OakNorth Bank

Co-founders Rishi Khosla and Joel Perlman lead the firm. Khosla serves as CEO, while Perlman is Senior Managing Director. Credit decisions run through a central committee supported by sector-focused underwriting teams, rather than a single CIO. The pair previously built Copal Amba, a financial-data firm sold to Moody's in 2014.

The firm sources primarily through a network of UK accountants, corporate-finance advisors, and direct outreach to growth-stage companies. Its lending is concentrated in the mid-market, where high-street banks have retrenched. OakNorth also receives referrals from private-equity sponsors and venture-capital investors whose portfolio companies need debt facilities.

Structurally, OakNorth is both. It holds a UK banking license and takes retail deposits, which fund a commercial-lending book. Simultaneously, it operates a SaaS subsidiary that licenses its credit-analysis platform to other banks globally — a revenue stream entirely separate from the lending balance sheet. This hybrid model separates it from pure-play neobanks and traditional lenders.

OakNorth lends from its own deposit-funded balance sheet but also manages institutional-credit vehicles that allow external allocators, including family offices and pension funds, to participate in larger transactions. The exact AUM of those vehicles is not publicly disclosed.

OakNorth does not take equity. It provides debt facilities — typically senior secured loans and working-capital lines — to established mid-market companies with proven cash flows. Startups and pre-revenue businesses are generally outside its mandate, though it has lent to revenue-generating, VC-backed companies scaling toward profitability.

The bank is privately held, with backing from institutional investors including SoftBank's Vision Fund, the Clermont Group, and several family offices. Khosla and Perlman retain significant ownership after their exit from Copal Amba. The firm has not disclosed a single-family-wealth origin.

OakNorth has not established a separate philanthropic foundation. Its ESG posture is embedded in lending criteria: the bank publishes sector-specific climate-risk assessments and has publicly committed to net-zero lending targets aligned with UK regulatory expectations. No ring-fenced impact fund has been launched.