Led by innovation in financial products and services, the protected financial services industry is now going through a period of change. There is an increasing need for “out of the box” solutions to maintain sustainability in the market.

Radian Group Inc, with a suite of products and services in mortgage insurance, public finance, structured finance and reinsurance focuses on providing credit enhancement solutions to clients, recently roped in S.A.Ibrahim to carry the baton.

Less than 100 days ago S.A.Ibrahim moved from the warm shores of the Bay Area to the East to take over as the Chief Executive Officer at Radian group. Ibrahim known for bootstrapping three disparate ventures into one structure at his previous company Green Point Mortgage lays out his plans for Radian. He identifies innovation, patience and focus to be the key to sustain growth.

Drawing from personal experience early in his career where a new idea was met with much criticism that hampered growth, Ibrahim feels an environment of innovation leads to growth. “An atmosphere of innovation and idea generation, energizes the team, we need to foster the entrepreneurial spirit it creates,” he says.

Known for establishing technical efficiency and innovation at GPM, Ibrahim says there is not much difference between GPM and Radian. “At both Green Point Mortgage and Radian, we have exceptionally smart people, our focus should be in leveraging the talent,” he says. Cultivating a proactive environment is essential he says, “It is important to allow people to generate ideas and implement them with the understanding that not all ideas work,” he adds.

While at GPM, Ibrahim was credited for his leadership during the tough times for the financial sector. He saw GPM rise in origination from $8 billion to $40 billion in five years. “I have learnt the value of things that you should do to be successful and equally important, learnt the value of things that you should not do!” he quips about his role. In a traditional and conservative environment like the financial sector Ibrahim believes in taking risk.

“You are in a business of taking risk, you need to do that,” he says. “Organizations have the tendency to try and add multiple layers to make sure people don’t get into trouble. In many case you are so scared to try that you inhibit creativity and ideas,” he adds.

Ibrahim talks about challenges at Radian and the need for new blood in process and approach in providing solutions. “The external challenge in our core MI business are driven by the fact that the mortgage industry is shifting away from traditional vanilla, Fanny Mae, Freddie Mac products to more innovative alternatives,” he says.

Radian is far more innovative than peers in the industry, with the ability to input certain financial engineering technologies from the financial guarantee business into the MI business and change the way in which risks are attached. Ibrahim calls for leveraging talent and brining in new blood.

“We have to critically examine the missing skill set and import them into the organization,” Ibrahim adds.

Everything in the industry goes through a cycle; it is time for technical innovation in the cycle for the financial sector and many organizations are not as prepared as Radian.

Ibrahim says innovation in the technical approach to find more creative solutions to the customers is the key. “Radian has a long history of success and a vast technical resources, we need to find ways to automate our decision process, to be much faster and efficient to the customer and also not duplicate work,” he says. Radian is known for customizing credit solutions to the lenders. “Radian pioneers in a creative structure for risk sharing and credit swap structures,” he says.

“We should continue to sharpen the technology, the way we leverage the technology and focus on bringing in more ‘out of the box’ solutions and the way which we connect technology with business,” he adds.

Ibrahim acknowledges that innovation is easier said than done. While there are no quick fix solutions for all problems and developing a technology needs more than just talent and resources. He prescribes patience. “Patience with innovation, will be a bigger factor, there is no short cut,” he says.

With innovation in one hand, patience on the other managing a $4.7 billion company is no easy task; drawing from his previous experience at GPM Ibrahim identifies focus. Focus on the things, he says, “Arrive at the handful of things we need to focus on, and work relentlessly on making that happen,” says Ibrahim.

With 27 years of experience and knowledge, a clear agenda of innovation, patience and focus Ibrahim will lead Radian into an era of radiating leadership in the financial sector.


S.A.Ibrahim CEO Radian Group Inc.
A 27 year old Banking vetran, joined Radian as the CEO, in April 2005. The past year has seen tremendous growth for Radian, Ibrahim served as the President and CEO of GreenPoint Mortgage, the nations largest mortgage banking company.
Ibrahim is known for his leadership at Greenpoint where he led through a period of dramatic growth in originations, market share and income, driven by product development, technology leadership and the establishment of successful industry partnerships and entrepreneurial new ventures.
Radian is a $3.95 Billion company, a leading provider of credit enhancement for the global financial and capital markets.