Signature Bank Launches Healthcare Banking and Finance Business Line

Signature Bank launched a new business line with the appointment of a nine-person healthcare banking and finance team. The new private client banking team will provide lending services while garnering deposits to clients within the healthcare arena.

The healthcare banking and finance team will focus on serving for-profit and nonprofit companies that provide healthcare services as well as senior housing owners and operators, hospitals, large physician practices, ambulatory surgery centers, drug and rehabilitation facilities, skilled nursing homes and facilities offering independent living, assisted living and memory care and continuing care retirement communities.

Matthew T. Huber will lead the new business and team as senior vice president and managing group director. In this role, Huber will oversee all aspects of the healthcare banking and finance team, including managing the team’s pipeline and banking activities and building a healthcare-related portfolio spanning both lending and deposit clients.

Huber has 25 years of healthcare banking and finance experience. Recently, he was market manager for healthcare finance at People’s United Bank until it merged with M&T Bank. In that role, he managed and oversaw the healthcare finance business vertical, serving clients throughout New England and the Mid-Atlantic market. Prior to that, he was director of healthcare enterprise strategy – commercial segment at Key Bank in Syracuse, NY. He also spent seven years as senior director and division manager for the commercial healthcare group at First Niagara Bank, also in Syracuse, NY, and was senior vice president and regional manager of the real estate capital healthcare group at Key Bank in Cleveland.

Joining Huber’s team are several experienced banking professionals who also previously worked at People’s United Bank, including:

• Walter Unangst, who will serve as senior vice president and group director at Signature Bank and was formerly a senior vice president and senior relationship manager
• Ken Jamison, who will serve as senior vice president and group director at Signature Bank and was formerly a senior vice president and market manager of capital markets
• Patricia Quint, who will serve as senior vice president and group director at Signature Bank and was formerly a market manager of commercial deposit services
• Ryan Zyskowski, who will serve as vice president and relationship manager at Signature Bank and was formerly a vice president and relationship manager
• Liam Ryan, who will serve as vice president and loan portfolio manager for Signature Bank and was formerly a vice president and portfolio manager
• Kristin Maier, who will serve as assistant vice president and associate loan portfolio manager at Signautre Bank and was formerly an assistant vice president and portfolio manager

Other appointments to the team include Doreen Schafer as vice president and loan administration manager and Eric Halpern as senior vice president and group director. Schafer was previously vice president and senior loan closer at KeyBank, while Halpern previously held the role of first senior vice president and national head of healthcare at Bank Leumi.

“Signature Bank had been seeking the right opportunity to enter the healthcare banking and finance space for years,” Joseph J. DePaolo, co-founder, president and CEO of Signature Bank, said. “Healthcare is a continually evolving and ever-changing industry, as baby boomers come of age, people live longer and medical technology advances. All this places an even greater demand for healthcare services, thereby elevating the opportunity for broader lending and finance services. We identified what we believe to be a tremendous and persistent need for commercial healthcare finance nationwide. The time is right, and we welcome Matt and his team, as they all bring deep healthcare banking and finance expertise to the bank as we launch this new national business line.”

“Signature Bank was looking to develop a de novo healthcare group with the type of specialty my team possesses. The way in which the bank is structured — in terms of its focus on relationship-based banking and its single-point-of-contact approach — was both very impressive and attractive to our team,” Huber said. “Furthermore, the entrepreneurial model is enticing for those of us with strong client relationships and solid credit skills. The working culture of the bank promotes balanced autonomy while also fostering significant opportunities for growth. We are looking forward to the contributions the HBF team will make to the continued success of Signature Bank.”