Nashville’s newest unicorn has its first president.
Former Amazon Web Services executive Bob Van Nortwick has been named president of Built Technologies, according to a news release.
The hire comes a little more than a month after Built announced a $125 million round of funding at a $1.5 billion valuation, launching the fintech startup into "unicorn" territory, a buzzy Silicon Valley term for startups with a ten-digit-plus valuation.
The big-dollar valuation was another important mile marker for Nashville’s tech industry, which has rarely seen a non-health-care-related tech startup reach unicorn heights.
Prior to Built, Van Nortwick worked at AWS for more than 10 years as its global general manager and director of the AWS startups team, according to the release, and was responsible for all of AWS’ more than 100,000 startup customers globally. He is also the co-founder of Square 1 Bank and held executive positions at Comerica Bank and Bank of America.
In the newly created role, Van Nortwick will lead Built’s business units and product organization, according to the release, including payment systems and financial products.
“As we continue to execute against our long-term strategy to expand and scale the Built platform and take the company into the global market, we saw an immediate advantage to adding Bob and the position of President to our leadership team,“ Chase Gilbert, cofounder and CEO of Built, said in the release. “His interest in construction and impressive background in technology, startups, and banking overall is ideal for this phase of our growth.”
Founded in 2015, Built’s platform works as a middle-man for those in construction lending in an effort to simplify the way borrowers and contractors access cash from lenders and managing loan disbursements.
Built’s platform has been used to manage the financing of more than $135 billion in construction projects, according to the release, representing 200,000 commercial, homebuilder, land development and residential projects. It’s lender clients include U.S. Bank Housing Capital Company, Fifth Third Bank, Citizens Bank, Regions Bank and Pinnacle Financial Partners. Its contractor and developer clients include Lennar Multifamily Communities, 84 Lumber, PRG Group, Homebound, NPR and Genesis Homes.
“The passion Built has for helping construction industry stakeholders improve their outcomes as they build the world around us is unmatched,” said Van Nortwick. “It’s an exciting time to join the company, and I am looking forward to helping our customers create and unlock value from our platform and products, alongside leading organizational growth at Built as we continue our rapid growth.”
