Dear Members:

An important change is happening within the Corporate One family of solutions that will take place over the course of the year. After three years as a wholly owned CUSO of Corporate One, we have decided to fold certain solutions offered by Sherpa Technologies back into Corporate One, retire other services, and make the CUSO inactive. This decision was made after nearly six months of strategic review, where it became apparent that our two organizations were working in similar directions and that this work could be more effectively supported within Corporate One while ensuring we operate as efficiently as possible for our members’ benefit.   

Coming full circle with payments

The original vision for Sherpa was to be an incubator of digital services and solutions for credit unions, enabling next-generation technology and data integration for optimized member digital experiences. Sherpa made great strides toward this vision (outlined below); however, over time, the Sherpa team found that their greatest successes resulted from what credit unions wanted the most: digital payment services that empowered them to enhance their payment offerings and improve their members’ payment experiences.  

With Corporate One already a leader in the payments space and with Sherpa relying on us to share this expertise, it became clear that moving Sherpa back into the Corporate One organization made the most sense. Joining forces means we can refine our focus on payments and that everyone benefits from the corporate operational structure, staff expertise and resources Corporate One has in place in the most efficient and streamlined manner possible.

What this means for our solution offerings

Sherpa delivered on its vision through many innovative accomplishments, and Corporate One will proudly continue to leverage the following capabilities and solutions, so credit unions have best-in-class digital payment experiences to offer their members:

• An innovative and technologically advanced data orchestration hub featuring an open framework for integrating diverse and vetted solutions with credit unions, their cores and various applications/experiences. In other words, we can integrate new and legacy payment systems with digital user experiences and then connect those directly to our members’ cores.
• A real-time payments service facilitating the technical connection to support ISO20022 messaging between a credit union and the RTP^® network (and the FedNow^SM Service when it launches) through a simplified API via the data orchestration hub so credit unions can harness immediate payments opportunities.
• A digital loan payments solution, called Payigy, providing credit unions with an omnichannel offering for streamlined collection of loans.

In addition to developing these solutions, Sherpa partnered with several industry leaders to offer credit unions solutions for the following:

• Identity verification (ID-Pal) 
• Account opening services (CreditSnap, ClickSWITCH) 
• Pre-qualified lending (CreditSnap) 
• Rewards-based checking (BaZing) 

Corporate One will refer the ID-Pal, CreditSnap, ClickSWITCH and BaZing solutions, and credit unions will receive them directly from our partners in the future instead of through us. Additionally, we will perform stringent due diligence on these partners/products and ensure enhanced value is provided to your credit union and your members when leveraging these services. 

We are very proud of the tremendous job the Sherpa team did to better position Corporate One as not only a leader in the payments space but also a digital services innovator. We have welcomed all the employees at Sherpa back into the Corporate One family. Together, we look forward to serving our members with best-in-class digital payments solutions and helping you find the best digital service providers to enhance your member experiences.

Best,