Equipment Leasing and Finance Association - Equipping Business for Success

Robert Cohen

Partner
Moritt Hock & Hamroff LLP

Robert S. Cohen is a Partner at Moritt Hock & Hamroff LLP, with offices located on Long Island and in New York City. With over 26 years of experience in all facets of the equipment leasing and asset based lending industries, Bob's practice is devoted to commercial litigation, creditors' rights, corporate transactions and bankruptcy matters. Bob has particular experience in the documentation of financial transactions, enforcement of equipment leases and secured loans, as well as the negotiation of workouts and resolutions. He frequently serves as a speaker and author on various topics relating to the leasing industry.

Bob devotes a significant portion of his time as an active member of ELFA, serving on its Credit and Collections Management Committee, as well as participating as a presenter at its various conferences, including its 2013 Legal Forum Conference, and 2012 and 2011 Credit and Collections Conferences where he served as a speaker at sessions on litigation strategy, electronic discovery, forbearance agreements, lease/secured transaction documentation and legal updates in the finance industry. He is also an active member of NEFA, serving on both its Legal and Education Committees and participating as a presenter at its annual conferences.

In 2012, Bob also presented at the Association of Commercial Finance Attorneys' CLEW Conference. In addition to his professional endeavors, Bob is an active supporter of the Special Olympics of New York-Long Island Region, where he has served as a Chairman of its Annual Gold Coast Tour for Champions Golf Outing for the past eleven years.

Troy Kepler

Corporate Counsel
Channel

Brad Peterson

CEO
Channel

Scott Riehl

VP, State Government Relations
Equipment Leasing and Finance Association

Scott Riehl serves as Vice President of State Government Relations for the Equipment Leasing and Finance Association (ELFA), the premier trade association representing 575+ member organizations in the $1 trillion equipment finance sector.

Mr. Riehl joined ELFA in June 2016. He directs and executes all aspects of the association’s state government relations strategy, monitoring and engaging legislation and regulation impacting the industry in all 50 states.

Mr. Riehl brings 24 years of direct issue advocacy, legal and legislative staff experience to ELFA. For 13 years he represented the consumer products industry, including serving as Vice President of State Government Affairs and Associate Counsel at the Grocery Manufacturers Association. Prior to GMA, Mr. Riehl served as a Vice President at Stateside Associates, a full-service state legislative tracking company, where he provided direct political consultation for numerous Fortune 500 companies and D.C.-based trade associations. Previously, Mr. Riehl was a state affairs specialist for the National Rifle Association of America. Immediately prior to joining ELFA, he led the Riehl Group LLC, a political and strategic issue management and consulting firm based in Virginia.

In the legal and state legislative arenas, Mr. Riehl worked in the Washington, D.C., office of Seyfarth, Shaw, Fairweather and Geraldson, where he specialized in the firm’s government and defense contracts practice. Previously, he was on the staff of the Michigan Attorney General. Mr. Riehl began his government relations career in the Michigan Senate, where he served as Counsel and Chief Legislative Aide for two Michigan state senators.

Mr. Riehl has a B.S. in Political Science from the University of Vermont and a J.D. from Thomas Cooley School of Law.

Eli Sethre

CFO
Channel

Eli Sethre has been involved in small-ticket commercial finance since 2004. He joined Channel in 2016 where he serves as Chief Financial Officer and oversees the administrative, financial and risk management operations, and reporting for the company. Prior to his current role, Eli was CEO and founder of aFundia, a data analytics and modeling firm he founded in 2014 which worked closely with Channel. Eli served in senior roles at CAN Capital in Sales and Marketing, Finance and Business Planning, and Risk Analytics. There he was responsible for risk management, portfolio performance, scoring model development, annual budgeting and reforecasts, ensuring financial objectives were met. Eli graduated from Kennesaw State University and was chosen as the 2004 University Scholar in Economics.

Moorari Shah

Partner
Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLC

Moorari K. Shah is Partner in the Orange County and San Francisco offices of Sheppard Mullin. He represents banks, equipment finance companies, fintechs, mortgage companies, auto lenders, and other non-bank financial institutions in transactional, licensing, regulatory compliance, and government enforcement matters covering mergers and acquisitions, consumer and commercial lending and leasing, and supervisory examinations and enforcement actions involving state and federal agencies.

Mr. Shah received his J.D. from Boston University School of Law (cum laude) and his B.A. from Duke University. He is a Certified Information Privacy Professional (CIPP) and a certified Six Sigma Black Belt.

Todd Wainwright

SVP - Head of Commerce & Strategic Partnerships
Amur Equipment Finance

Thomas Ware

President
Tom Ware Advisory Services, LLC

Now an independent analytics, risk, and credit scoring consultant, Tom Ware was for 18 years Senior Vice President of Analytics & Product Development at PayNet, which was acquired by Equifax in 2019. In that role he was responsible for the development of PayNet’s MasterScore and probability of default models, which have been used by hundreds of lenders to help decision millions of commercial loan and lease applications worth over $300 billion. He was also responsible for creating loss forecasting models, peer lender performance benchmarking and Strategic Business Reviews, and for developing a wide variety of research about commercial lending that appeared regularly at ELFA conferences as well as in the Wall Street Journal, American Banker, RMA Journal, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, Crain’s, Bloomberg, Reuters, AP, CNBC, ABC News, Congressional Testimony, and the published papers of two Federal Reserve Governors.

Prior to PayNet, Tom had 17 years’ experience as a lender with banks and finance companies, including as General Manager of a billion-dollar division of J.I. Case/CNH Capital, and as Chief Credit Officer & Senior Vice President, Operations of Rockford Industries, a NASDAQ-traded finance company that was acquired by American Express. Tom began working with commercial credit scoring in the mid-1990s, when he was responsible for bring scoring to a mid-sized bank, and within a few years developed scores that were auto-decisioning 40% of applications under $100,000. Previously he founded Sequa Credit Corporation, later acquired by Hypercom. Tom began his career with a Boston management consulting firm that became the New England office of Oliver Wyman.

Tom is Chairman of the Equipment Leasing & Finance Foundation’s Research Committee, and is a member of the Foundation’s Board of Trustees and its Executive Committee. He is a long-time member of the ELFA’s Credit & Collection’s Committee, and previously served on ELFA’s Small Ticket Business Council, and on the Board of Governors of RMA’s Washington D.C. & Maryland chapter. He is a frequent contributor to Equipment Leasing Today and the Monitor, where he published, as a three-part series of articles, “The 12 Secrets of Commercial Credit Scoring.” The ELFA selected him as the 2021 recipient of the Michael J. Fleming Distinguished Service Award, for contributions to the Association and the industry. Tom graduated with Distinction in Mathematical Economics from Dartmouth College, and has an MBA from Harvard Business School.