How AI May Fix the Broken Credit System | Car Dealership Guy Podcast

If there's a reason why it's 24 hours, it's an endurance race. You have three drivers, they trade off eight hours a piece. And the whole point is like, can you get this incredible machine to actually run at peak performance for 24 straight hours? That's why it's such a challenge.

如果有一个原因让比赛持续24小时，那就是一场耐力赛。你有三名司机，他们每人轮流驾驶八个小时。整个意义就在于，你能不能让这台不可思议的机器连续24小时保持最佳性能状态？这就是为什么这样的比赛如此具有挑战性。

Are 40% of Americans really overpaying for their car loans? That might just be the case. Today I'm speaking with Alex Rouse, VP, GM Auto at Upstart, an AI-powered lending platform for auto loans. We discuss whether the US credit system is broken for car buyers, CEO secrets learned from Jeff Bezos, blowing an engine at 24 hours of lemons, and much more. Don't forget to click Subscribe so you never miss an episode.

美国人的40%是否真的在为他们的汽车贷款付出过多的费用？这可能确实是事实。今天我和Upstart汽车贷款的副总裁Alex Rouse进行了对话，Upstart是一个使用人工智能的汽车贷款平台。我们讨论了美国的信用体系是否对汽车买家有问题，从Jeff Bezos学到的CEO秘诀，24小时柠檬赛中引擎爆裂的经历，还有更多内容。别忘了点击订阅，这样您就不会错过任何一集。

What's up, everyone? This is Card dealership Guy. You're listening to the Card dealership Guy podcast, which is my effort to give you access to the most transparent insights into the car market. But before we get into the show, this episode was brought to you by the Auto Hauler Exchange. Auto Hauler Exchange is changing how people who send and carry cars work together. Now, if you need to send a car, you can directly work with carriers all over the country. And if you carry cars, you don't have to look through broker's list to find good, fair jobs anymore. By eliminating the middleman, all shipments on the Auto Hauler Exchange come directly from the owner of the vehicle being shipped, with carriers receiving real shipment opportunities at direct pricing.

大家好，我是汽车经销店的小伙子。你正在收听的是我的汽车经销店小伙子播客，我努力为您提供对车市最透明的见解。但在进入节目之前，本集由Auto Hauler Exchange赞助。Auto Hauler Exchange正在改变发送和运输汽车的人们如何合作。现在，如果您需要发送一辆车，您可以直接与全国各地的承运商合作。如果您运输车辆，您不必再查看经纪人的清单来找到好的、公平的工作。通过消除中间商，Auto Hauler Exchange上的所有货物都直接来自被运输的车辆的所有者，承运商以直接价格获得真正的运输机会。

Auto Hauler Exchange helps shippers and carriers work together easily and clearly adding transparency and making better partnerships. Get off the Auto Hauling Roller Coaster by getting on the Auto Hauler Exchange. To learn more, visit autohaulerexchange.com or click the link in the show notes below. Lastly, this episode is also brought to you by Upstart. I'd like to thank Upstart for coming on as a guest and also supporting this podcast.

Auto Hauler Exchange帮助承运商和承运商轻松明确地合作，增加透明度，建立更好的合作关系。通过加入Auto Hauler Exchange，摆脱汽车运输的过山车。要了解更多信息，请访问autohaulerexchange.com或点击下方节目说明中的链接。最后，本集节目还由Upstart赞助。感谢Upstart作为嘉宾出现，也支持这个播客。

Alex Rouse on the CDG podcast. Alex, welcome. Thank you. Very excited to be here. I'm excited to have you on. Hey, I got to ask you, was looking through your LinkedIn before this. What's this with your involvement in the Le Mans race in France? I hope I'm even pronouncing that correctly. Tell us a little about your background and being involved in racing, which I didn't expect from someone involved in tech early in their career. So that was a surprise for me.

Alex Rouse在CDG播客中。 Alex，欢迎。 谢谢。 非常高兴能在这里。我很高兴你来。嘿，我得问问你，在这之前我看了你的领英。 你参与法国勒芒赛车是怎么回事？希望我的发音是正确的。告诉我们一些关于你的背景和参与赛车的经历，我没有想到你在职业早期会有这方面的涉足，这让我很意外。

Yes, I've always had two passions in my life, the technology and then cars. So I grew up, my house is one where I was always working in the garage, with my dad and my brothers working on some kind of car. So I've always been a car guy. When I was in college, I was actually trying to get some work done on my car. So I was just calling up shops to get work done. And I happened to call a shop that was in American Le Mans series team, which I didn't even know they were. It turned out that they need help. I have a twin brother. And so we couldn't have been more eager to help them. And so the very next day, we left for Lime Rock Raceway in Connecticut. And so that's what kicked off that season with that team. And the season ended with us getting opportunity to go race in the 24 hours of Le Mans, this incredibly historic race in France. And it was just such an incredible opportunity.

是的，我一直都有两个热情，科技和汽车。所以我长大后，我的家里总是忙着在车库里修车，和我爸爸以及哥哥们一起。我一直都是个汽车迷。上大学时，我实际上是想在我的车上做些维修工作。所以我给修车店打电话，想找人帮忙。碰巧我打给了一个参加美国勒芒系列赛的车队，我甚至不知道他们是谁。结果他们需要帮助。我有一个双胞胎兄弟。所以我们非常乐意帮助他们。第二天，我们就前往康涅狄格州的莱姆罗克赛道。那就是与那个车队一起展开新赛季的开始。赛季结束时，我们得到了一个机会，参加法国勒芒24小时耐力赛，这是一个极具历史意义的比赛。那是一个非常难得的机会。

I can remember being there and walking through walking down the raceway and the finish line. And there's these massive grandstands on either side. And your Corvette race team is there. Aston Martin, the team is there. Audi and Porsche, they're all there. And just, it was like pinching myself. Like I couldn't believe that I was there. It's a difficult race. There's a reason why it's 24 hours. It's an endurance race. What does that mean? Yeah.

我可以记得当时的情景，穿过赛道，沿着赛道走，走到终点线。两侧是巨大的看台，雪佛兰赛车队在那里，阿斯顿·马丁车队也在那里。奥迪和保时捷，他们全都在那里。就像捏自己一样，我简直不敢相信我在那里。这是一场艰难的比赛。这是为什么它要持续24小时的原因。这是一场耐力赛。那意味着什么？是的。

For anyone listening, right? What does that even mean? Like 24 hours. How does that work? Well, it's like you have three drivers. They trade off eight hours apiece. And the whole point is like, can you get this incredible machine to actually run at peak performance for 24 straight hours? So that's why it's such a challenge. And so, and we were in what's called a prototype race. That's sort of the car that looked kind of like F1 cars. That was the type of car that we had. And we would go back and forth in the lead in our class.

对于任何倾听者来说，对吧？这到底意味着什么？像24小时这样长时间。这是怎么运作的呢？嗯，就好像你有三名司机。他们每人轮流驾驶八个小时。整个重点在于，你能否让这台令人惊叹的机器连续 24 小时以最佳状态运行？这就是为什么这么具有挑战性。我们参加的是所谓的原型赛。那种车看起来有点像 F1 赛车。这就是我们的赛车类型。在我们的组别中，我们会不断领先，来回争夺领先位置。

And in our 17, our engine failed. And so, I think we broke a valve or something. And so, our car was out. Even though we were at the lead at the time, we were doing so good. Oh my gosh. And so, yeah, it's common. Like, that's sort of a normal thing to happen in these races. But I didn't care, honestly. It was like, I got the opportunity to do that. Be a part of this historic race. It was discouraging, but still an awesome experience. And couldn't believe I was there.

在我们17号车比赛时，我们的引擎出了问题。我想是我们打破了一个阀门或者什么东西。所以，我们的车就出局了。尽管那时我们处于领先位置，表现得非常出色。天哪。但是，这种情况很常见。在这些比赛中发生这种事情是很正常的。但是，老实说，我并不在意。我很高兴有机会参加这场历史悠久的比赛。虽然令人沮丧，但这依然是一个很棒的经历。我简直无法相信我能在那里。

Well, look, I like to tell you, I've never driven a car for 17 hours. But I think at some point, some people left a car turned on at the last 24 hours. So that's the closest I've been to having a car on for that long. I'm sure someone listening to this can think of that one lot attendant at the dealership, like 10 years ago, they left a car running overnight. It's happened. I have to admit. So not proud of it. But that was definitely my most memorable 17 plus hour experience of a car running. So that's hilarious.

嗯，看，我想告诉你，我从来没有连续开车17个小时。但我想在某个时候，有些人把车开着，持续了24个小时。所以那是我离开过车子开了那么久的最接近的经历。我相信听到这个的某些人会想起那个曾经在经销商那里工作的停车服务员，大约10年前，他把车子开了一整夜。这种事情确实发生过。我不得不承认。所以并不骄傲。但那绝对是我最难忘的超过17小时的车子持续开动的经历。所以这真是太好笑了。

Well, I love to hear it. Dude, you've had a very interesting career leading you up to Upstart where you are today. And you're working on lots of innovation with just automotive lending. I built an online auto retailer, which many people listening already know this. One of the biggest pain points was lending. I would say lending and titling probably. Even more so than the physical world stuff. Just lending at scale, especially indirect lending at the dealership when you're not the lender yourself or by your payer, it gets really complicated. And more than just complicated, I think, again, lots of people could probably resonate with this, but it's really tough to create a good customer experience because there's so many touch points in the process. It's just not smooth. Right? So we're going to dig into that. I want to get your take on how we can fix that, where we are and where we're headed.

哇，我喜欢听到这个。伙计，你之前的职业经历非常有趣，最终让你来到了现在的 Upstart。而且你现在正在做很多创新工作，特别是在汽车贷款方面。我曾经建立过一个在线汽车零售商，很多人听过这个。其中最大的痛点可能是贷款。我想说贷款和所有权转让可能更难一些，甚至比现实世界的事情更加困难。特别是规模化的贷款，尤其是在经销商进行间接贷款时，当你不是贷款方自己或者支付者时，情况会变得非常复杂。不仅仅是复杂，我认为很多人都能 resonant 这一点，但是创造良好的客户体验真的很困难，因为在整个流程中有太多的接触点。这一过程并不顺利，对吧？所以我们将深入探讨这个问题。我想听听你对我们如何解决这个问题的看法，以及我们目前的状况和未来的发展方向。

Before we even get there, you had Stinson Amazon. You co-founded a company. You've done some stuff. So give us a run out. Tell us a little bit more about yourself from your time co-founding company and Amazon and Adam Tickits, I saw. Just give us the high level overview. Sure. Yeah. So after I went to business school, wanted to get into technology, and from there went to Amazon. And so, is it Amazon for about five years? It's an incredible place to get your start. I think of it as a five year long bootcamp. It's a really intense place to work, but the training that you receive there is just incredible. And so, the area that I worked on was Amazon digital devices. So Kindle Fire, Fire TV, and Firephone. And so, that was really the tip of the spear for the company at that time. It was, Amazon really felt like that consumers were creating their relationships with consumer tech companies, and it was now or never. So the whole company was sort of pivoted to invest in these devices. And so, because of that, I got the opportunity to work with Jeff. And that was an incredible experience. So, I can remember we would have reviews with him where we would be actually be like walking through the customer experience for these devices, buying apps or whatever it was. And this guy's over like this massive company, and he's taking the time to get into the actual customer experience. And he's giving us feedback on any click, any page that was confusing. And so, I just remember being blown away that he would go into that level of depth on the things that he cared about. And so, yeah, it was an incredible experience. I love that, because it's, again, that level of attention to detail is how you just build great products. And it's like, you're right. At that scale of a company, that's pretty remarkable that he gets down to that level of detail within one org when you have this conglomerate. And I listened to your podcast with Jay, who was talking about Elon. It's a very similar thing there. Steve Jobs, very similar thing. RCO Dave, he's down listening to calls from our borrowers.

在我们谈论之前，你曾在斯汀森亚马逊工作过。你是一家公司的联合创始人。你做过一些事情。那么，简单介绍一下你的工作经历吧。告诉我们关于你从联合创始公司到亚马逊再到 Adam Tickits 的经历。简要介绍一下你的经历。好的。是的。我是在商学院毕业后想进入科技行业，然后去了亚马逊。在亚马逊工作了大约五年。那是一个非常棒的地方开始工作。我认为那像是一个长达五年的训练营。工作强度很大，但在那里接受的培训是非常出色的。我在亚马逊的工作领域是数字设备。比如 Kindle Fire、Fire TV 和 Firephone。那时，这些设备是公司的重点产品。亚马逊真的觉得消费者正在和消费科技公司建立关系，这是当时现在或永远的问题。整个公司都在转向投资这些设备。正因为如此，我有机会和杰夫合作。那是一个令人难忘的经历。我记得我们经常和他进行评审，一起深入了解这些设备的客户体验，购买应用程序或其他内容。这个人管理着一个庞大的公司，却花时间深入了解实际客户体验。他一一给我们各种反馈，包括哪些点击、哪个页面让人困惑。我记得当时对他如此注重细节感到惊讶。我喜欢那种对细节的关注，因为这就是如何打造出色的产品。在你有这样一个庞大的公司规模时，他能如此深入到一个部门的细节层面，这是相当了不起的。我听了你和 Jay 的播客，他提到了埃隆。那里有一个非常相似的情况。史蒂夫·乔布斯，也是类似的情况。RCO 大卫，他在听借款人的来电。

So, yeah, I think it's those founder CEO types, they get right into the weeds, and they're given really, really good feedback for what they think is most important. Yeah. What about your time in the startup world? What was that about? Yeah. So, building products at Amazon, have built products that were used by millions of people, generated hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. But it's, what's the saying, rising tide lets all boats. If you're building products at Amazon, products probably going to be successful. And so, you've just got this massive tailwind that is the Amazon platform.

所以嗯，我认为那些创始人兼首席执行官类型的人，他们会深入细节，并且会得到非常好的反馈，他们认为最重要的事情。是的。那么，你在创业世界的那段时间怎么样？是啊。在亚马逊建立产品，已经建立了被数百万人使用的产品，创造了数亿美元的收入。但是，俗话说得好，涨潮能让所有的船都上去。如果你在亚马逊建立产品，那么产品很可能会成功。因此，你有着亚马逊平台这个巨大的顺风。

And so, really wanted a chance to try that on my own without sort of tailwind from Amazon. And so, left with a handful of guys I worked with at Amazon, then we started a company in the entertainment space. And the goal of that company was really, so it's movie ticketing. And we really wanted to create the sort of two opportunities we're going after. We wanted to create a more social, more mobile movie going experience. And then, we thought there was a large opportunity to improve the way movies tickets are priced.

因此，我真的很想有机会自己尝试一下，而不是倚靠亚马逊的支持。于是，我和几个在亚马逊工作的伙伴一起离开，然后我们在娱乐领域开始了一家公司。该公司的目标实际上是电影票务。我们真的想创造两个机会。我们想要创造一个更社交、更移动的电影体验。然后，我们认为有很大的机会来改善电影票的定价方式。

So, like, movies take it, movies have all of this empty inventory that doesn't get sold. And yet, they're still priced in kind of a one size fits all kind of way. And so, there's all these other industries, hotels and airlines, etc. where there's there's yield management, dynamic pricing kind of thing. And so, we thought that would be, that's a huge opportunity. And so, we did that, raised a bunch of money, ended up, we couldn't get movie theaters and studios to cooperate in order to get that dynamic pricing part. We never, we got really, really close, but we can never get them to sort of get over the hump.

所以，电影就拿来说吧，电影有很多无法销售的空置库存。然而，它们的定价方式仍然是一种适用于所有的方式。所以，还有很多其他行业，如酒店和航空公司等，有收益管理、动态定价等方式。所以，我们认为这是一个巨大的机会。于是，我们做了这件事，筹集了一大笔资金，最终，我们无法让电影院和制片厂合作，以实现动态定价的部分。我们几乎做到了，但我们无法让他们跨过这个障碍。

We did build a great product. We build a product that I think is better than like Fandango would be the competition there. So, you can download it, give it a try. But it's, it's, you know, what the lesson there is really like, it has to be, it can't just be a better product. It has to be a way better product to get people fromwhatever it is that they're doing today to your new thing. And so, yeah, no, you start, I don't know if that resonates for you in sort of your time. Well, you know, we've been using this line and I really like this one, right?

我们确实创建了一个很棒的产品。我认为我们所创建的产品比竞争对手（比如Fandango）更好。所以，你可以下载它，试一试。但要知道的是，教训是，产品不能仅仅比竞争对手好，它必须是一个远远更好的产品，才能吸引人们从现有的产品转向你的新产品。所以，你知道的，我不知道这是否符合你目前的处境。嗯，你知道，我们一直在用这个方法，而且我真的很喜欢。

So, ready for this one? Painkillers, not vitamins. Totally. Like we've been, we've been using this line a lot because as we think about things, and we think about content, we think about, we launched, you know, I talked about all time, now my industry job board, which is free to the industry, but like, everything we're doing is like, okay, is this a painkiller or is this a vitamin? Right. And again, I've thought about, I thought I've used this framework even as a dealer, right? When introducing a new marketing promotion or something, but like, are we really doing something that people give a shit about? Or is this just like, okay, you know, maybe, are we really offering an incentive to bring someone to come in now to buy a car or whatever? Or is it again?

准备好了吗？止痛药，而不是维生素。完全是如此。我们经常使用这句话，因为在我们考虑事情和内容时，我们会想到，我们推出了，你知道的，我一直在谈论的我的行业招聘网站，这对行业是免费的，但是，我们所做的一切都像是，好吧，这是止痛药还是维生素？对的。再次，即使作为一个经销商，我也考虑过，我甚至在介绍新的营销促销或其他事情时使用过这个框架，但我们真的在做一些人们在乎的事情吗？或者这只是，好吧，也许，我们真的在提供一些激励措施来吸引某人现在过来购买汽车或其他什么东西吗？或者又是另一回事？

So, I think that painkillers versus vitamins, like it's a saying that we've really adopted and we think about it all the time. I think that's totally right on 100%. This episode is brought to you by my very own car dealership guy, industry job board. CDGjobs.com, my industry job board connecting the best talent and automotive with the best companies will remain absolutely free for CDG listeners to post and fill available roles at their companies. This free job board is for anyone in automotive vendors, dealers, lenders, manufacturers, auto tech, everyone.

因此，我认为止痛药与维生素之间的区别，就像一句我们真的深有体会并且经常思考的格言。我认为这完全是百分百正确的。本集节目由我的个人汽车经销商的行业职业板网站赞助。CDGjobs.com，我的行业职业板连接最优秀的汽车人才与最优秀的公司，将继续为CDG听众提供免费发布和填补公司可用职位的机会。这个免费的职位委员会是为汽车供应商、经销商、贷款机构、制造商、汽车技术等所有人而设的。

Already over 100 companies have posted open positions, including lithium motors, recurrent credit acceptance, Vero's credit, cars, commerce, shift digital, plug, full path, Westlake trade pending, you get the point. The best part is that when these companies hire through CDGjobs.com, they are hiring the most informed candidates in the marketplace. So, don't hesitate. You can add your open roles today by visiting CDGjobs.com or clicking the link in the show notes below. That's CDGjobs.com.

已经有100多家公司发布了空缺职位，包括锂电机、经常性信贷接受、Vero贷款、汽车、商务、数字化换班、插头、全路径、Westlake等待交易，你明白我的意思了。最棒的是，当这些公司通过CDGjobs.com招聘时，他们在市场上招聘的是最了解行情的候选人。所以，不要犹豫。您可以通过访问CDGjobs.com或点击下面展示说明中的链接，立即添加您的空缺职位。这就是CDGjobs.com。

So, bring us full circle, right? Today, you're an upstart. Tell us about how, why you joined upstart back to auto, right? You started with auto, you're now back at auto. No, you're, I'm sure you're nowhere near your end here. So, I don't want to make it seem like you're at the end, but right? Like, why back to auto, why upstart? What are you working on nowadays? Yeah. So, maybe I'll give you a little bit of history about kind of upstart, what was founded in the mission that's going after. So, the company was founded 12 years ago by a couple ex-googlers, Dave and Anna, and then Paul, our technical CTO. They follow me. I peeped that follow. Yeah, I saw that. Yeah, I saw that.

那么，说回到起点，对吧？今天，你是一个新兴力量。告诉我们你是如何、为什么回到汽车行业的，对吧？你以汽车为起点，现在又回到汽车行业了。不，我肯定你在这里的道路上还远远没有结束。所以，我不想让人觉得你已经到了终点，对吧？为什么回到汽车行业，为什么选择加入新兴企业？你现在在做什么工作？是的。所以，也许我可以给你一点关于upstart公司的历史，以及他们的使命。公司是12年前由前谷歌员工大卫和安娜以及我们的技术首席技术官保罗创立的。他们关注我的，我看到他们关注我了。是的，我看到了。

Yes, the goal of the company was really, it was established with a mission of expanding access to credit. And so, obviously, credit is incredibly important part of our lives. It's very, very important in the auto industry. And what you might not know is that it's really inefficient. So, people, the right people do not get access to loans at the right prices.

是的，公司的目标真的是这样，它设立的使命是扩大信贷准入。显然，信贷是我们生活中极其重要的一部分。在汽车行业中尤为重要。你可能不知道的是，信贷机制实际上效率非常低。因此，有些合适的人没有以合适的价格获得贷款。

And so, there's this stat that we use to show that. And it's that only 40% of the population has access to prime credit. But if you look at all of the people who have never defaulted on a loan, that's actually 80%. So, if the world was working perfectly, 80% of people would have access to that low-cost capital, but it's not what's happening today.

因此，我们使用的统计数据显示，仅有40%的人口能够获得优质信贷。但如果我们看看那些从未拖欠贷款的人群，实际上达到了80%。所以，如果世界运作得完美无缺，80%的人将能够获得低成本资金，但这并不是今天发生的事情。

You might. Wait, so, recap that for me for a second. 80% have never defaulted on a loan of the US population. That's right. And 40% have credit. 40% have access to prime credit. Oh, sorry, sorry. Yes, low-cost credit. Got it. Okay, keep going.

你可能会有误会。等一下，让我用简单的话再重述一下。美国人口中，80% 从未拖欠过贷款。没错。有40%的人有信用记录。有40%的人有获得主流信用的权利。哦，对不起，我的错。是低成本信用。明白了。好的，继续。

And so, why is that? Well, it's because a lot of the financial system, like the wind banks are making those lending decisions, they're really. A lot of it is based on the credit score, the FICO score. And that really. That was invented in the 80s and really hasn't changed very much.

因此，为什么会这样呢？嗯，这是因为很多金融系统，如风险银行正在做出这些贷款决定，实际上。很多这些决定是基于信用评分，即FICO评分。而这个评分是在80年代发明的，而且并没有太大变化。

So, think about that three-digit number. It's the same three-digit number if you're buying a $400,000 house, a $50,000 car, or a $10,000 loan to build a deck. And so, you can imagine the risk profile of those different things. They're incredibly different. But yet, we're using the same tool.

所以，想想那个三位数。无论你是在买一栋价值40万美元的房子，一辆价值5万美元的汽车，还是用于修建阳台的1万美元贷款，这个三位数是一样的。因此，你可以想象这些不同事物的风险特征。它们是完全不同的。但是，我们却在使用同样的工具。

And so, what we've done is really say, there's a way to do this better. In 2012, AI was just beginning. Now, of course, it's everywhere. But that time we saw this technology is going to change the world. And lending really is the perfect use case for AI. There's tons of data available to feed these big models. And the impact that you can do it better is so meaningful to people and to businesses.

因此，我们所做的是真的在说，有一种更好的方法来做这件事。在2012年，人工智能刚刚起步。现在，当然，它随处可见。但那时我们就看到这项技术将改变世界。而贷款真的是人工智能的完美应用案例。有大量数据可用来供给这些大型模型。而且，能够更好地做这件事对个人和企业有着如此深远的意义。

And so, anyway, that's kind of a mission the company was founded to try to take on. And it's really just these two components. You take more data, you take more sophisticated modeling techniques. And with that, you can make better predictions of risk. You can make better predictions of risk. You can find people that. Today, lenders are saying no to them because they think they're too risky. But we can actually see that they're not that risky. So, we can approve them.

因此，无论如何，这是公司创立的一项使命，试图应对这一挑战。主要有两个组成部分。一是收集更多的数据，二是采用更复杂的建模技术。通过这样做，你可以更好地预测风险。你可以找到那些今天被贷款人拒绝的人，因为他们认为他们太冒险了。但实际上，我们可以看到他们并不那么冒险。因此，我们可以批准他们。

And so, that's access to credit. That's more sales volume. And then there's the flip side. There's people that. Interesting. The flip side is people who are nutritional lenders would think they are not risky. But we can see, hey, actually, that person is actually risky. Decline them. And so, you mean, you know, that's a big part of your interest rate, is actually to cover the losses of other defaulters. And so, if you can remove defaults, you can actually lower rates for everybody.

因此，这就是信用准入。这意味着更多的销售量。然后就有了另一面。有些人可能会认为他们是不会带来风险的营养借款人。但我们可以看到，实际上这个人是有风险的。要拒绝他们。因此，你知道，你的利率的很大一部分实际上是为了覆盖其他违约者的损失。因此，如果你能减少违约行为，你其实可以降低每个人的利率。

And what that looks like to a dealership, you know, higher approvals, lower rates, more room for back end is kind of all interchangeable. So, where is this inefficiency? I mean, this is primarily with like a subprime segment, right? Where is that? Where you see the most inefficiency with lending?

对于经销商来说，这意味着更高的批准率、更低的利率、更多的后端利润空间。那么，这种低效率主要存在于次级信用市场吧？您觉得贷款方面最大的低效率在哪里？

So, like, when we think about this is when a borrower is like, let's call them a traditionally prime borrower. You know, they've got a high credit score. They make a lot of money. Like, it's pretty easy to tell that person's low risk. So, where it gets more complicated is when that picture is not as clear.

所以，就像当我们考虑借款人时，我们说的是像传统的优质借款人。你知道的，他们信用分很高，挣很多钱。就像，很容易判断那个人的风险很低。所以，当情况不那么明确时，就会变得更加复杂。

And so, what we find is what you can think about is lower down the credit spectrum. There's this big range. There are people with 550, 600 FICO's that have the risk profile of someone with a 750 FICO. And that's a segment we call hidden prime. And so, by having models that can identify those people, we're able to provide them with a type of rate that they would see if they were, you know, if they were prime.

因此，我们发现的是，你能考虑的是信用评分较低的范围。有很大的区别。有些人的信用评分是550，600，但风险评级却和750分的人相似。我们将这一群体称为隐藏的优质客户。因此，通过拥有能够识别这些人的模型，我们能够为他们提供一种利率，这种利率相当于他们如果是优质客户时能获得的利率。

And so, that's one of, like, when we in, as we build this out in auto, you know, there's sort of three segments that we've found that are where we're already beginning to demonstrate the value of AI lending. One of them is this, this like hidden prime segment.

因此，这是我们在汽车领域发展时发现的三个部分之一，我们已经开始展示人工智能借贷价值的地方。其中之一是隐藏的优质客户群。

We're able to find those people and, you know, dealers send us those types of deals disproportionately, as you might expect. There's a couple others. The other, you know, another one is thin files. Like, thin files are tough. It's hard to know whether that, you know, what's the true risk of that? Not a lot of history on the credit. That's right.

我们能够找到那些人，并且，你知道，经销商向我们发送这些类型的交易比例偏高，正如你所料。还有一些其他情况。另一个是资料稀缺。像，资料稀缺的情况很棘手。很难确定这种情况的真正风险是什么？信用记录不够丰富。没错。

Yeah. So, they have very limited credit history, very, you know, a very small number of loans, if any, in their credit file. And so, you know, our models are very good at actually sensing the risk of those people. And then the last one is on age collateral. So, older cars. So, you know, when our model prices someone at an applicant level, basically what we're doing is we're determining when we think they might, whether they'll default in when we're determining when we think they might prepay because that plays in if someone pre-pays their loan. It's a good thing. Like, they're not defaulting, but it also means you're not getting the return that you expected. So, we need to know that. And then we model their specific car and the value of that car over time.

是的。所以，他们的信用历史非常有限，很少有贷款记录，如果有的话，也是很少。因此，我们的模型非常擅长识别这些人的风险。最后一个是抵押品的年龄。例如，老旧的汽车。所以，当我们的模型对一个申请人定价时，基本上我们正在确定我们认为他们可能会拖欠贷款的时间，以及我们认为他们可能提前还款的时间，因为如果有人提前还款，这是一件好事。表示他们没有违约，但这也意味着您没有得到预期的回报。所以我们需要知道这一点。然后，我们对他们的具体汽车和汽车价值随时间变化进行建模。

And so, what we, you know, we found inefficiency in cars that are one year to five years old. And what it means is we're able to provide those, you know, those deals disproportionately lower rates. And we see higher conversion from our dealers. So, and how are you, and why specifically when you talk about the older units or like age collateral, explain that to me one more time. Why, where's the inefficiency that you're able to bridge?

因此，我们发现一到五年的汽车存在效率问题。这意味着我们能够提供那些交易以显著较低的利率。我们看到我们的经销商的转化率更高。那么，当你谈到年龄较大的单位或抵押品时，能再解释一次吗？为什么你能够填补这种效率不足呢？

Yeah. So, think of it as like the way that lenders are, traditional lenders are coming up with those rates might be, you know, it could be simple rate tables. And they're saying, as the car gets older, we're bumping the rate by X basis points. Well, our approach is totally different. We're actually forecasting the depreciation of that vehicle, the recovery value of that vehicle. We're not saying, you know, if it's a two year old car, add 50 basis points, it's a three year old, whatever. Yeah. And so, that lets us by doing that, we can provide lower rates there.

是的。所以，可以将它看作传统借款人制定利率的方式，可能是简单的利率表。他们会说，随着汽车年龄的增长，我们将利率提高X个基点。嗯，我们的方法完全不同。实际上，我们在预测车辆的折旧和回收价值。我们不是说，如果是一辆两年的车，加50个基点，是三年的就加多少。嗯。通过这样做，我们可以提供更低的利率。

I want to ask you about the market share of different types of lending, right? So, I talked a lot about an end of 22 and like 20 early 23 about the rise of credit unions. Credit unions went from like 15% market share of all auto loans, like 30% in a very short period of time. Then over the last, you know, six months or so, credit unions have receded, right? They don't have unlimited cash or capital put up. Captives have grown again, right?

我想问一下你们对不同类型贷款市场份额的看法，对吧？所以，我在22年末和23年初谈了很多关于信用合作社的崛起。信用合作社在短短时间内，从所有汽车贷款的市场份额15％上升到30％。然后在过去的六个月左右，信用合作社开始衰退，对吧？他们没有无限的现金或资本投入。垄断集体再次增长，对吧？

So, there's this constant shift in who is actually lending and look traditional banks, lenders, they're always kind of in the middle. But where do we go from here? Right? Like, as a dealer listening or even as a consumer, like where do you think the sweet spot is when it with respect to lenders as we look out over the next year or so? What are your thoughts? The way we think about it is, you know, our platform is really one where, you know, we're developing a network of dealerships who are sending us loan applications and we work with all kinds of lenders. So, we work with traditional subprime lenders, banks, and credit unions. And you can think of them as all competing for the volume that's coming through our channel.

因此，在实际谁在借款方面一直不断变化的情况下，传统银行、贷款人一直处于中间地位。但我们接下来要怎么做呢？对吧？作为一个经销商或者消费者，你认为在接下来的一年中或者以后，与贷款人相比，甜蜜的点在哪里呢？你有什么想法？我们的想法是，我们的平台是一个真正正在发展中的网络，我们与各种各样的贷款人合作，包括传统的次级贷款人、银行和信用合作社。你可以把它们想象成正在争夺通过我们渠道的交易量。

And so, we've seen the same thing you've seen. Like, we have 100 basic credit unions on our platform today. It, over the last few years, we've seen a big increase in the number of credit unions that use our platform. You know, liquidity has been tighter. They have reserves. They need as losses increase. They have to maintain these reserves. And so, like, now what we're beginning to see is so they tightened up. There was less capital to lend. We're starting to see that free up.

所以，我们看到了你看到的相同的情况。比如，我们今天在我们的平台上有100家基本信用合作社。在过去几年里，我们看到使用我们平台的信用合作社数量大幅增加。你知道，流动性变得更紧张了。他们有储备金。随着损失增加，他们必须维持这些储备金。所以，现在我们开始看到的是他们开始松动了。资本不再那么紧张。我们开始看到可以释放出来的资金。

So, we're actually starting to see our credit unions and our traditional banks come back with more capital. We're still early in that, but definitely we're seeing green shoots compared to where we've been for the past two years. That's interesting. Especially having seen, you know, credit unions sort of, they were, you know, they were starting to dry up, but I mean, everything's in cycles, I guess. I do want to ask you about what you're seeing in the market, you know, given your access to dealers and, of course, having all this data. But before that, I do have a separate, completely separate question. Again, I saw this on your LinkedIn as well, but there's been a lot of buzz in over the last week about this E-Start Coalition.

因此，我们实际上开始看到我们的信用合作社和传统银行拥有更多资本。我们仍处于早期阶段，但与过去两年相比，我们确实看到了一些发展迹象。这很有趣。特别是看到，你知道的，信用合作社在某种程度上，它们开始枯竭，但我想一切都是循环的。在这之前，我想问问你对市场的看法，毕竟你可以接触到经销商，并且拥有所有这些数据。但在此之前，我有一个完全不同的问题。我在你的 LinkedIn 上也看到了这个消息，但在过去的一周里，关于这个 E-Start 联盟有很多讨论。

And I'd love to hear for you to explain what this is and for context to the audience, right? Again, anyone that, if you try, if anyone here listening has sold a car online or maybe even bought a car online, right, you know that some of the biggest, just, you know, pain points are lending and titling, right? Again, I dealt with this first hand, titling was a huge headache. So I got to say, I was pretty surprised when I saw this new initiative where all these, you know, lots of really influential companies in automotive got together and said, hey, we are going to work on bringing digital titling for the industry. Where, like, when I hear this, right, to me again, this is, this is painkillers. Like, this is big. And so, tell me about like, what is this E-Start Coalition? How did you, how did you upstart, get involved in this? What does it mean for our industry?

我很想听你解释一下这是什么，也希望能让观众了解背景，对吧？再次提醒一下，如果你尝试过在网上卖车或者甚至在网上买车，你就会知道，其中一些最大的痛点是贷款和车辆所有权转移，对吧？再次强调，我亲身经历过，车辆所有权转移真的是一个巨大的头疼事。所以当我看到这个新倡议时，我感到非常惊讶，很多汽车行业的有影响力的公司都聚集在一起，说，“嘿，我们要努力推动行业实现数字化的车辆所有权转移。” 当我听到这个消息时，对我来说，这就像解痛药一样，这是一个大举措。那么，告诉我一下，这个E-Start联盟是什么？你是如何参与其中的？这对我们的行业意味着什么？

Yeah. So we, we are on our, with two businesses, we have our digital retail indirect lending business and also a direct consumer refinance business. And so in both, you know, our vision of the future is a completely digital purchase experience end to end. And so what you might, what you might not know is that there are still many states that require wet signatures on documents that need to be sent mailed to the DMV. Oh, yeah. So, yeah, if you're not in one of those states, like it sounds crazy, but it's actually a real thing and it's not a small number of states. And so in order to get to that, you know, that vision that we're going for, we need the DMV's to change their processes. We need them to accept digital signatures without having to mail paperwork back and forth.

是的。所以我们拥有两家业务，一家是数字零售间接放贷业务，另一家是直接消费者再融资业务。对于这两个业务，我们的未来愿景是实现完全数字化的购买体验。你可能不知道的是，仍然有许多州的法律要求文件上需要湿签名，这些文件需要寄给车管所。如果你不在这些州之一，可能会听起来很不可思议，但实际上这是一个真实存在的问题，而且州的数量也不少。为了实现我们的愿景，我们需要车管所改变他们的流程，接受数字签名而不必来回邮寄文件。

And so that creates, it's so much better. It's sort of amazing to have to do this. It's such a better experience. It's, you know, lower friction for the consumer and it's much lower costs. Like, to maintain, you know, operational processes to manage those titles and mail them back and forth. Like it makes, you know, lending, it's a real component to the cost structure of lending. And so we joined forces with Carvana and DocuSign and, you know, in 17 others and we're pushing the states to modernize the way they, their DMV processes and move towards easing it. How realistic do you think this is and in what timeframe? And I know you can't like guess this, but like just roughly speaking, what do you think is a timeframe for something that is? I just think that this is, this would be game changing. If every state, you know, all nine titling, it would be make life so much easier.

如此一来，情况会好很多。这是非常令人惊讶的事情。这样的体验更好。对于消费者来说，摩擦力更小，成本更低。比如，维护运营流程、管理这些持有权并来回邮寄这些文件。这样会使得借贷成本结构的一个非常重要的组成部分。因此，我们与Carvana和DocuSign以及其他17家公司合作，推动各州现代化他们的DMV流程，并朝着更加便捷的方向发展。您认为这一计划有多大可能实现，并在多长时间内？我知道您无法预测，但大致上来说，您认为一个合理的时间表是什么？我认为，如果每个州都能像处理九个所有权一样，这将是一个颠覆性的改变。这将让生活变得更加轻松。

So yeah, it's a good question. We, hopefully, you know, it's not something that's that far away. We actually pushed this in, you know, during COVID, we actually took states that were, that were, you know, required digital signatures, or I'm sorry, required signatures. And we actually just started saying them digital copies just to see if they would approve it during, because we knew it was during COVID. And what we saw, they like we had a handful of states that actually began accepting it that way just because they had the need. And so that's what gives me hope that like maybe this won't, you know, go to DMV pace. Maybe this will actually, you know, be at a pace that we can, you know, we can get this done in the next, you know, hopefully small number of years.

这是个好问题。希望这不会太遥远。实际上，在COVID期间，我们推动了这个。我们拿一些需要签名的州，我们就开始用数字副本来代替，就是为了看他们是否会在COVID期间批准。我们发现，有几个州开始接受这种方式，因为他们需要。所以我对此感到希望，也许这不会像去DMV一样耗费很久时间。也许我们可以在未来几年内完成这个目标。

You also mentioned earlier, your involvement in digital retailing, which, you know, I talk a lot about the just evolution of the right way to do online car buying and, you know, what makes sense, what's kind of hoopla. So give us a little bit of an overview of what you're doing with the digital retailing from. Yeah. So, you know, we, we, as we thought about getting into the auto market, you know, we wanted to bring, bring our AI lending to, to dealerships. And we were trying to think about the best way to do that. And what I haven't talked a little much about, but a thing that we, you know, as part of our mission is something we're really passionate about. And that's building simple, streamlined experiences.

你之前提到了你参与数字零售，你知道我经常谈论在线购车的正确演变方式，知道什么是合理的，什么是炒作。所以给我们简要介绍一下你在数字零售方面的工作。是的，当我们考虑进入汽车市场时，我们希望将我们的AI贷款引入到经销商中。我们试图想出最佳方式。我们还没有过多讨论的是，作为我们使命的一部分，我们非常热衷于打造简单、流畅的体验。

And so, you know, on our core business, our personal own business, we have 80% of our loans require no steps, no documentation. It's a completely instant, you know, rate and funding experience. And so we, you know, as we thought about getting into into automotive, what we wanted to do is we wanted to completely, you know, build a seamless e-commerce car buying experience. And so that's why we've gone to market through our own digital retail software. That digital retail software has, you know, has three parts. It has what we call online, in-store, and then lending. Our online product, you know, that's a product that lives on a dealerships website. You know, it helps the consumer.

所以，你知道，在我们的核心业务，我们个人的业务中，我们有80%的贷款不需要步骤，不需要文件。这是一个完全即时的贷款和资金体验。因此，当我们考虑进入汽车行业时，我们想要做的是完全构建一个无缝的电子商务购车体验。因此，这就是为什么我们通过我们自己的数字零售软件进入市场。该数字零售软件分为三个部分。它包括在线、门店和贷款。我们的在线产品，就是存在于经销商网站上的产品。它帮助消费者。

You know, they can, they can, you can essentially build their deal. They can add their trade. They can explore different financing options. They can browse add-ons, you know, F&I products at home on their couch. Primary user for that would be the internet director at the dealership in our value proposition. Then what we're trying to, our dealership see, you know, on average, like 50% higher lead to close conversion. So that's why, that's why that, you know, the BDC manager cares about that product. Then we've got our in-store product. So that's a, that's, that's, you know, imagine that customer, they walk in to the dealership.

你知道，他们可以，他们可以，你基本上可以建立他们的交易。他们可以添加他们的交易。他们可以探索不同的融资选项。他们可以在家里的沙发上浏览附加产品，你知道，F&I产品。这个产品的主要用户将是经销店的互联网总监。我们的价值主张是，我们正在努力让我们的经销店平均实现50%更高的线索转化率。所以，这就是为什么，互联网部经理会关心那个产品。然后，我们有我们的实体店产品。所以，想象一下客户走进经销店。

This product facilitates the end-to-end car buying experience. So, you know, the salesperson can have an iPad or they could, you know, they could be sitting at their desk on a computer and they can bring up that customer. They can see exactly what they were looking at. They can see the car they were looking at, the payments they were looking at, you know, they got their traded information and they can pick up right there, you know, and keep going. So if you're a consumer that feels like magic, that you just walk in, they know, they know about you and they're ready to sort of move forward. And if you're, you're a dealer, what that results for is, is kind of better satisfaction, you know, higher customer satisfaction. It's a much faster process. So we see 90 minutes saved on average. And if you can save time, you know, that creates a ton of efficiency. So, so we've got an in-store process that facilitates sale process, facilitates the desking process, fully digital pencils, communication back and forth. Like we're trying to make that process instead of using eight different tools to manage that process. We're trying to give our dealers one tool that integrates with all of the tools they have on their platform.

这款产品可以方便顾客从头到尾完成购车体验。销售人员可以使用iPad或者在电脑桌前操作，可以查看顾客的信息，了解他们的需求，看到他们正在关注的车辆、付款方式以及交易信息，可以直接在那里继续交流。对于顾客来说，这就像魔术般，走进去，销售人员就知道你的情况，并准备好继续推进。对于经销商来说，这意味着更高的客户满意度，更快速的流程。我们看到平均节省了90分钟的时间。如果能节省时间，就可以提高效率。因此我们有一个店内流程，促进销售流程，促进谈判流程，完全数字化的谈判，来回沟通。我们试图让这个流程更简单化，不再使用八种不同的工具来管理流程，而是给我们的经销商提供一个与他们平台上所有工具集成的工具。

And then, of course, we've got lending. So on the lending side, you know, what we're trying to do there is make that instant approvals, you know, no manual effort trying to figure out what kind of F&I products can fit with that, you know, in this particular lender. And of course, we're trying to trying to approve more borrowers and give them, you know, more room for backend. All right. So broadly speaking, right, if we zoom out, what are, what are challenges right now that dealers are coming to you with, right? What are some like pain points that your dealers are looking to be to have solved? Yeah. So there's a handful of challenges that we see, you know, our customers are coming to us looking for our help. You know, one of those is that, you know, they might see a dip in their, in their, in their deal conversion. And when they look at that, what they're seeing is, you know, dip the people on the floor, you know, that they might be short cutting, you know, one part of the process or another within their sales process. And so what they're looking for is a way to sort of standardize that sales process and give their, their sales managers a way to understand who, you know, who's following the process and who isn't. And so that's, you know, that's one thing our tool can do, can do for them. Or we also see, you know, people might be, it's a field where there's a lot of turnover. And so they're looking for a way to bring, you know, a simple process that can bring people up to speed faster, or even higher people that are outside of the auto industry. And so having a simple standardized process helps with that. And then profitability, of course, is a huge one. So that, you know, they might be looking to, you know, with making everything is automated through our platform, they can run their dealership on fewer people. So that that's kind of one, one thing they're trying to do. And then, or they might be looking for our lending to help them increase their approvals or increase back end. And so, our dealerships are seeing 60% higher back end growths. So there's all like customer satisfaction, of course, is a big one. You know, that's, you know, driving that drives the whole online experience. But that's some of the challenges that dealers are coming to us and looking for help.

然后，当然，我们还有贷款。因此，在贷款方面，我们正在努力实现即时批准，不需要人工努力来确定何种贷款和保险产品适合该贷款方。当然，我们还尽力批准更多借款人并为他们提供更多后端空间。总的来说，如果我们放大一点，目前经销商面临的挑战是什么？你的经销商们希望解决哪些痛点呢？是的，我们看到一些挑战，我们的客户希望我们的帮助。其中之一是，他们可能会看到成交量下降。当他们审视时，他们会发现地面上的人们可能在销售流程中的一个环节或另一个环节中取巧。因此，他们正在寻求一种方式标准化销售流程，并让销售经理了解谁遵循流程，谁没有。所以，我们的工具可以为他们做的一件事。或者我们也看到，这个领域人员流动性很大。因此，他们正在寻找一种可以让人员更快掌握业务的简单流程，甚至雇佣来自汽车行业之外的人员。因此，具有简单标准化流程有助于这一点。当然，盈利能力是一个巨大的挑战。通过我们的平台实现自动化，他们可以用更少的人员管理经销商。这是他们正在尝试做的一件事。或者他们可能正在寻找我们的贷款帮助他们增加批准率或增加后端。我们的经销商看到了60%的后端增长。当然，客户满意度也是一个重要的挑战。这推动了整个在线体验。但这些是经销商向我们寻求帮助时面临的一些挑战。

Do you think as an industry, we should expect to have less people or fewer people in the dealership driven by AI over the next, you know, couple of years, you think that's like a reality? Or do you just think it makes the current people a lot more efficient? I mean, I do think that technology can make that process more simplified. It can create tools that mean people don't have to have as much specialization. So I do think that that will be, I think that there's a natural part of improving technology, you know, processes through technology. When it comes to like generative AI, and do I see that, you know, replacing, honestly, I think for these types of experiences, like consumers want, they want to have a human touch, you know, it's the second biggest versus of their life. So I'm sure it will be, you know, might be something that's augmented in terms of like a tool for people to use. But personally, I don't see this, you know, going to going to take away half the people in the dealership or something like that.

作为一个行业，你认为未来几年在由人工智能驱动的经销店里，我们应该期望人数减少吗？你认为这是现实吗？或者你认为只是让现有人员更高效？我认为技术可以简化这个过程。它可以创造工具，使人们不必拥有太多专业知识。所以我认为，这将是改进技术、通过技术进行流程的自然部分。当涉及到像生成式人工智能这样的技术，我是否看到它会取代，老实说，我认为对于这些类型的体验，消费者们想要人性化的接触，这是他们生活中第二重要的事情。所以我认为它可能会被作为一个工具来增强人们的使用。但就个人而言，我并不认为这会导致经销店里的人数减少一半之类的情况。

What's your vision, right? Again, zooming out and before we wrap up, what do you think over the next five years, right? Like if you could say what success looks like for your goals to impact the industry, what does that look like? Yeah, for us, you know, we're trying to build the best car buying and selling experience that's powered by the most differentiated financing offers there are. And so for us, we're still very early in that. I think about these transactions, they're super complicated, regulated, state specific.

你的愿景是什么，对吧？再放大一些，然后在我们结束之前，你认为未来五年会发生什么？比如，如果你能描述一下成功对行业产生影响的目标是什么样子的，那会是什么样子？是的，对我们来说，我们正努力打造由最具差异化融资方案驱动的最佳汽车买卖体验。所以对我们来说，我们仍然处于早期阶段。我想到这些交易，它们非常复杂，受监管，而且具体到各州特定。

And so we think of that as like, that's something that we're excited, that's a challenge we're excited to get up and go tackle. And then lending, you know, think about that as like, you know, anytime someone pays back alone, they're in a pay that loan back and fall, they way overpaid for that loan. And so it's our job, what we see is we want to build models that can much more accurately predict whether that person's going to pay back. And if they are, we can give them a much lower rate.

因此，我们认为这就像是一件令人兴奋的事情，这是一个我们很乐意去应对的挑战。然后放贷，你知道，想象一下，每当有人还清贷款时，他们实际上支付的金额远远超过了贷款金额。因此，我们的工作就是，我们希望建立能够更准确预测这个人是否会偿还贷款的模型。如果他们会偿还，我们就可以给他们一个更低的利率。

Alex, this was awesome. Really appreciate the insight. Of course, if anyone wants to learn more, upstart.com slash dealers, I'm looking at the website right now, we'll throw the link in the show notes as well. So if you want to go just click below, you can get there as well. Alex, appreciate your comment on it. And this was awesome. Yep. Thanks, Jesse. Really engaging conversation. Appreciate being here. All right.

Alex，这太棒了。真的很感谢你的洞察力。当然，如果有人想了解更多，请访问upstart.com/dealers，我现在正在查看网站，我们也会把链接放在节目备注中。所以如果你想要去，只需点击下方，你也可以到达那里。Alex，感谢你的评论。这真是太棒了。是的，谢谢，Jesse。真是一次很有趣的对话。很感谢能在这里。好的。

Hope you enjoyed that episode. Please give the podcast a rating, consider subscribing to the show and check the show notes for links to what we talked about. Thanks for tuning in. I'll see you guys next time.

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