VantageScore Solutions names trade group exec as new CEO

October 12, 2021

American Banker Online/National Mortgage News

VantageScore Solutions has named Silvio Tavares, a former trade association head and Visa executive, as the new president and CEO of the credit-bureau analytics firm.

Tavares, a lawyer and engineer by training, had been chairman and CEO of the Digital Commerce Alliance, a trade group of banks and technology companies including Bank of America, Discover, MasterCard, Microsoft and Klarna.

He previously was senior vice president and global head of the information products business unit at Visa, as well as senior vice president and general manager of the global information and analytics business at First Data Corp.

Tavares succeeds Barrett Burns, the Stamford, Conn., company’s founding president and CEO, who was named to the newly created role of vice chairman.

VantageScore was developed by Equifax, Experian and TransUnion, which devoted top data scientists to test and develop the firm’s credit model in 2006 based on millions of anonymous files of consumers with little or no credit histories. The company was the first to incorporate rental payments into credit models.

“In many ways, VantageScore was ahead of its time and the market has caught up,” Tavares said in an interview. “This intersection of financial data and technology is going to be the big driver that propels our commerce going forward for the next decade or two.”