LONDON, Feb 19 (Reuters) - OakNorth Bank, a new Britishbanking venture, plans to open for business this summer,offering finance to small businesses and savings products toretail customers, it said on Thursday.
OakNorth will join a number of new entrants to the industry,looking to challenge the dominance of Britain's "Big Four"lenders, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds Banking Group, Barclays and HSBC.
OakNorth has been founded by Rishi Khosla and Joel Perlman,who set up financial research firm Copal Amba before selling itto Moody's. It plans to lend over 1 billion pounds ($1.5billion) to businesses over the next few years and willdifferentiate from rivals by offering loans secured againstassets not limited to property.
"When smaller growth companies have tried to access loans,they have often been refused, required security against propertyor been served at a glacial pace," said Khosla, who will be thebank's chief executive.
OakNorth will offer loans through relationship managers atregional offices, initially in London and Manchester.
British lawmakers and regulators are keen to stimulatecompetition and new rules have been introduced easing thecapital requirements for start-up banks and speeding up theprocess of obtaining a banking licence.
Other recently launched British "challenger banks" includeAldermore