Clarista White Paper, FinovateFall Demo, on Moving Past Legacy Data Silos
- Roy Urrico
- Sep 5
- 3 min read
By Roy Urrico
New York City-based Clarista, an artificial intelligence (AI)-native data fabric platform designed to unify fragmented enterprise data, announced the release of its latest white paper, The Intelligence Layer for Banks & Credit Unions. Clarista also revealed it will present at FinovateFall 2025 in New York on September 9th. Finoptamus is a media sponsor for FinovateFall 2025 and will be onsite for the conference.
The white paper investigates how financial institutions can move past legacy data silos to generate a trusted “intelligence layer” that drives every step of the customer and lending journey, from loan application to ongoing risk monitoring. It highlights Clarista’s zero-copy, source-agnostic approach that unifies scattered records into structured, decision-ready intelligence without duplication or disruption.
Key insights from the white paper:
Loan Pack Automation – Automate the intake and review of loan documentation, freeing analysts from hours of manual processing.
Risk Monitoring and Customer 360 – Create unified profiles that bring together structured and unstructured data for holistic oversight.
Agentic Copilot and Q&A Briefs – Go beyond dashboards with multi-format outputs that deliver explainable, decision-ready insights instantly.
“Banks and credit unions are under immense pressure to make faster, more accurate, and more compliant decisions,” said Suvrat Bansal, founder and CEO of Clarista. “Our new white paper outlines how Clarista delivers a live, semantic data fabric that transforms raw documents and systems into actionable intelligence. Finovate is the perfect stage to show how this technology is already reshaping financial services.”
Can CUs Keep Up with Faster Business Expectations?
“Credit unions were built on care, trust, and personalized service, but limited resources and outdated systems often get in the way,” voiced the white paper. “Small business members now expect faster answers, tailored support, and less friction. Regional banks and fintech lenders are pulling ahead, not because they care more, but because they’ve invested in better systems.”
Small business members are operating in a world that moves faster, and they expect their lenders to keep up. Seventy-three percent of small and midsize businesses (SMBs) expect loan decisions within 48 hours, according to the white paper. “But credit unions typically take 5-10 business days, causing their members to seek faster alternatives.”
The white paper noted fintech lenders are increasingly using AI and real-time data. Plus, according to American Banker, over 60% of regional banks are increasing investment in automated underwriting. However, only 1 in 5 credit unions use AI or automation in their loan review processes, according to the ACU Technology Council, “leading to inefficiency, inconsistent risk assessment, and operational strain.”
The white paper suggested “while credit unions lead in values and relationships, they’re underperforming on speed, personalization, and responsiveness, which is core to today’s lending expectations.”
Avoiding the SMB Shift to Nontraditional Players
The Clarista study pointed to a McKinsey report that projects up to 40% of small business lending could shift to nontraditional players by 2030. “The solution lies in leveraging the data credit unions already possess, along with more innovative infrastructure, to unlock its value.”
The white paper claimed loan files are slowed by:
Data scattered across emails, PDFs, and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) notes.
Manual efforts to reconstruct the borrower’s story.
Inconsistent decisions due to a lack of shared context.
Red flags showing up too late or not at all.
“This isn’t just inefficiency. It’s friction that frustrates members, burns out staff, and causes missed growth,” said the white paper.
Another stumbling block is that only 8% of SMBs apply for loans through credit unions despite high approval rates, claimed the white paper. “Small business owners don’t choose their banking partners based on the sophistication of chatbots. They choose institutions that understand their needs and deliver fast, reliable, and personalized service. That is what credit unions were built to do. But outdated systems, paper-heavy workflows, and limited staff capacity are holding that promise back,” maintained the white paper.
Clarista said its presentation at FinovateFall 2025 will demonstrate how its platform enables banks and credit unions to unblock knowledge, govern all content for compliance, and deliver real-time intelligence across teams and workflows. “Clarista helps you deliver not by adding more tools, but by removing the friction that slows decisions down. No more buried data. No more fragmented judgment. Just smarter, faster approvals.”
