Ellie Mae : 01.24.18Gold Star Financial Group Announced as Winner of Ellie Mae Encompass Innovation Challenge

Gold Star to Demo Innovative Solution to Improve Loan Appraisal Processes at Ellie Mae Experience 2018 in Las Vegas

PLEASANTON, Calif. - January 24, 2018 - Ellie Mae^® (NYSE: ELLI), the leading cloud-based platform provider for the mortgage finance industry, announces Gold Star Financial Group as the winner of the Ellie Mae Encompass Innovation Challenge. Launched in 2017, the competition invited users of Ellie Mae's Encompass^® to build and submit innovations leveraging the company's Encompass NG Lending Platform^™ and Application Program Interfaces (APIs). Gold Star will demo its solution on the main stage during the General Session Keynote at the Ellie Mae Experience 2018 conference in Las Vegas.

The collaborative competition highlighted the inventive ways mortgage industry professionals are leveraging the lending platform's flexibility and capabilities to improve processes or create solutions to their challenges facing the industry. Entrants were asked to provide their original solutions for using the platform and APIs in ways that help lower the cost of origination, reduce time to close loans, ensure higher quality loans through greater compliance or improve user experience for homebuyers.

Gold Star's winning entry highlighted how the mortgage lending company harnessed Encompass to automate service ordering and streamline their appraisal process, creating a ripple effect in terms of efficiency and accuracy that not only has improved compliance and loan quality, but reduced the time to close and lower overall costs of origination. Additionally, the accuracy and efficiency created by this automation enables Loan Officers to focus on building relationships and trust with borrowers.

'Using Encompass to automate workflow and help enhance our Appraisal Process translates to an improved investor loan delivery timeline and the improved pricing associated with that expedited delivery,' said AJ Franchi, Chief Operating Officer, Gold Star Financial Group. 'Shortening underwriting review of each loan file by roughly 11 minutes in addition to improving post-closing reconciliation decreases overtime and overall manpower expense, ultimately lowering the overall cost of origination.'

Gold Star's Innovation Challenge submission was judged by a panel of Ellie Mae executives, and selected among nine other finalists including: CrossCountry Mortgage, Inc., Eagle Home Mortgage, EverBank, J.G. Wentworth, Mortgage 1, Inc., New American Funding, NVR Mortgage, Paramount Residential Mortgage Group, Inc. and Primary Residential Mortgage, Inc.

'Gold Star and fellow Innovation Challenge nominees represent some of the mortgage industry's top market leaders and innovators,' said Jonas Moe, Senior Vice President of Market Strategy, Ellie Mae. 'These organizations are successfully leveraging Ellie Mae's Encompass NG Lending Platform and APIs to improve quality, efficiency and user experience for their customers and ultimately helping fulfill our mission of providing a true digital mortgage.'

Registration is still open for Ellie Mae Experience 2018. The three-and-a-half-day event will include eight conference tracks, 46 interactive breakout sessions and 12 hands-on training sessions hosted by Ellie Mae experts and industry leaders. To learn more, visit https://experience.elliemae.com

About Ellie Mae

Ellie Mae (NYSE:ELLI) is the leading cloud-based platform provider for the mortgage finance industry. Ellie Mae's technology solutions enable lenders to originate more loans, reduce origination costs, and shorten the time to close, all while ensuring the highest levels of compliance, quality and efficiency. Visit EllieMae.com or call 877.355.4362 to learn more.

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