Equipment Leasing and Finance Association - Equipping Business for Success

Chelsey Barron

Senior Vice President
LEAF Commercial Capital Inc.

Chelsey Barron serves as VP, Sales Operations for LEAF Commercial Capital. As a legacy VAR Technology Finance employee, she has served on several internal committees on the merger transition with LEAF Commercial Capital. Chelsey currently oversees and manages account management and sales support teams. Her role is focused on implementing better efficiencies from beginning of the sales cycle throughout the life of the lease while also creating unique finance solutions. Chelsey currently serves on the ELFA’s Operations and Technology committee.

Eric Bunnell CLFP

President
Arvest Equipment Finance

Andy Fishburn CLFP

Senior Vice President of Public Policy
Equipment Leasing & Finance Association

Jae Jang

Senior Policy Advisor to Rep. French Hill
U.S. House of Representatives

Alberto Rossi PhD

Hachigian Family Professor and Director, Future of Work Initiative
Georgetown University

Gaurav Shukla

Partner
Deloitte

Shelly Tauer CLFP

SVP, Head of EF Product Management & Strategic Initiatives
U.S. Bank

Shelly has been with U.S. Bank for 30 years.  She began her career as an underwriter in 1994 with Lyon Financial, a small ticket leasing company that was later acquired by U.S. Bank in September 2000.  She has held a variety of positions all within U.S. Bank Equipment Finance including Special Projects, Collections Management, Sales, Operations Manager, Customer Integration and Support Manager, Project Manager, Security Manager and System Technology Manager.  She continues to oversee the Security and System Technology teams with added responsibilities as of 2022 to include Project Management, Professional Development and Training, Modeling and Analytics and EF Applications teams. She is currently a member of the ELFA's (Equipment Leasing Finance Association) Research Committee and the Operations and Technology Planning Committee and earned her CLFP (Certified Leasing Finance Professional) Certification in 2018.

Shelly and her husband, Bill, have 3 grown children Abby (husband Josh), Lexi and Jake along with 2 grandchildren, Grayson (3) and Saelah (1).  They are avid local and MN sports fans and cherish time with their grandchildren as well as family and friends enjoying water sports, pontoon rides and campfires at their lake home on Lake Shetek.

William Verhelle

CEO
QuickFi

Bill is the Founder of Innovation Finance USA (QuickFi) and First American Equipment Finance.

Innovation Finance® is the creator of QuickFi®, a patented, self-service equipment financing platform incorporating A.I., blockchain, facial recognition, and the latest mobile and cloud technologies.

QuickFi® facilitates business equipment financing transactions that previously took days or weeks in three minutes, 24/7/365, from anywhere.

Several of the world’s leading global business equipment manufacturers selected QuickFi® to enable faster, more profitable equipment sales, combined with a better and more transparent customer experience.

QuickFi enables banks and OEMs to transition from a legacy business model to an end-to-end, AI-agent, EMBEDDED LENDING model in less than 30 days, with no long-term commitment and no upfront cost.

Bill previously served as the cofounder and CEO of First American Equipment Finance (from its launch in 1996 until 2015).

While a student at Cornell Law School in 1996, Bill founded First American with his long-time friend and business partner, Guy Klingler. Bill led the company as CEO for twenty years. Today, First American is one of the 50 largest US bank lenders in the US Equipment Finance Industry and is owned by the Royal Bank of Canada.

Bill has J.D. from Cornell Law School (’98), an MBA from the Anderson Business School at UCLA (’92) and a Bachelor of General Studies degree from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor (’88).

Bill is a member of the New York Bar and is admitted to practice in the New York Third District, the New York Court of Appeals, and the U.S. Supreme Court.

In 2009 Bill served as the Chairman of the ELFA in Washington DC.  Bill and Cyndee Verhelle reside in Naples, FL.