The Equipment Leasing and Finance Association (ELFA) announced that Channel is the recipient of the 2024 Operations and Technology Excellence Award. The award recognizes innovative uses of technology in the equipment finance industry. Channel’s award-winning project will be showcased during ELFA’s Operations & Technology Conference, Sept. 9-11 in Nashville.

Channel is recognized for its comprehensive overhaul of processes and systems, creating a streamlined, efficient and scalable infrastructure that supports sustainable growth. By collaborating with an external solutions provider, Channel reassessed its business processes and technology systems, involving the entire company in building capability maps and process flows, surveying partners and benchmarking against industry-leading practices. The result was significant annual savings and enhanced customer experiences with faster solutions and better technology.

“Our strong culture and rapid growth improved team efficiency, but we recognized the need to enhance our enterprise processes for continued success,” said Mark Blais, CIO at Channel. “We took a collaborative approach to revamp our business processes and technology, and focused on a win-together approach that prioritized our partners’ needs. Leveraging external consultants, internal teams and our partners, we designed exceptional solutions across the company. This massive initiative laid a solid foundation that delivered outstanding results for both our partners and teams.”

The award co-chairs congratulated Channel on this achievement. “Channel’s impressive transformation project exemplifies how to effectively streamline operations while supporting sustainable growth,” said Chelsey Barron, VP of Sales Operations at LEAF Commercial Capital Inc., and Peter Haug, Project Manager at LTi Technology Solutions. “We look forward to sharing their journey at the upcoming Operations and Technology Conference and inspiring other ELFA members to innovate and optimize their operations.”