Associated Software Consultants Celebrates 25th Anniversary.Business Editors MIDDLEBURG HEIGHTS, Ohio--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 29, 2003 Associated Software Consultants, Inc. (ASC ASC Ambulatory surgery center, see there ), a provider of loan automation software to the mortgage industry, celebrates its 25th anniversary in 2003. ASC was founded in 1978 by Mike Liston, who, with his brothers Tim and John, are still focused on their original mission of using the most modern technology to make the lending process easier and more cost effective for lenders. Much has changed since the 1970s, when the most common examples of office technology were typewriters and copy machines. In the beginning, ASC focused on creating software that would save time for users during the data-entry process, enable users to make loan program changes themselves and eliminate the hand typing of loan forms. The result was UNI-FORM(R), a loan processing system that enabled non-programmers to change the way the system requested borrower data, performed financial calculations, printed loan documents and reports and transmitted data. While Mike Liston was developing UNI-FORM, his brother, John, wrote the system's user manual while on summer vacation Summer vacation (also called summer holidays or summer break) is a vacation in the summertime between school years in which students are off for 3 months, depending on the country and district. during college, and his other brother, Tim, started installing and training users just days after college graduation Graduation is the action of receiving or conferring an academic degree or the associated ceremony. The date of event is often called degree day. The event itself is also called commencement, convocation or invocation. . Although UNI-FORM was cutting-edge technology in its day, computing computing - computer back then left much to be desired. "When UNI-FORM first came out, a typical computer had 32 kilobytes of RAM and ten megabytes of disk space," said Mike Liston, founder of ASC. "Customers used pre-printed forms for document production and line printers for printing reports. It would be many years before bigger and better computers came out and UNI-FORM would be able to live up to its full potential." By design, UNI-FORM kept computer programs, user-defined business rules, and borrower data all separate. This allowed UNI-FORM users to implement software updates that did not interfere with their customized business logic or with customer data. ASC only needed to maintain a single set of programs for its entire customer base, greatly reducing development and most importantly Adv. 1. most importantly - above and beyond all other consideration; "above all, you must be independent" above all, most especially , support costs. UNI-FORM put the control of customization in the lenders' hands, allowing them to do business their way and more quickly react to an ever-changing and increasingly competitive market. Economically, the late 1970s and early 1980s were troubled times. The term "stagflation stagflation, in economics, a word coined in the 1970s to describe a combination of a stagnant economy and severe inflation. Previously, these two conditions had not existed at the same time because lowered demand, brought about by a recession (see depression), " was being used to describe the condition of high interest rates (up to 18 percent) and slow economic growth. Additionally, the mortgage lending industry was much less sophisticated than it is today, and there was less standardization standardization In industry, the development and application of standards that make it possible to manufacture a large volume of interchangeable parts. Standardization may focus on engineering standards, such as properties of materials, fits and tolerances, and drafting . No computer systems dominated the industry and business people were much less "tech-savvy." Lenders relied on proprietary systems and were at the mercy of the vendor for programming and support requirements. "Computer technology at that time was new enough that the average user was not able to do even basic things such as moving from screen to screen," said Tim Liston, president of ASC. "Many people actually feared computers and felt the only people who should use them were computer scientists." As the mortgage lending industry became more sophisticated in the 1990s, ASC began developing PowerSeller(R), a complete secondary marketing and pipeline risk management system. The system provided users with necessary tools for successful pricing, pipeline data management, builder and master commitment processing, pooling, trade processing, pipeline risk management, shipping and document tracking. PowerSeller went on to become the top-selling system of its kind in the industry. In 2002, ASC reengineered UNI-FORM and developed PowerLender(R), a Java-based loan origination The examples and perspective in this article or section may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please [ improve this article] or discuss the issue on the talk page. and processing system. PowerLender had all the flexibility of UNI-FORM, and was designed specifically to exploit future developments in computing and technology. During ASC's 25-year history, the company's software has been widely used by lenders to process an estimated 5 million loans on 10,000 workstations for approximately 250 lenders including Bank of America
Bank of America (NYSE: BAC TYO: 8648 ) is the largest commercial bank in the United States in terms of deposits, and the largest company of its kind in the world. , New Century and Bank One. "ASC has always developed innovative computer systems that focused on making businesses more successful," said John Liston John Liston (c. 1776 - March 22, 1846), English comedian, was born in London. He made his public debut on the stage at Weymouth as Lord Duberley in The Heir-at-law. , senior programmer (1) A hardware device used to customize a programmable logic chip such as a PAL, GAL, EPROM, etc. See PROM programmer. (2) A person who designs the logic for and writes the lines of codes of a computer program. and analyst at ASC. "Technology may have changed a great deal during the many years since we started, but ASC's commitment to serving our customers' needs has always remained constant." About ASC Associated Software Consultants, Inc. (ASC) designs and markets loan automation software for use by mortgage banks, commercial banks, community banks and credit unions. ASC's business strategy focuses on providing software and support services support services Psychology Non-health care-related ancillary services–eg, transportation, financial aid, support groups, homemaker services, respite services, and other services that enable lenders to improve the volume and quality of their business, streamline workflow The automatic routing of documents to the users responsible for working on them. Workflow is concerned with providing the information required to support each step of the business cycle. and reduce processing costs. The company's lending solutions enhance secondary marketing operations, improve overall profitability and better serve borrowers, investors, real estate brokers, third-party service providers and other constituents. For additional information about ASC, visit the company's Web site at www.asconline.com. |
|
||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion