Responsible Finance member Salad has been named LendTech of the Year in the UK FinTech Awards, scooping the accolade in a category featuring strong finalists including NatWest, Pockit and ThinCats.
Salad is a social enterprise which uses Open Banking and its own human- and machine-learning technology to make lending decisions. The UK FinTech Awards were developed to celebrate the UK’s “best and brightest” financial services and financial technology firms. Organisers say this year saw a record number of entries “with really strong competition in every category”. LendTech of the Year was the first award announced.
Tim Rooney, Salad CEO said:
“Making small loans affordable has a huge impact, enabling people who need and can afford credit to pay for things in the way that suits them best without being penalised if, like millions in the UK, they don’t have a perfect credit score.
“Salad has combined technological innovation with a human lens, not only to make fair lending decisions but to build features to support all our applicants and enable customers to manage their money how it suits them. We’re delighted to be named LendTech of the Year, reflecting our team’s continued innovation and all the new features driven by customers’ ideas and feedback.”
Salad has previously won the Open Banking for Good Award and multiple other accolades. It is currently running its third ethical lending bond issue on Ethex.
Several other CDFIs have recently won acclaim: Moneyline won the Credit Strategy Alternative Consumer Lender of the Year 2024 Award and Karen Davies (Purple Shoots), Shiona Crichton (Moneyline), Lindsay Wake (Social Investment Scotland), Sharon Gorman (Resonance), Emma Lower (Lendology), Naomi Ilagoswa (The Growth Company) and Gael Drummond (Firstport) were all named on this year’s list of the 100 leading women in social enterprise, impact investment and mission-driven business, the WISE100 Women in Social Enterprise 2025 top 100.