收入分配，对吧？你必须弄清楚，嗯，他们可以在那个事情上赚多少钱。所以我们有一个模型，可以预测，你知道的，根据它所知道的你的一切，你在未来十年左右可能赚多少钱。
Well, we sent over a very short period of time, Paul transformed that into a model that said, what's the likelihood they're going to pay back this alone? And so it's sort of like asking different questions of a model. And load behold, starting in 2014, we had what became a very unique credit origination model that used data, both traditional data and data that, you know, traditional engines weren't using.
好的，我们在很短的时间内把问题交给了 Paul。他把问题转变成了一个模型，来判断他们有多大可能会还款。就像向一个模型提出不同的问题一样。意料之中的是，从2014年开始，我们拥有了一种非常独特的信贷发起模型，它使用了传统数据和传统引擎不使用的数据。
It's very simple simplistic back in the time, but I'll just say that the day we sort of pulled the lever and moved from income shares to loans, it started accelerating very, very quickly. So suddenly, we don't done that. Creating a bespoke market from scratch is no small task. It's no small task to step into a giant, heavily competed industry like lending, but in the end for us, it was obviously the better, the better step.
这句话的意思是：在过去，这很简单老土，但我只想说，当我们把杠杆拉动，把收入份额变成贷款时，它开始非常非常快地加速。所以突然间，我们就完成了这个转变。从零开始创造一个定制市场的工作并不轻松。进入像贷款这样一个巨大而竞争激烈的行业，也不是一件轻松的事情。但对我们来说，最终这是更好的决策。
Yeah. I remember most about that, that those months was how risky the decision felt in advance and how obvious it felt on retrospect. I mean, you turn it on, you watch it, you go, how did we ever think this was a, was a questionable call, but it did not feel obvious at the time that we were the first call. I mean, it's hard to like do us something. Even if it's not working, I mean, you put so much into it, it, it, it always felt like maybe the next turn around the corner, it was going to start working.
嗯，我最清楚的记得那时候的感觉是我们在决定前感觉多么危险，在回想过去时又有多显而易见。我的意思是，你开启它，你看着它，你会问自己，我们当初怎么会觉得这是一个有疑问的决定呢？但是当时并不觉得我们是第一个做这个决定的人是显而易见的。我是说，这很难理解。即使它不起作用，你投入了那么多，总感觉也许下一个转角就会开始起作用。
So it is hard to work away and, you know, the, the chapter of the upstart book that we will omit is the one where we did hedge and we did look for a period of time. I'm sure you recall to actually having both of these products in parallel, just, just to sort of have a loan if you want a loan or an income share, if you want to do an income share. And I'm that sort of thing, which we invested in for a few months, we shut off in about a week because it became clear what everybody wanted and it wasn't the income share agreement.
所以，很难在外地工作，你知道的，我们将省略的那个篇章是我们寻找一段时间的对冲和并行产品。我相信你记得，我们同时拥有这两个产品，只是为了如果你想要贷款或收入分成，提供一种贷款或收入分成的选择。我们投资了这种东西几个月，但仅一个星期后就关闭了，因为众所周知，大家想要的不是收入分成协议。
No, it became obvious. And it's a little bit about like the unsecure like you could have, we could have asked Paul to kind of predict student loan repayments, other things. We kind of set it on unsecured consumer debt in the kind of smaller range and student loans, shorter duration of three or five years versus a student loan, which is often 10 or 15.
“不，很明显。而且这有点像不安全的，你可以向保罗询问学生贷款还款预测等其他事情。我们将其设置为不安全的消费者债务，涉及较小的范围和较短的三到五年期限，而不是通常为10到15年的学生贷款。”
Talk to me about the parts of that market that make that a more compelling place to start from your point of view or why you didn't go somewhere else.
跟我谈谈那个市场的哪些方面让你觉得更有吸引力，从你的角度出发或者为什么你没有选择其他地方开始。
Yeah, I think it's really a question of what as a non bank, a technology company, you know, what can you play, what can you prove? And secured loans, whether those are cars or homes or what have you, it's just a lot to those, a lot to prove credit cards. The funding structure of a credit card is fairly sophisticated.
是的，我认为这实际上是一个问题，非银行、技术公司该如何证明自己、展示自己可以发挥哪些作用？对于那些有抵押的贷款，无论是汽车还是房屋，都需要有很多要证明的内容，与信用卡相比更加复杂。信用卡的资金结构相当复杂。
You know, an unsecured personal loan, first of all, obviously the fintechs were largely creating the category, the lending clubs and prospers at the time were kind of essentially had been creating this category out of almost out of thin air. So it was clearly doable, even if you had, even if you were selling loans to hedge funds at fairly high returns, if you hadn't a strong enough edge in your model, you could get started. So in some sense, it was doable. And that's probably the first thing.
你知道，首先显然，未担保的个人贷款，金融科技公司主要是在创建这一类别，当时的贷款俱乐部和prospers基本上是在几乎空中创造这一类别的。因此，显然是可做的，即使你在以相当高的回报将贷款销售给对冲基金，如果你的模式没有足够强大的优势，你也可以开始。因此，在某种程度上，这是可行的。这可能是第一件事。
But the second thing also is it's really kind of the purist form of credit, right? You're just underwriting an individual, there's no collateral. And in some sense, it's process wise, the easiest and it's model wise, the hardest. So that was a good fit for us because we had real modeling advantages we believe and I think we're proven to be true. But we of course, the idea of trying to like, I'll suddenly build a mortgage origination product out of scratch, certainly felt beyond us at that time.
但第二件事是，这种形式的信贷真的是最纯粹的形式，对吗？你只是为一个人提供贷款担保，没有抵押品。从某种意义上讲，它在流程上是最容易的，但在模型上是最难的。所以，这对我们来说是一个好的选择，因为我们相信我们有真正的建模优势，我认为我们已经被证明是正确的。但当然，那个时候，我们试图突然建立一个抵押贷款业务产品，肯定让我们感到超出了我们的能力范围。
Yeah, it's really interesting to think about where your strengths make the biggest difference in the market and focusing on that, which felt like the right decision for the company at the time. So we've used the word model a bunch and I mean, I'm sorry, it's maybe at the forefront of what we term AI lending and applying AI was AI or machine learning always kind of central to the thesis and central to how you were thinking about what would differentiate the company because it's very much center of what we do today. But I'm curious if that was always in your mind, the thing that was going to be the differentiator or the focus.
嗯，考虑到你的优势在市场上带来最大的影响并专注于此确实很有趣，当时这也是我们公司做出的正确决定。所以我们经常使用“模型”这个词，我的意思是，对我们所谓的AI借贷而言，它可能一直处于核心位置，而应用AI或机器学习是否始终是核心观点和思考公司差异化的方法呢？因为它非常贯穿我们今天所做的一切。但我很好奇，在您的思维中，这是否一直是区别点或重点所在。
Well, you know, in the early days, we certainly didn't use those words. We definitely thought more data in better math, right? So and they kind of go together, the more data you have, the more you need more sophisticated math to make any sense of it. But we really, you know, we always like in the beginning, it was Monte Carlo simulations and a few other things that were probably better than what's out there, but not dramatically and we started with two or three dozen variables assembled together to create the first version of the model. So I definitely think we saw the road ahead. We knew what we were ahead. I don't think we would have been so bold to call it AI in those days. Probably would have been a stretch of the term, but you know, over time, certainly as the amount of data in the sophistication of the models grew, it became obvious that that's what it really is.
你知道，在早期，我们肯定没有使用那些术语。我们确实认为更多的数据就意味着更好的数学，对吧？所以它们有点紧密相连，你拥有的数据越多，你就需要更复杂的数学来理解它。但是我们真的，你知道，在开始的时候，我们使用的是蒙特卡罗模拟以及其他一些可能比现在更好，但不是显著的方法。我们最初用了两三十个变量组合在一起创建了模型的第一个版本。所以我肯定认为我们看到了前方的道路。我们知道自己面前的任务。我想在那些日子里我们不会那么大胆地称之为人工智能。也许这个词的含义过于宽泛了，但是随着时间的推移，随着数据量和模型复杂度的增加，很明显那才是真正的人工智能。
It's using AI and or machine learning to sort of predict the future to make credit decisions and in a bunch of other things as well. And but again, I think we knew the path we didn't quite have the vernacular nor do I think it would have made sense back then. Yeah, the initial models were not sophisticated enough to probably earn the time term AI. That's right. I think they are now.
它使用人工智能和机器学习来预测未来，并在信贷决策和其他许多方面上操作。但我认为，我们当时并没有相应的术语，也不会用它合理。初期模型可能不够复杂以至于无法被称为“人工智能”。但现在它们可以了。
I'd like to explore a little bit too, then, how the usage of AI evolved because there's both the sophistication of the initial model, the kind of income prediction turned into some version of can you repay. And then there's all other sorts of parts of the lending process to which upstart is now applying AI.
我也想探索一下AI的使用方式是如何发展的，因为这既涉及到最初模型的复杂程度，也涉及到收入预测变成了能否还款的某个版本。现在，upstart正在应用AI到贷款过程的各种其他方面。
So talk a little bit about the journey of like, how do we think of AI in the process and how do we go from the one problem who deserves access to credit? How do we think about likelihood to repay to applying that more broadly to the problem of getting a consumer alone?
请稍微谈一下这个过程，我们在这个过程中如何看待人工智能，以及我们是如何从考虑哪些人有资格获得贷款的一个问题出发，逐步将这个思路应用到更广泛的消费者贷款问题中的。
Yeah, when you think about lending and the lifecycle of lending, there are risks all along the path, you know, all the way from the very beginning. If you're going to spend some money to send direct mail to a bunch of people, you're risking that no one's going to respond to that thing and you just do some money down the toilet. Obviously, writing the core of it is the decision about who you lend to. And there's a lot more. But in the very beginning, the only thing we really tried to do was say, will this person default or not? What's the likelihood for this product that they're applying for? So it was a very binary sort of thing.
嗯，当你考虑到贷款和贷款生命周期时，整个路径都存在风险，从一开始就是这样。如果你要花钱给一群人发直邮，你就冒着没有人回应而把钱扔到垃圾桶的风险。当然，核心是决定借给谁的决定。还有很多其他因素。但在一开始，我们唯一真正试图做的就是问：这个人会不会违约？他们正在申请的这款产品的成功风险有多大？所以这是一个非常二进制的事情。
What's the percent likelihood of default? That's simple. And there was a lot of room for improvement just in that. And so that's where we got started. But over time, of course, you start to look through the whole process and you say, wow, all along this path, there's ways to be better modeling and better predicting the future de-risking the process. So for example, the credit decision itself is not just important whether or not they default. It actually really matters when. Someone who defaults in the 10th month of alone is very different from someone who defaults in the 3rd month of alone.
默认的可能性是多少？这很简单。不过，有很多改进的空间。所以我们就从那里开始了。但随着时间的推移，你开始审视整个过程，发现哇，沿着这条线路，有很多方法可以更好地建模和预测未来的风险。例如，信用决策本身并不仅仅是重要的问题是不是会违约。更重要的是，违约的时间。在贷款的第10个月违约的人与在贷款的第三个月违约的人是完全不同的。
And so over time, probably over a period of years, turned a model with a sort of binary prediction into one that literally predicts the likelihood of default and or prepayment for that matter each month of alone. And that switch, which we flipped, I think in 2018, something like that, was the single biggest upgrade to our model we've done.
逐渐地，可能是在几年的时间内，我们将一个具有二元预测的模型转变为一个可以每月准确预测违约和/或提前还款的模型。而这个转变，在2018年左右完成，是我们模型中最重要的一次升级。
Now, of course, in online lending, there's a lot of risk involved, a lot of potential fraud, a lot of misrepresentation of credentials. So we also began to apply what we do to the problem of verification. Where essentially you wanted to do is make the borrower do as little work as possible, but verify everything you can.
当然了，在在线借贷领域，存在很多风险，很多潜在的欺诈，很多证书的虚假不实。因此，我们也开始将我们的工作应用于验证的问题。您想做的就是尽量减少借款人的工作量，但验证一切可以验证的东西。
In the early days, we just had a hard rule. We were trying to build that credit decision model. So we just verified every input to the 10th degree. And it's the hand. Was that by hand? We were talking to everybody, looking at everything. Yeah, it was just really, but the average applicant would probably upload four-ish, five-ish documents, and it'd be reviewed, there'd be phone calls, there'd be everything. And over time, we began to build more automated ways to do it.
在早期，我们只有一个严格的规则。我们试图构建信用决策模型。所以我们只是对每个输入进行了到十分之一的验证。而且都是手动的吗？我们跟每个人都在交谈，看了很多东西。是的，真的很辛苦，但每个申请人可能会上传四五个文件左右，然后会进行审核、电话沟通等等。随着时间的推移，我们开始构建更多自动化的方式来完成这件事。
And we also began to build models too. If you knew four things about somebody, what was the likelihood the fifth thing was true or not true? So we began to apply machine learning to that part of the equation. And if you fast forward to today, vast majority, more than two-thirds of our loans, there's no human involved on any side. There's no documents to upload. There's no human involved. And that's a true degree of sophistication.
我们还开始建立模型了。如果你知道某人的四样事情，那么第五样事情是真还是假的可能性是多少？因此，我们开始将机器学习应用于这一方程的部分。如果你快进到今天，超过三分之二的贷款都没有任何人参与。没有需要上传的文件。没有人参与。这是真正的复杂度。
We've been able to get to over time. Yeah, I think that's fascinating to see both the increase in sophistication and the core problem that you started with. And then they're like, hey, there's lots of other problems. We could take this concept and apply to and improve the process. That's kind of how I guess growth works in a business.
我们一直能够随着时间的推移实现这一目标。是的，我认为看到复杂度增加和最初出发的核心问题都是很有趣的。然后他们说，嘿，还有很多其他的问题。我们可以把这个概念应用到并改进这个过程。这就是我想象中企业发展的方式。
Talk to me now about the, you made this decision somewhere down the path. We started with a going a bank partner route where all the loans were really originated by a bank and not by even apply for charter or state licenses and become a lender the way some fintechs have pursued.
现在跟我谈谈关于你在某个阶段做出的决定。我们起初采取了与一家银行合作的途径，所有贷款都由银行实际担责发放，这样我们不必申请特许或州级许可证，也不必像某些金融科技公司那样去成为贷方。
And then later on, the decision to partner with more than one bank to make this kind of a technology that you were making available to banks, to crush it to banks, and credit unions and other lenders. But why that decision? Why the path of working with existing financial institutions versus the kind of disruptor? We're going to throw out the banks, the bank is the old way. We don't need them. I think a lot of fintechs take that approach. This is very different.
然后之后，决定与不止一家银行合作，将这种技术提供给银行、信用合作社和其他借款人。但为什么会做出这个决定？为什么要选择与现有的金融机构合作，而不是像那些变革者一样，直接废除银行，认为银行是旧的方式，我们不需要它们。我认为很多金融科技公司都采取这种方法，但这个决定非常不同。
I'm curious why you thought of that as the right approach for upstart. So in the first few years, I think we just wanted to make a product that worked. We weren't in position to go work with 200 banks or 500 banks. We really just wanted to prove we could build a better product.
我很好奇你为什么认为那是为初创公司合适的正确方法。因此，在最初几年中，我认为我们只是想制造一个能够工作的产品。我们无法与200家或500家银行合作。我们只是想证明我们可以建立一个更好的产品。
And we worked with one single bank in those days to make it work. I think we reached a point in the history where it felt to us that this notion of being a brand with a hidden bank behind it and selling loans to hedge funds or whomever or maybe through to securitizations was ultimately the best business model. So we saw fork in the road where either you become a chartered bank of one type or another.
那时候，我们只跟一家银行合作，以便它能够运作。在历史的某个时刻，我们感觉到成为一个品牌，但是潜在的银行背景掩盖在它背后，向对冲基金或其他人或通过证券化出售贷款这一理念，最终成为了最好的商业模式。所以我们看到了一个分岔路口，要么成为某种类型的特许银行。
You take deposits and also that improves your cost of funding. It improves your liquidity, etc. is a lot of great reasons to do that. Or you just say we're not a bank. We really want to be a technology company and partner with banks. And you know, it's a lot of us being like you and I are ex-cougal people.
你接受存款，这可以提高你的资金成本。这可以提高你的流动性，等等很多好处。或者你可以说我们不是一家银行。我们真的想成为一家科技公司并与银行合作。你知道，我们很多人都像你和我一样是前Cougals员工。
Becoming a bank didn't feel natural to us. It just felt like look, we're building great technology here. I don't know if we have the DNA of being a bank ourselves. But there's a lot of banks out there and I don't think it makes sense for most of them trying to replicate the kind of things we're doing here.
成为一家银行对我们来说不自然。它就像是，我们在这里正在构建伟大的技术。我不知道我们是否本身具备成为银行的DNA。但是有很多银行存在，我认为大多数银行试图复制我们在这里所做的事情是没有意义的。
So I think we took what ended up being a unique path. I don't think others in our peer group or industries really decided this path. But for us it made a lot of sense. And it kind of made all of a sudden we can't just work with one bank. We have to work lots of banks. And that opened up a whole bunch of new sets of capabilities and functionality we needed. But I think several years later now it's been proven to be a great path for us.
我认为我们走了一条独特的道路，其他同行或其他行业的人并没有选择这条路。但对我们来说，这条路很有意义。而且突然间，我们不能只与一个银行合作，而是需要与很多银行合作。这开启了许多新的能力和功能。但我认为几年后，这条路已经被证明对我们来说是一个伟大的选择。
Yeah. The interesting part of that path to me is that it introduces a number of people producing oversight or looking at what you're doing and wanting to do diligence. And particularly with the utilization of AI in an environment where that is from a regulatory point of view, not as well understood how to think about how regulations apply.
是的。我觉得这条道路上有趣的部分是，它涉及到很多人进行监督，或者关注你所做的事情，并且希望进行审慎。特别是在使用人工智能的环境中，在监管方面，我们还没有很好地理解如何思考规定如何适用。
How do you think about working with your partners to make sure, hey, what you're doing in this space, it's kind of on the cutting edge. It may be where legislation or regulation has kind of thought about how to engage. How do you work with them to get them comfortable and feel like you're supporting those partners through that journey? And in some ways it's easier not to have them onboard everybody going, hey, absolutely, what do you think about this over here? And when the guy from the CFPB said something, so it comes with a downside.
你认为与你的合作伙伴一起工作，确保你在这个领域所做的事情处于领先地位，这个想法怎么样？可能会考虑到立法或监管方面的介入。你如何与他们合作让他们感到舒适，并感觉到你正在支持他们的远程工作？有时候不让他们成为每个人都参与的船员，这样会更容易，对吧？当CFPB的人说了些什么时，这也有负面影响。
I'm curious how you think about engaging with those partners to make sure they're comfortable and supportive of what we're doing. Yeah, I think very early on we knew that banks are heavily regulated and conservative by nature and they should be.
我很好奇你对如何与合作伙伴互动以确保他们感到舒适并支持我们的做法有什么想法。是的，我认为我们非常早就知道银行受到监管，本质上保守，他们应该保持这种态度。
So working with them, building a product that banks would adopt really meant kind of seeing the world from their position and providing the types of controls and visibility and data that meant they could do this responsibly. They could do this with their own policy, with their own risk appetite, with their own business objectives and ways that they just had a lot of degrees of control.
所以和他们一起工作，建立一个银行会采纳的产品，确实意味着从他们的角度看世界，并提供各种控制、可见性和数据，以确保他们可以负责任地完成这项工作。他们可以用自己的政策、风险承受能力、业务目标和掌控方式来完成这项工作。
This is an upstart originating loans for you. It's a tool set that allows you to originate loans better than you could yourself. And also in the company is both a consumer-facing company but also really enterprise company selling the most sophisticated technologies into one of the largest and most important industries that we have in the US.
这是一个新兴的贷款起点为您提供贷款。它是一个工具集，可以让您比自己更好地发起贷款。而且公司既是面向消费者的公司，也是一个向美国最大、最重要的行业销售最先进技术的企业。
And so pulling those both off is no small thing. Also it became obvious this is not a do things wrong and apologize later move faster and break things type of industry.
所以完成这两件事情并不是易事。此外，很明显这并不是一个以后再道歉、先快速行动再打破规矩的行业。
So we began to engage with regulators really from the inception of the company to say, hey, we think what we're trying to do is going to be very good for the American consumer. It's actually going to be very good for lenders.
所以我们从公司成立之初开始与监管机构接触，告诉他们，嘿，我们认为我们所尝试做的事情将非常有益于美国消费者。实际上，这对放贷人也很有好处。
And so I think literally back in 2012 before we even got started, we marched up and met with a CFPB and kind of open book showed them what we're doing. And then you know, over time as we started to look to working with banks, took some of it similar approach with FDIC, the OCC, the Federal Reserve, et cetera.
所以，我想在2012年甚至开始之前，我们就向CFPB走去，开诚布公地展示了我们正在进行的工作。然后，随着时间的推移，当我们开始与银行合作时，采取了类似的方法与FDIC、OCC、联邦储备等机构合作。
And I think perhaps little nightively, you know, Silicon Valley company just saying, hey, here's what we're going to do. We're kind of open in the commoto to you. What do you think? But I think it's paid off and you know, it's never perfect.
我觉得也许有点像深夜想法，你知道，硅谷公司只是说，嘿，这是我们要做的事情。我们对你很开放。你觉得怎么样？但我认为这是值得的，你知道，它永远不是完美的。
I view it as an area that we will need to invest in along with our bank partners for a long time because it is cutting edge technology. There's a lot of suspicion about AI and what it could do and could it introduce bias? Is it explainable? All these myriad of issues. So we have needed to proactively work with regulators both directly in and with our bank and credit union partners because it's a whole new area of technology and you just can't expect the world to just embrace it overnight.
我认为，这是一个需要长期投资的领域，与我们的银行合作伙伴一起投资。因为它是最前沿的技术，人们对人工智能有很多怀疑，担心它会引入偏见，能否解释，还有许多其他问题。所以我们需要积极与监管机构合作，与我们的银行和信用合作社合作，因为这是一种全新的技术领域，不能指望整个世界一夜之间就接受它。
It's going to take a lot of proof points that this is a good thing. It's helpful to banks. One of the most important things is it's going to allow more banks to be competitive, right? That's our belief is you're going to have success of more banks, regional banks, community banks. And the largest of banks, despite the onslaught of technology and fintechs and everything else going on out there.
这需要很多证据来证明这是好事。这对银行有帮助。最重要的一点是它将使更多的银行有竞争力，对吧？我们相信你会看到更多银行的成功，地区性银行，社区银行。即使有各种技术和金融科技来袭击，甚至还有其他的事情在发生，最大的银行也会如此。
But you know, it's a journey and it's a journey will never be done with. But those are what I would say are the two big pillars that we had to sort of take on when we made this move, which one is having a product that works for banks gives them degrees of control they want. And number two, of course, is sort of a constant effort to work with regulators.
你知道，这是一段旅程，这是一段永远不会结束的旅程。但这就是我们在做出这个决定时要承担的两个重要支柱，一个是拥有一个对银行有用的产品，给他们想要的程度的控制。第二个当然是与监管机构不断努力合作的机会。
Yeah, it's a fascinating space to be in very different than the pure SaaS space. That's a little simpler. The challenges are, I don't know, they make strong companies I think in the end.
是呀，这是一个非常吸引人的领域，与纯SaaS领域非常不同。这更简单一些。挑战是，我不知道，我认为最终会产生强大的公司。
One of the other interesting decisions that upstart made that I think is very different than many fintechs in the space was to focus almost exclusively on a single product for what feels like an extraordinarily long period of time compared to many who are coming out there with I'm going to have all the products, lots of stuff and two or three years, why that focus on one product and then obviously auto lending is kind of phase two and there's more stuff coming down the pipe.
Upstart这个创业公司所做的另一个有趣的决定，我认为和很多金融科技公司截然不同的是，几乎专注于一个产品长时间地推广，而不像其他公司宣称的是“我会提供所有产品，大量东西，并在两三年内推出”。为什么要专注于一个产品呢？而很明显，汽车贷款是第二阶段，更多的产品仍然在不断推陈出新。
So I'm curious why the focus on keeping really, really focused on a singular product for that long and then what made this the moment to say, hey, it's time to go and really start putting a lot of bets in different areas.
所以，我很想知道为什么要专注于一个产品这么长时间，而现在又是什么原因让你们认为现在是时候开始在不同领域做很多投注了？
You know, a little bit I would say the DNA of the company and the founders, you know, a lot of Silicon Valley is extremely good at raising a lot of money. I mean, you have a lot of money, you become very good at spending a lot of money, usually means you hire a lot of people and a lot of people, you're just actually going to want to put a lot of products out there and it all sounds good and you're kind of hoping it works out sometimes it does.
你知道，我觉得公司和创始人的DNA有点影响。你知道，在硅谷，很擅长筹集大量资金。这就意味着你有很多钱，变得非常擅长花钱，通常会雇用很多人，而很多人就只是想发布很多产品，听起来很不错，但有时候只是希望它能有效果。
But I think we were a little more wanting to really prove we had something, we wanted the product to work for banks, for consumers, we wanted the unit economics to work and we just didn't really see a place to sort of replicate what we were doing until we really had the confidence of working and that took quite a few years and I think we will have, you know, we're hopeful that this will prove to be the right path in the long haul.
我认为我们更想真正证明我们有实力，我们希望我们的产品能在银行和消费者之间起作用，我们希望单元经济能够运作，但我们实际上没有看到任何地方可以复制我们的做法，直到我们真正有工作的信心，这需要花费了相当多的时间，我认为我们希望这将证明是正确的长期道路。
We're now moving pretty quickly into auto lending on the platform and to us for a variety of reasons that was a logical next step. But it took us years to get started and now we're finally really beginning to see progress on that front. So we will go broader, but we really felt the base had to be exceptionally strong. We're going to do more work to do auto, more work to do a small business product, more work to do a mortgage product. Eventually, they all require a lot of work, but the stronger the base is the more proven it is, the more confident you can feel with dealing with the differences between these products, which are not small.
我们现在正在平台上快速发展汽车贷款，出于多种原因，这是一个合理的下一步。但是我们花了多年时间才开始，现在我们终于真正开始在这方面取得进展。因此，我们将会更加广泛，但我们真的觉得基础必须异常强大。我们将会更多地投入汽车、小型企业和抵押产品的研发。最终，它们都需要大量的工作，但基础越强、越经得起考验，你就越能够自信地应对这些产品之间的差异，而这些差异并不小。
Yeah, I think it's, it was really, it's so interesting that you focus on really getting to positive unit economics, like a business that works before you expand because so often the startups they don't do that. And so often I think in Fintechs, they're focused on solving the business problems. The next product will just like it'll fix all of our unit and I'll just get fixed. And we just have two more things to put out the door. It's like the change man, right? We volume, we make it up in volume, but anyway, sometimes I can't make up losses with more losses.
是啊，我认为真的非常有趣，你关注实现积极的单元经济，先构建起一个可行的业务再进行扩展，因为很多初创公司没有这样做。在金融科技领域，我认为很多企业都专注于解决业务问题，下一个产品会修复所有单元问题，而我们只需要再推出两个东西就可以了。这就像是改变的过程，对不对？我们通过数量来弥补，但有时候再亏损中赔亏损是不可行的。
Exactly. So I think those are just, and those are really the key focus areas now for new products. Is it kind of auto, small business, mortgage? What do you find as a unifying thread for how you see upstart improving outcome?
所以，我认为这些领域非常重要，是新产品的关键焦点。它们包括汽车、小企业和抵押贷款等方面。你认为有哪些共同点可以让Upstart改善结果呢？
Or like adding value in those spaces? Because it's easy to go to a bunch of places and I think many institutions feel like their goal of having those products is to have them. So when they have a customer they have all the things a customer might want are available. And I feel like upstart's eat us is a little more like we're going to go into a space. If we think we can make it better in some meaningful way, if we can add value to the consumer, the bank, but improve the outcomes, how do you see the thread between those as far as like how the how you know upstart adds value to the ecosystem in those spaces?
或者就像在那些领域中增加价值一样？因为去很多地方很容易，我认为许多机构觉得他们拥有这些产品的目标就是拥有它们。所以当他们有了一个客户，客户可能想要的所有东西都可以得到。而我觉得upstart的eat us有点像我们将要进入一个领域。如果我们认为我们可以以某种有意义的方式使其变得更好，如果我们可以为消费者，银行增加价值，但改善结果，您如何看待这些之间的联系，比如您如何看待upstart在这些领域中增加生态系统的价值？
Yeah, I think that the sort of common thread is we look for inefficiencies in the existing market, existing products. And in ways that mean that consumers aren't being particularly well served and maybe banks aren't doing as well as they could in a category. If there's no inefficiency, then you're just going toe to toe and there's no margins and there's just no win in it. You know, you just kind of, it's just a fight, a zero sum fight for market share. And we're not necessarily interested in that. We're looking for fairly transformative opportunities to make the product way better from both parties construct.
是的，我认为共同点在于我们寻找现有市场、现有产品中的低效率。这意味着消费者得不到很好的服务，也许银行在某些方面做得并不尽如人意。如果没有低效率，那么你们只是在硬碰硬，没有利润，也没有什么胜利可言。你们只是在为市场份额而战，这是一个零和游戏。我们并不一定感兴趣。我们正在寻找相当具有变革性的机会，让产品从两方面构建更好。
And, you know, so auto, for example, clearly, I would also say we're trying to be increasingly meaningful both to the consumer and to our lending partners.
还有，你知道，像汽车这样的东西，我们试图变得越来越有意义，不仅对消费者，也对我们的借贷伙伴。我想说的是，我们正努力提高意义。
Meaning personal lending, you know, it's a fairly new product. We think it's incredibly useful. I like to call it the duct tape of credit. Consumers love it. Banks love it less, but they're warming up. But it's a useful product. But of course, it's not the centerpiece. It's hard to say everybody in the country needs a personal loan.
你知道吗，个人借贷是一个相当新的产品。我们认为它非常有用。我喜欢把它称为信用卡上的胶布。消费者喜欢它。银行不那么喜欢，但他们正在逐渐接受它。但是，它是一个有用的产品。当然，它不是中心。很难说每个人都需要个人贷款。
But most people do need auto loans. Most people eventually, if they want to be homeowners, need mortgages, most small businesses need to tap credit. So we look for very large categories that really, in our view, underserved, not really great solutions or offerings from the borrower perspective or from the lender perspective.
但是大多数人确实需要汽车贷款。如果他们想成为房主，大多数人最终需要抵押贷款，大多数小企业需要获得信用。因此，我们寻找非常大的类别，我们认为这些类别对于借款人和借款方来说并没有很好的解决方案或提供的选择，因此它们是真正未满足的。
And you know, I guess it's a little Amazon like, I mean, Amazon always says like, your margins are opportunity. And it's inefficiency, right, where there's just a room where better models, more sophisticated, a elimination of friction can lead to better outcomes for all parties involved. And that's what I think is the real opportunity.
你知道吗，我想这有点像亚马逊的做法，亚马逊总是说你的利润空间是机会。这其实是一种低效的做法，在这种情况下，更好的模式、更复杂的模型以及减少摩擦可以带来更好的结果，对于所有涉及方来说。这就是我认为的真正机会。
If we talk about auto lending, for example, you know, we're getting involved now we're in a business where there are consumers involved. There are lenders, banks and lenders involved. There are card dealerships involved. So you also have yet another party in this thing. But in our view, the market works so poorly today that there's a chance to build product that leads to better outcomes for all three of those parties simultaneously.
如果我们谈论汽车放贷的话，现在我们处于一个与消费者、银行贷款方和借款方都有关的业务当中。此外，还牵涉到了汽车经销商。因此，这件事情还有一个涉及方。但是在我们看来，今天市场的运作非常糟糕，所以有机会建立一个产品，同时可以实现这三方的更好结果。
And that's actually, in our view, ultimately what you want to achieve. You're not here to like put them out of business or them out of business. You hear to really do something that can be a win all around. And I think we have that opportunity. Yeah, that's the thing that I always come back to for the business is kind of that core insight that like many more Americans are credit worthy than we understand to be so. And if you can close that gap, then there's wins in that for everybody.
其实，我们认为你最终想要达成的目标就是这个。你不是要把他们挤出市场，也不是要让他们倒闭。你来这里是想做一些能让所有人都获利的事情。我认为我们有这个机会。对于这家公司，我经常回到的核心见解是许多更多的美国人是有信用价值的，而我们尚未意识到这一点。如果你能弥合这个差距，那么每个人都会获胜。
The consumer can win. The lender can make more money, lower losses. The dealer can serve more consumers. So that that core insight really has a lot of legs. Yeah one of the, you know, main message I really feel like we need to deliver better to the market is, you know, credit score, FICO was invented in 1989.
消费者能赢得好处。贷款人能够赚更多的钱，减少损失。经销商能够为更多的消费者提供服务。因此，这个核心见解确实有很多长处。是的，我觉得我们需要更好地向市场传递的主要信息之一是，信用评分，FICO是在1989年发明的。
And it clearly was a very novel notion, sort of a universal number you could look up, not for everybody, but for increasing fraction of Americans to have a basis by which you could decide if you could make a loan or not. And of course, before that, God only knows you had people sitting across the desk from each other asking questions and more problems than you can count in that process. So it was an advancement. But, frankly, if you look between 1989 or 90 and today, have we really made strides forward in terms of inclusiveness, in terms of access to credit on affordable terms?
显而易见，这是一个非常新的概念，一种可以查阅的通用数字，虽然并不适用于每个人，但越来越多的美国人可以借此决定是否可以获得贷款。当然，在那之前，只有上下坐在桌子前互相问问题，这个过程中有无数的问题。所以，这是一个进步。但是，坦率地说，如果你看看1989或90年至今的情况，我们在包容性和以可负担的条件获得信贷方面真的取得了进步吗？
I'm not really sure that we have. I don't think the world looks much different in terms of who can get a loan at what price. So we really feel this sort of use of technology, AI machine learning, applied to this very large segment, which is such a big part of our economy, is long overdue.
我不是真的确定我们已经拥有了。我不认为世界从谁能以什么价格获得贷款的角度看起来有太大的不同。因此，我们确实感到这种对技术、AI机器学习的运用非常迫切，而这种运用是针对我们经济中如此重要的一个非常大的部分。
I mean, it's wonderful cloud computing and AI have all sort of come to the forefront in the last decade. And it's unlocking this thing. But the real bright future we see is where the vast majority of people have access to affordable credit on reasonable terms in the blink of an eye, not through a elongated process or painful process, but when you need it.
我是说，在过去的十年中，云计算和人工智能的出现真是太好了。这都解锁了一些东西。但我们真正看到的光明未来是，绝大多数人可以随时随地以合理的条件获得负担得起的信用，而不需要经过漫长或痛苦的过程。当你需要时，它就会像眨眼那样变得可用。
Because as someone who grew up as a product of really high quality access to credit, I'm almost like a testament for when it works well. I grew up in a family with effectively no net worth. I was able to go to a great college and finance that. I went to a great grad school and finance that, moved to the west coast, bought my first car, bought my first home, found my way to Google, found my found it upstart.
因为我是由极高质量的信贷获得机会成长起来的人，所以我几乎成为了一个例证，证明信贷在运作得好时的优秀成果。我在一个事实上没有任何净值的家庭成长。我能够去一所伟大的大学，并为此提供资金。我去了一所伟大的研究生院，并为此提供资金，搬到了西海岸，买了我的第一辆车，买了我的第一栋房子，找到了我在谷歌的发现，创办了我的创业公司 Upstart。
And all along the way, if I did not have access to affordable credit, there's just none of it would have happened. So I'm sort of an example of when the system works well. And I'm very grateful for that. But there's just many, many millions of people who never would have had the chances I had. And that's what we're here to fix.
沿路上，如果我没有获得经济实惠的信贷，这一切都不可能发生。所以，我是一个很好的系统运作的例子。我非常感激这一点。但是还有许许多多的人，他们从来没有像我一样有机会。这就是我们在这里要解决的问题。
How do you think about it upstart as the company grows, keeping people's focus on that? I mean, I feel like all of financial services when I talk to people and banks and credit unions have an obvious kind of affinity to helping consumers, saying, hey, we want to watch the George Bailey.
作为公司不断发展，如何让人们始终保持关注？我是说，当我和人们谈论金融服务、银行和信用联盟时，它们都明显希望为消费者提供帮助，说，嘿，我们想要看到乔治·贝利（《生活多美好》中的主角）的那种类型。
It's a wonderful life. We're going out and using credit to enable. And then you read the stories. In other words, one about some of the credit card banks where for so many people in the institution, it becomes a game and they're like optimizing outstanding balances and like revolving credit because that's where the money comes from and you're turning knobs and you lose side of like what you're in it for and you kind of start making choices that aren't as good for the consumer because they're a little bit better for the business.
这是个美好的生活。我们会去外面并使用信用卡来付账单。然后你会读到一些关于银行信用卡的故事，对于很多人来说，这种机构成了一场游戏，他们会优化未偿还的余额以及循环信用，因为这些是赚钱的地方。你会开始调整各种控制，但你会失去原本的意义，开始为了企业的好处而做不利于消费者的选择。
How do you think about driving the organization as it grows and grows very rapidly to maintain that focus on kind of the true north being? How do we help people have more access to credit and not turn the knob to optimize gross profit margin or something like that?
你认为随着组织的快速发展，如何将焦点保持在正确的方向上呢？我们如何帮助人们更容易获得信用，而不是调整比例以达到最大利润？
Yeah, I mean, let's say first of all, you have to start with alignment, meaning what you hope is success of your business, growth of your business is well aligned with this mission you theoretically are pursuing. If there's misalignment there, it's really hard.
嗯，我的意思是，首先，你必须从定位开始，也就是说，你希望你的业务成功和业务增长都与你理论上追求的使命相一致。如果存在不一致，那就真的很难。
So just take, I mean, I don't want to pick on any particular social media companies, but if a social media company's goal is to keep you using the product as much as you can, ultimately, you have misalignment between what the consumer wants and what you need as a business and that misalignment is really hard to address because I don't think any of us believe being on our phones all day long is a good thing.
那就是说，如果一个社交媒体公司的目标是尽可能让你使用他们的产品，我并不想挑选任何特定的社交媒体公司，但是最终，消费者所想要的和企业所需要的不一致，这种不一致真的很难解决，因为我不认为我们任何人都认为整天用手机是一件好事。
I'm not frankly sure if the metaverse in immersing ourselves further in a fake world instead of the real one is a good thing. But from our point of view, I think we have really good alignment when we grow, when we enter new categories, when we bring more banks and lending partners on board, when we serve more consumers, it's generally because we're giving them better than they had available elsewhere.
我不太确定投入更多的精力到虚拟的“元宇宙”中，而非真实世界中，是不是一件好事。但从我们的角度来看，我认为当我们增长、进入新的领域、吸引更多的银行和贷款合作伙伴，为更多的消费者服务时，这通常是因为我们正在提供更好的服务，超越其他可用的选择。
So that alignment is fun, it's really hard to change. I mean, if we didn't have it, we wouldn't have it. We fortunately do. So that's a good starting point. From there, I would say, being a mission-oriented company means not having to say your mission-oriented company, you should just feel it.
为了让对准更有趣，它真的很难改变。我的意思是，如果我们没有它，我们就没有它了。幸运的是，我们有它。所以这是一个很好的起点。从那里开始，我会说，成为一个以使命为导向的公司意味着不必说你是以使命为导向的公司，你应该感受到它。
And everything you do, everything you talk about naturally is about how do we improve the product for the consumer? How do we make it easier and better for lenders to serve the consumer? And it becomes obvious like why you're doing this. So at Google, Jonathan Rosenberg always said, repetition doesn't spoil the prayer. He didn't make that up, of course.
你所做的一切事情，谈论的一切自然而然都是关于如何为消费者改进产品的？我们如何使金融机构更轻松、更好地服务消费者？这一切都变得明显，就好像你为什么这么做。所以在谷歌，乔纳森·罗森伯格总是说，重复不会破坏祷告。当然，这句话不是他自己想出来的。
But as a leader in a company like this, you just have to day in, day out, keep reinforcing why we're doing what we're doing, challenging anything that seems to run in the face of it in the wrong direction.
但是，作为这样一家公司的领导者，你必须每天都不断强调我们为什么要做这件事情，并挑战任何似乎偏离了正确方向的事情。
And we kind of know our success is the world's success in a way that we feel inherently. So that alignment and then just that constantly reinforcement of where we're going and how we make decisions, how it drives what we do, sort of keeps you on the right path.
我们有点知道我们的成功在某种程度上是世界的成功，这种感觉是固有的。因此，这种一致性和不断地强调我们的方向和决策如何推动我们所做的事情，会让你始终坚持正确的道路。
Yeah, I think that's an interesting point that it's not about, mission's not about talking about the mission, mission's about how you ask questions in the product and the business and the day-to-day execution, and does it align with what you want or not? Ultimately, you could put the make every company's got these mission statements on the wall and you, it doesn't feel that way when I'm here.
是的，我认为这是一个有趣的观点，即使谈到使命，它不是关于谈论使命，而是关于如何在产品、业务和日常执行中提出问题，并且是否与你想要的一致。最终，你可以在墙上贴上每个公司都有的使命陈述，但当我在这里的时候，它并不是那样的感觉。
And that's a row of capturing things and words because they become roundable and repeatable. So I'm not against mission statements and not against value statements. We have those in those things.
这是一系列捕捉事物和单词的行，因为它们能够被圆滑地重复。所以我不反对任务声明和价值声明。我们在那些东西中有这些。
Yeah, but ultimately they don't certainly don't make the company, they don't make them more real than what is already real in the company. And I think we live it every day. We have three founders that have been here since day one and that really helps us stay true to the mission. Agreed.
是的，但最终他们确实不能决定公司的成败，不能让公司变得比现实中更真实。我认为，我们每天都在亲身体验这一点。我们有三位创始人从一开始就在这里，这确实帮助我们忠于我们的使命。同意。
And one last area I want to delve into is a clearly AI transforming the consumer finance, probably the business finance and lending space is something, you know, UC coming.
我想深入探讨的最后一个领域是人工智能明显地改变了消费金融，可能是企业金融和借贷领域，您知道，这是UC即将做到的事情。
What are the other interesting trends you see in Fintech or finance in general, with just kind of like the BNPL, the embedded payments? There's all sorts of like stuff going on, crypto. There are other areas you're going, hey, this is the thing I think is really got some legs. What do you focus on over the next couple of years?
你认为金融科技或是金融领域中还有哪些有意思的趋势，除了类似 "买后支付" 和嵌入式支付的呢？像加密货币等等，有各种各样的事情正在发生。你认为哪些领域有很大的发展潜力？在未来几年里，你会专注于哪些方面呢？
Yeah, I think, you know, I certainly am a student of crypto and I think it could be one of the most overwhelming changes that any of us will experience in our lives. It's paying more goes and it's a little unclear.
嗯，我觉得，你知道，我确实是一个加密学的学生，我认为它可能是我们生活中最令人震撼的变化之一。它是付出更多的价格，而且有点不清楚。
I mean, I think, you know, I love to watch what Square now called Block is doing because, you know, they're really building an incredible ecosystem, both of consumers, meeting they have a huge consumer presence, but also merchants.
我是说，我觉得你知道，我喜欢看 Square 现在所称的 Block 在做什么，因为他们真的正在构建一个令人难以置信的生态系统，既涉及到消费者，他们拥有庞大的消费者市场，也涉及到商家。
And so if there's anybody that was going to flip a bit and suddenly you're using Bitcoin to pay for something instead of a Visa, MasterCard rails, it would probably be, you know, Square or again, now called Block. But so I think that area of technology is, I mean, there's a lot of other things that are good and helpful, important that I think are just making business more efficient, making things easier for consumers.
如果有人突然决定使用比特币而不是 Visa 或 MasterCard 这样的支付方式，那么最有可能的就是 Square 或现在叫做 Block 的公司了。我认为这个技术领域有很多其他的好东西，它们能够帮助企业变得更有效率，也让消费者更加方便。
But when I think of something truly, potentially transformative, certainly it's sort of Web 3 and what could go on there. And it's certainly an area that we are going to be involved in over time. And I think at the right time, we want to make sure our partners have a foot in this as well because if it is that transformative, if you are a financial institution of any type, it's going to be a part of your future. And I think we can be an ally for our partners out there to make sure that they're on the right side of things. If and when, as crypto plays out, so to speak.
当我考虑到某些真正、具有潜力的变革时，肯定与 Web 3 有关，它可以在那里发挥作用。这肯定是我们未来要参与的领域。在合适的时候，我们希望确保我们的合作伙伴也涉足其中，因为如果它真的是如此变革性的话，如果您是任何类型的金融机构，它将成为您未来的一部分。我认为我们可以成为我们的合作伙伴的盟友，确保他们站在正确的一边。待加密货币等待成熟，我们就可以说所谓。
Yeah, I've certainly, I think students are good word. I don't feel like I'm an expert, but there's too much interesting stuff. And the amount of talent pouring into that space really seems to indicate that that doesn't typically happen unless there's something that's going to happen.
是的，我认为学生是很有才华的群体。虽然我不觉得自己是专家，但是这个领域有太多有趣的东西。而且涌入这个领域的人才数量似乎表明除非有什么即将发生的事情，否则通常不会发生这种情况。
Yeah, you may still be a little unclear on the value prop of crypto. And I certainly question it in certain areas, but as you say, yeah, when the technology, when the, when the talent sort of moves so quickly in one direction, it's almost inevitable. I mean, that something very big is going to come of that. There's not really a history of technical talent wholesale moving towards something so quickly where it didn't become, you know, enormous fairly soon. So I think it's inevitable. I think there'll be a lot of flame outs, of course. Not everything's going to work. Not every coin is going to work. And some of the propositions I find a little dubious, but I think there's going to be some very, very big transformative wins. And we certainly want to be a part of that. Absolutely.
是的，你可能还不太清楚加密货币的价值主张。我也确实对某些领域持怀疑态度，但正如你所说，当技术、人才急剧朝一个方向发展时，它几乎是不可避免的。实际上，还没有任何一个技术人才群体如此迅速地向某个方向集中，而没有变得相当巨大的历史。所以我认为这是不可避免的。当然，肯定会有很多失败的尝试。并不是所有事情都会成功，也不是每个硬币都会成功。我有时也觉得有些提议有点可疑，但我认为会有一些非常非常大的变革性赢家。我们肯定希望成为其中的一部分。绝对。
So, Dave, was there anything else? I got my kind of closing three questions that I asked everybody that I've got for you. Was there anything else you thought we should cover? Did I say this is more like a performance review when I asked this question about there, but I asked it to use a little bit of it. Like, was there anything else you felt like we ought to cover or topics you wanted to talk about that I didn't ask about?
那么，戴夫，还有其他什么需要提到的吗？我有三个收尾问题，每个人都会问，现在轮到你了。你有没有觉得有什么遗漏的呢？我之前问到的关于表现评估的问题，只是为了提出一个问题。你还有什么其他话题想要讨论，或者我没有提到的问题吗？
I guess maybe I would just ask back to you, Jeff. When did you know you made a good decision to come to Upstart? That's a hard question. I would just say, you know, there's the question of like, did you make a good financial decision? Like, was giving up some salary for equity? Was that a smile? It's a question like, did I think I'd made a good call and did I convince my mother-in-law I'd made a good call? The second one probably took a while longer.
我想我可能会跟你, Jeff，问回去。你是在什么时候知道你来Upstart是一个好决定的？这是一个难题。我只会说，你知道，有一个问题，就是你做了一个好的金融决策吗？比如，放弃一些薪水换取股份？这是一个微笑吗？这是一个问题，我认为我是否做出了一个正确的决定，我是否说服了我的岳母我做出了正确的决定？第二个问题可能需要更长的时间来回答。
But to me, the amount I learned coming in day one, and this is for anybody listening, like joining a startup, I was a what, fourth or fifth person in the door, depending on whether you get Amazon or I on the podcast to talk about it. I get the microphone, so I get it. But, you know, just the amount you learned and that experience is incredible. And I, I mean, I joined you at Google in 2006, so right at the beginning of the cloud wave, but it is a whole different thing. Google, the Google business card got you so many meetings that you couldn't have gotten. And it just kind of like, it's like playing the game on the easy level. And I think it's a hard game, but you're not on the hard level. And doing it on your own is a whole different level. And I, that learning was invaluable.
对我而言，我学到了很多东西，这适用于任何人，在第一天加入像创业公司这样的公司时。我是第四或第五个进入门的人，具体取决于你是否可以在播客中和亚马逊或我交谈。我拿到了话筒，所以我明白。但是，你知道的，你学到的东西和那种经验都是难以置信的。我是在2006年加入谷歌的，正值云浪潮的开始，但这是完全不同的事情。谷歌的商务名片可以让你得到许多你无法获得的会议。这就像在简单的级别上玩游戏一样。我认为这是一款很难的游戏，但你并没有处在困难的级别上。独自做这件事是完全不同的级别。我觉得那种学习无价。
So I knew I made a good choice from the very beginning, from that point of view. And then, you know, I think, I think one of the other points that you can talk to this is that you never, the success people see from the outside at any startup or new venture, it can look like, oh my God, you guys just killed it. And there were points along the way until very recently where you went, man, maybe, maybe we're not going to get there. It never feels nearly as certain from the inside as it looks from the outside.
所以我从一开始就知道我做了一个好选择，从这个角度来看。你知道，我认为，你可以谈论的另一个观点是，无论是在任何初创企业或新的冒险中，人们从外面看到的成功都可能看起来像是，“哦天啊，你们把它干翻了”。直到最近，一路上都有一些点让你说：“兄弟，也许我们达不到那个目标”。从内部来看，它从来没有像从外部看起来那样确定。
And so I think from that point of view, it's been a, it truly is a roller coaster. I think people who haven't been through the real company starting experience don't appreciate how on the edge it can feel for how long, even when the outside world is. I'm like, I just raised a ton of money. You're looking so successful going on. Man, I think even in the best years of the company, if you looked at them day by day, each day would look like a struggle. It would look like work. They only tend to look really nice in retrospect when you're past something and you see the aggregate of what you've achieved. And hopefully it's a good thing.
所以，我认为从那个角度来看，这真的是一次过山车之旅。我认为那些没有经历过真正公司创业经历的人不会意识到在外部环境看起来已经很成功的情况下，它可以有多么危险。我就像，“我刚刚筹了很多钱，你看起来很成功。”但即使在公司最好的年份中，如果你每天都看，每天都会感觉像是在奋斗，像是在努力工作。只有回忆过去，看到你所取得的成果总和，它们才会真正变得漂亮。希望这是一件好事。
But it's an experience I would never give up. It's not for everybody, for sure. And I think even if you're not going to be in a startup, not going to do a startup, there's things you can take away into your own job. And being a leader of innovation, being the person that's going to stick their neck out a little bit and push things forward.
但这是一种我绝不放弃的经历。当然，并不是适用于每个人。我认为即使你不想加入创业公司或从事创业，你也可以从中得到一些有用的东西并运用于自己的工作中。成为一位创新的领导者，敢于冒险并推动事物向前发展。
To me, it's always about that. It's just how do you make steps forward? How do you move a little beyond your comfort zone and say, I have this idea, this vision of where things are going for my company. And I'm going to really do something new and different to get there. And you don't have to do a startup. It's not, again, not for everybody. And so many of them don't work out. So it's not giving everybody should do that.
对我来说，它总是与这个有关。问题只是你如何向前迈进？你如何走出自己的舒适区，说出我有这个想法，我对公司的未来有这种看法。我将真正做出新的和不同的努力来实现这个愿景。并不需要开启一家初创企业。这并不是每个人都适合的。很多人都不能成功。所以并不是每个人都应该这样做。
But I think there's something almost anybody can learn from how startups work and what makes them special. Yeah. And I guess that when I get asked for my career advice and ask you for your soon, one of the things I always tell people is like, I've always looked for jobs where I felt a little bit like, I can't quite believe that I'm qualified for the thing and that you offered it to me. But I feel like maybe I could figure it out. And that's always felt like the place where you're to your point where you're learning, where you're going, hey, I'm, there's something here for me to learn and contribute to. But if it feels comfortable, it's probably not, maybe I could tell that. So right? Challenges like riding a horse.
我认为几乎任何人都能从创业公司的工作方式和特点中学到一些东西。是啊，当人们向我询问职业建议时，我通常会像向你请教一样，告诉他们一个观点，我一直在寻找一些让我感觉自己似乎不太符合要求却又被提供这份工作的工作，但我觉得也许我能够解决问题。这总是感觉到你正在学习的地方，正在前往的地方，嘿，这里有些东西可以让我学习和贡献。但如果感觉舒适，也许我可以这么说。那么，挑战就像骑马一样。
If you're comfortable while you're doing it, you're probably not doing it right. And last time I love Thomas. But like, I think that's always the way I viewed it. And Ubstard has been that in spades, right? From day one, you kind of went, I don't quite know how I'm doing or how I'm supposed to do it or what it's supposed to be. But like, I think with a little bit of hard work and a little bit of luck, we can figure it out and make it for point A to point B.
如果你在做某事时感到舒适，那么你可能做错了。上一次，我爱过托马斯。但是，我认为我一直是这么看待它的。而Ubstard正是如此，对吧？从一开始，你就说：“我不太清楚我在做什么，或者我应该如何做，或者这应该是什么样子。”但是，我认为只要有一点努力和一点运气，我们就可以弄清楚并从A点到B点。
So let me start on these kind of three closing questions for you. Number one, what's the most valuable leadership lesson you've learned during the course of starting and growing Ubstard? It's been, it's been quite the journey from, you know, your wife and kids in a t-shirt to say congrats for leaving Google and nobody's with you, but we are to, you know, go over 1,000, I think 1,500 people in the company now and an IPO.
那让我来开始这三个终止问题吧。第一个问题，你在创立和发展Ubstard的过程中学到的最有价值的领导力教训是什么？从你穿着T恤，只有你的妻子和孩子为你离开Google而祝贺的时候开始，到现在公司已经有超过1,000甚至1,500人，并且还要进行IPO，这已经是一段相当不同寻常的历程了。
But like, what's the most valuable kind of leadership lessons you've learned along that journey? You know, I think maybe the first starting point is kind of self-awareness of who you are, why you're in it, what you think you're good at and what you're not good at. So a real dose of self-awareness to start with because in building a company, you need first and foremost to surround yourself with people that make sense. I mean, you can share the mission with them, but hopefully they bring a lot of skills and capabilities that you don't have in your complimentary.
但是，你在这个旅程中学到的最有价值的领导力经验是什么呢？我认为，也许最重要的起点是自我意识——了解自己是谁，为什么加入企业，自认为擅长什么，不擅长什么。因为在建立企业时，首先需要与让你感到有意义的人合作。我是说，你可以与他们共享使命，但希望他们带来许多你没有的技能和能力。
And because ultimately, you know, we've been up and down and all around as you know, I mean, we usually could have failed and been out of business many years ago, but we, we saw our way through it. And then I think we got to this point several years in where even when the worst thing hit us in the face, we really didn't flinch. We had huge confidence that this team could work its way if you think. So you know, that self-awareness, I think, leads to having a team that if you do the right in terms of recruiting and you can get the right people in the boat leads to a strength of team.
因为最终，你知道的，我们经历了起起落落和各种挣扎，就像你知道的那样，我是说，我们通常很容易失败并在许多年前破产，但我们挺过了来。然后我想，在几年后，即使最糟糕的事情直接面对我们，我们也没有退缩。我们有巨大的信心，这个团队可以克服它。所以，你知道的，这种自我意识，我想，会导致有一个团队，如果你在招聘方面做得正确，并能让正确的人加入到团队中，就会导致一个强大的团队。
And ultimately, that's the key to success. It is the strength of the team itself. It's not choosing the right product or the right market. I mean, over time, you have to make good decisions and execute well. And the right team will help you do that more often than not. But if that team, a core team that I think is ultimately the predictor of your success, I mean, I can happily say, as you know, so much of our leadership team has been together, either from the very beginning or for many years, we have very little turnover. And it just kind of means when the next crazy thing in the road happens, like COVID, for example, you know, you're just in a place where you can navigate and execute, do things well, feel comfortable that this team is going to navigate these, these turbulent waters, whatever they might be. And if you can just get yourself to that position, everything feels much better.
最终，这就是成功的关键。团队本身的力量是关键所在，而不是选择正确的产品或市场。当然，随着时间的推移，你必须做出正确的决策并执行得好。而正确的团队通常会帮助你做到这一点。但如果这支团队——我认为最终是你成功的预测因素——能够稳定，我很高兴地告诉你，我们的领导团队中有很多人要么从一开始就在一起，要么已经在一起很多年了，我们的人员流动率非常低。这意味着当道路上出现下一个疯狂的事情，比如COVID，你就会处于一个可以导航和执行，使事情做得好并感到舒适的位置，你就可以相信这支团队将航行过这些动荡的水域，无论它们是什么样子的。如果你能让自己达到这个位置，一切都会感觉更好。
I almost feel like it inverts it a little bit. The challenge becomes the opportunity to go, hey, if it's hard for us, just imagine everybody else who doesn't have this group of people in the room to tackle it, like you kind of, I feel like at least for that team, we almost like it and go, I know it's going to suck, but it's probably good for us competitively because we feel like we can weather that storm better than most and we'll make better decisions because of the quality of people.
我差不多觉得它有点相反。挑战就变成了机会，可以去想，如果这对我们很难，就想象其他人没有这个团队来解决这个问题，像你们一样。我感觉至少对于这个团队来说，我们差不多喜欢它，会说，我知道那会很难，但这对我们来说可能竞争上更有利，因为我们觉得我们可以比大多数人更好地经受住风暴，并且由于人员的质量而做出更好的决策。
All right, that's what would be interesting. I usually ask bankers, like, what's the best piece of consumer banking or consumer lending advice you get in there? They're often come back to me 20 years ago when I was going through training and you've come into the space a little more recently in your career than all the way back to what's the best advice you've gotten about entering the consumer lending or the consumer banking space?
好的，那会很有趣。我通常会问银行家，比如说，你在那个领域获得的最好的消费银行或消费信贷建议是什么？他们通常会回答我20年前当我正在接受培训的时候，你的职业生涯可能比那时候稍微晚一些，那么你获得的最佳进入消费信贷或消费银行领域的建议是什么？
I think, you know, ultimately it was the advice early on from some legal folks we knew, even before Alicina joined, to say like, you should meet the regulators. You should take that path because it was sort of a, there's many people who look at value who I think would have said, you know, run under the radar as long as you can and then eventually you'll talk to them. But we sort of took the counter advice to go and really be, as I said, open Camano early on, perhaps naively in certain ways, but I think the trusted and gendered over time, not purely.
我想说的是，早在Alicina加入之前，我们就认识到一些法律人士的建议。他们建议我们与监管机构见面。他们认为，这是一条正确的道路，因为有很多人在考虑价值时，可能会选择尽可能低调地运作一段时间，然后再与监管机构商谈。但我们采取了相反的建议，尽早采取开放的姿态，也许在某些方面有些天真，但我认为这种行为久而久之建立了信任，而信任并非单纯。
I mean, they're still plenty that don't know us. We, it's a very wide array of regulators and attorney generals and lawmakers and advocacy groups. We can't win them all over once, but I think having that, like, we have nothing to hide attitude. We will share what we're doing with anybody. We're proud of it. We're dedicating our careers to, you know, improving access to credit for people. So, so I think when you have that, you know, go back to it is, is, is yeah, if you're confident and proud of what you're doing in the case of what we're doing, we're closely with the regulators because they matter a lot.
我的意思是，还有很多人不了解我们。我们包括了广泛的监管机构、检察官、立法者和倡导组织。我们不能一次赢得所有人的支持，但我认为有一种“我们没有什么可隐瞒”的态度很好。我们会与任何人分享我们正在做的事情。我们为此感到自豪，并致力于改善人们的信用准入。因此，当你拥有这种态度时，你会变得自信并为自己的所做所为感到骄傲。在我们的情况下，我们与监管机构密切合作，因为他们非常重要。
I was, I was certainly fascinating advice and I certainly was given the counter advice often, like, what do you crazy people do on talking to regulators? And I think it's paid off in spades.
我曾经得到了一些非常有趣的建议，而且我也经常得到相反的建议，比如，“你们这些疯子跟监管机构说话会干什么？”但我认为它产生了很大的回报。
All right, last question for you, Dave. What's one bold prediction about the future? So I mean, I guess usually I got to bring a guest back on to see if they were right or right. Yeah, I get to see you more frequently. So we'll get a check in on this one more. No, no, no, no sort of context for that. Just a bold prediction about why I had another Brady super bowl, which I guess whoever said that is because losing their bet because that's not happening now. But you know, any, any, you can keep it in the banking space. You can put it in the metaverse wherever you want.
好的，最后一个问题，戴夫。你对未来有什么大胆的预测吗？我想，通常我得再请嘉宾回来看看他们是否正确。是啊，我会经常看到你的。所以我们会再来检查一下这个问题。没有任何背景，只是对于为什么我还有另一个布雷迪超级碗的大胆预测，我想猜测是因为那个人已经输了他们的赌注，因为这不会发生了。但你知道的，你可以把它放在银行空间，你可以把它放在元宇宙里，随便你怎么想。
Yeah, I think we're going to start to see a lot of new banks being formed. I mean, I think the grounds, you know, we went many decades without really bank formation almost at all. And suddenly we're seeing some, some fintech pushing through and there's some charter, OCC Charters and myelcy stuff happening. And I think that can only, you know, go in the direction of more. And if there's, if there's people that come together to create these, these businesses and pursue charters, I just don't see how I think it's good.
嗯，我认为我们会开始看到许多新银行的出现。我的意思是，你知道，几十年来我们几乎没有看到银行的形成。突然间，一些金融科技正在推进，出现了一些OCC牌照和其他类似的事情。我认为这只会让情况向更好的方向发展。如果有人联合起来创建这些企业并追求许可证，我觉得这是很有益的。
By the way, I mean, I think naturally any, any market should be able to have new competitors and incumbents and it's been emerging a banks going on for a long time. But I think we're going to start to see some real new competitors in the industry. And I think in a helpful way, in a way that's going to be good for the industry overall. It's really going to change things and drive change. But so I think we'll see a lot more vibrant industry looking forward than I think we've probably seen in recent times. More partners for Upstar. Let's hope. Let's hope.
顺便说一句，我的意思是，我认为任何市场在自然情况下应该能够拥有新的竞争对手和现有者，而银行市场已经这样发展了很长一段时间。但是我认为我们将开始看到一些真正的新竞争对手进入这个行业。而且我认为这是有益的，对整个行业来说是好事。这真的会改变事情并推动变革。但是我认为我们将会看到一个更加充满活力的行业，比我们近期看到的要多得多。更多的合作伙伴为Upstar。让我们希望吧。让我们希望吧。
All right, Dave, I appreciate you making the time. This was a great conversation and it's really great to have you. Thanks, Jeff. Great to be here.
好的，大卫，我很感激你能抽出时间来。这真是一次很棒的交谈，能跟你聊天很棒。谢谢，杰夫。很高兴能来这里。
Upstar partners with banks and credit unions to help grow their consumer loan portfolios and deliver a modern, all digital lending experience. As the average consumer becomes more digitally savvy, it only makes sense that their bank does too. Upstar's AI lending platform uses sophisticated machine learning models to more accurately identify risk and approve more applicants than traditional credit models, with fraud rates mere zero.
Upstar与银行和信用联盟合作，帮助增加其消费贷款组合并提供现代化、全数字化的借贷体验。随着普通消费者变得更加数字化，他们的银行也应该跟上步伐。Upstar的AI借贷平台使用先进的机器学习模型，以比传统信用模型更准确地识别风险并批准更多申请人，欺诈率仅为零。
Upstar's all digital experience reduces manual processing for banks and offers a simple and convenient experience for consumers. Whether you're looking to grow and enhance your existing personal and auto lending programs, or you're just getting started, Upstar can help. Upstar offers an end-to-end solution that can help you find more credit-worthy borrowers within your risk profile, with all digital underwriting, onboarding, loan closing, and servicing. It's all possible with Upstar in your corner.
Upstar 的全数字体验可以减少银行手动处理的繁琐工作，为消费者提供简单便捷的体验。无论您是想扩大和增强现有的个人和汽车贷款计划，还是刚刚开始，Upstar都可以为您提供帮助。Upstar 提供了一种端到端的解决方案，可以帮助您在风险档案中找到更多值得信贷的借款人，包括全数字化的承保、入职、放贷和服务。在Upstar 的支持下，一切皆有可能。
Learn more about finding new borrowers, enhancing your credit-decisioning process, and growing your business by visiting Upstar.com slash 4-Banks. Use the listening to leaders in lending from Upstar. Make sure you never miss an episode. Subscribe to leaders in lending in your favorite podcast player. Using Apple Podcasts, leave us a quick rating by capping the number of stars you think the show deserves. Thanks for listening. Until next time.
请到Upstar.com/4-Banks了解更多关于如何寻找新的借款人、改进信用决策过程和扩大业务的信息。倾听Upstar的金融行业领袖的建议，确保您不会错过任何一集，请在您最喜欢的播客播放器中订阅Leaders in Lending。如果您使用苹果播客，请留下您认为这个节目应该获得的星级评分。谢谢您的倾听。下次再见。