Our Team
Cerebro Capital seeks to transform the way credit facilities are analyzed, managed, and sourced by offering comprehensive corporate loan management software and services.
With world-class security, and data-driven technology Cerebro streamlines redundant processes and offers visibility to all debt stakeholders including finance teams, lenders and intermediaries.
Improving Corporate Loan Management
Throughout his career in corporate finance, Cerebro Capital Founder and CEO Matthew Bjonerud noticed mid-sized companies faced difficulties sourcing and managing loans.
As Matt explains to The Baltimore Sun, “No company has a sense of how much they can borrow without calling 30 lenders and handing out their information to each of them.” Similarly middle market lenders spend wasted hours chasing borrowers that might never pass their credit committee requirements.
Smaller businesses can use any number of working capital platforms for loan sizes below $1MM. Large enterprises have access to investment banks and the Bloomberg terminal to source complex debt transactions over $100MM. But middle market companies have traditionally had to acquire capital markets data strictly through existing lender relationships or regional brokers, through time-consuming and often ineffective loan application processes.
Cerebro Capital was formed in late 2017 to solve these market inefficiencies for middle market corporate borrowers and lenders.
Our Values
Predictability and Intuitiveness
Predictability and Intuitiveness
Excellence and Trust
Excellence and Trust
Innovation and Knowledge
Innovation and Knowledge
Data Driven and Accessible
Data Driven and Accessible
Leadership
At Cerebro Capital, our commitment to innovation continues as we work with our partners to provide intuitive, user-friendly solutions to commercial lending’s largest problems. In order to do this, we’ve assembled an experienced team of multifaceted experts who continuously work to change the commercial lending landscape. Learn more about our leadership team below or see our open positions.
Matthew Bjonerud
Founder & CEO
Matt has broad experience across many areas of corporate finance especially across debt and equity transactions. Most recently, with Laureate Education—a multi-billion dollar company with operations across 25 countries— Matt worked as part of the corporate finance team that ushered the company through $3.5 billion of transactions including Laureate’s IPO—the world’s first Public Benefit Corporation IPO. Prior to Laureate, Matt was a Vice President within the PNC Corporate Banking Group. He was responsible for growth and management of large-scale corporate and public finance portfolios.
Matt also served as the President of At Jacobs Well (AJW), a nonprofit that is the only exclusive provider of housing to the mentally ill homeless in Baltimore City. He is a graduate of Georgetown University McDonough School of Business.
Kevin Dieter
Chief Technology Officer
Kevin has over 25 years of experience designing and developing complex applications. Prior to joining Cerebro Capital, Kevin served as Chief Technology Officer at ExpertConnect, an expert network company serving the financial services industry. There he architected, designed, and built the core software platform products and services that were used by all employees, clients, and partners. Additionally, he co-founded Megree, an enterprise social network built on patented technology enabling enterprise users to discover connections. And, he founded iSwimFaster, an online software solution for competitive swimmers and coaches. Kevin graduated from Stanford University with a BS in Computer Systems Engineering. He is a veteran of the U.S. Air Force, serving as a space & ground systems acquisition officer at the Space & Missile Systems Center.
Chris Dalo
Executive Vice President
Chris has over 30 years of experience building, growing and leading commercial lending businesses at banks, non-banks, and Fintechs both in the US and Internationally. He began his career at GE in their premier Engineering and Leadership Development Programs and soon after moved to GE Capital. There he worked in various roles including Product Development in Consumer Finance, Mergers and Acquisitions in Corporate Finance, as well as General Manager roles in Debt Restructuring – Southeast Asia and Working Capital Trade Finance. He moved to Standard Chartered Bank to become the Global Chief Commercial Officer – Commercial Banking and prior to joining Cerebro led Sales, Business Development, and Digital Partnerships at InterNex Capital, a Fintech SMB Lender. He holds both a Bachelor’s degree and Master’s Degree in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.
Team
Board Members
Doug Becker
Mr. Becker is a lifelong entrepreneur, investor, and operator. In 1983 he co-founded Sterling Partners; since then the firm has become a leading investor across many industries, having made over 80 investments over the years. Sterling Partners, based out of Chicago, IL currently has over $2.5 billion of assets under management.
Kevin Hoffberg
Over the past forty years, Mr. Hoffberg has been a consultant, entrepreneur, and senior executive, with a focus on financial services. Since 1980, he was a co-founder of three start-ups (in addition to the consulting and training companies he founded). From 2010 to 2016 he was the Managing Director of Marketing for the Private Client Services business at Russell Investments. Kevin is now a Venture Partner at Ulu Ventures.
Jim McGuire
Mr. McGuire’s background includes 16 years of leading a software-focused private equity firm. He has held executive positions, including CEO level, in the technology and software industry and early in his career was in commercial lending with a major U.S. bank. He has served on numerous public and private company boards, including Laureate Education, Inc. and Digital Insight Corporation. Digital Insight is now an NCR Corporation company.
- info@cerebrocapital.com
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12 W Madison St.
Baltimore, MD 21201