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Financial comparison shopping site SmartHippo.com announces advisory board at Finovate Startup '08San Francisco, CA, April 29 /PRNewswire/ -- SmartHippo.com (http://www.smarthippo.com/), a vertical search engine and comparison shopping service for financial products, today announced the creation of a business advisory board. Founding advisory board members include Lori Collins, former Senior Vice President and General Manager for LendingTree Exchange; Bill Rice, CEO of Kaleidico; and John Philip Green, Founder and CTO at LearnHub. SmartHippo.com uses the power of community to help consumers find the best finance rates and save money. Currently focused on the mortgage vertical, SmartHippo.com allows any individual to post information and feedback on a mortgage rate they received, and to compare rates with other members of the community with similar profiles. George Favvas, CEO of SmartHippo.com, said: "We're excited to have some of the smartest and most accomplished business and technology leaders join our advisory board. Their expertise in lending, customer acquisition, social media, and consumer Internet will be invaluable assets as we grow our business." Unlike traditional mortgage comparison sites that adopted either a lead generation model or a pay-to-play model, SmartHippo.com levels the playing field by letting any bank or broker post rates for free, and then uses the power of the community to keep them honest as well as report on additional rates that individual members have found. SmartHippo.com provides a platform for banks and financial institutions to connect with prospective customers and engage them in a conversation at a level never before possible. Advisory board member Lori Collins said: "SmartHippo.com has pioneered a win-win business model that injects transparency and accountability into the lending process, while giving banks and financial institutions a new way to connect with prospective customers. I'm excited to be advising a team that has a clear vision for helping financial services consumers benefit from the Internet." The announcement was made from Finovate Startup '08 (http://www.finovate.com/startup08), a one-day conference showcasing startups that are innovating at the intersection of finance and technology, where SmartHippo.com CEO George Favvas is a presenter. Bios of Members Appointed to the Advisory Board ----------------------------------------------- Lori Collins Lori Collins was the Senior Vice President and General Manager at LendingTree. She was responsible for sales, relationship management, and product management for the LendingTree Lender network, increasing revenues from $31 million to $224 million over seven years. Prior to LendingTree, she was SVP at Bank of America, where she was head of national marketing and product development for Nations Funds, which grew to $68 billion in mutual fund assets during her tenure. Collins also served as a VP at Fidelity Investments in Boston, where she launched the first mutual fund marketplace and drove assets in the marketplace from zero to more than $9 billion in three years. She was also a director of marketing at American Express Company in New York. Collins earned her MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, and a B.S. in Business Administration from UNC-Chapel Hill. Bill Rice Bill Rice is founder and CEO of Kaleidico (http://www.kaleidico.com/), a leader and innovator in customer acquisition and lead management solutions focused on the mortgage industry, and the driving force behind SalesTwit, a tool for managing leads and customer relationships using Twitter. Before founding Kaleidico, Rice was vice president of home equity and corporate programs at Quicken Loans. He also served as COO of Rock Bank, leading Quicken Loans - then the bank's mortgage lending counterpart - in efforts to obtain a federal OTS thrift charter and approval as an FDIC-insured institution. Rice received an MBA from the University of Phoenix and his BS in political science from the United States Air Force Academy. John Philip Green John Phillip Green is the Founder and CTO of LearnHub (http://www.learnhub.com/), a site which offers a set of tools that makes learning online fun and engaging, and teaching online easy and effective. Prior to founding LearnHub, Green was Director of Engineering at Affinity Labs, where he led the technical team which launched 10 highly customized major sites in under a year, leading to the company's acquisition by Monster for $61M. He holds a Bachelor's degree in Mathematics from the University of Waterloo, and also advises CommunityLend, a peer to peer lender in Canada. About SmartHippo.com SmartHippo.com is a vertical search engine and comparison shopping service for financial products. The site is currently focused on the mortgage vertical. Using the power of online community, SmartHippo.com brings much-needed transparency to the process of taking out a mortgage. Members can post feedback on mortgage rates they received, compare rates with other members of the community, and sort through banks based on feedback posted by other members. Smarthippo.com lets consumers click their way to savings by making informed decisions and getting the best rates possible, while giving banks and financial institutions a new way to connect with prospective customers. Learn more at http://www.smarthippo.com/ Smart Hippo.com CONTACT: Dov Smith, Smarthippo.com media relations, (514) 242-1776,[email protected] |