Dubai - Sharikat Mubasher: Emirates NBD and Mashreq Bank announced a strategic investment in NewBridge Fintech Solutions, a fintech firm owning LoanBook, a next-generation platform digitizing the syndicated loan and private credit markets.

With this investment, LoanBook gains significant resources, scale, and industry support to deliver transformative solutions to the loan capital markets, a recent statement revealed.

Focusing on Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) region, LoanBook aims to fundamentally innovate the $5.5 trillion annual loan issuance market across primary syndication, secondary trading, and lifecycle management workflows between borrowers, lenders, and administrative agents.

Sid Bhandari, Founder and CEO of NewBridge Fintech, said: “Our partnership with Emirates NBD and Mashreq Bank is a major step forward in our mission to digitize the syndicated loan market. By collaborating closely with both teams, we will jointly address the numerous friction points in syndicated loan markets and leverage LoanBook's next-generation technologies to bring new, innovative solutions.”

On his part, Hitesh Asarpota, CEO of Emirates NBD Capital, stated that the collaboration with LoanBook aligns with the bank’s collaborative approach to innovation.

"Our loan syndication and agency team will actively collaborate with LoanBook to effectively address the multiple friction points endemic to the current loan market structure,” Asarpota added.

Meanwhile, Chiradeep Deb, Global Head of Investment Banking at Mashreq, commented: "Mashreq is pleased to be part of LoanBook's effort to bring digitization to the loan markets. As part of our Neo ventures initiative, we will actively collaborate, co-create, and commercialize solutions across the larger EMEA markets to bring modernization to the syndicated loans market."

LoanBook offers a centralized marketplace for market participants to access global loan opportunities and automates end-to-end workflows, bringing much-needed efficiency and velocity to an industry still heavily reliant on manual processes.