FORT WORTH, Texas -

After spending several weeks soaking in as many company details as possible, Digital Recognition Network’s new chief executive officer is traveling full bore, meeting with lenders and agents in attempt to push the license plate recognition technology operation to “the next level.”

Chris Metaxas officially became DRN’s top boss back on Dec. 1, and used that time between then and when he spoke with Auto Remarketing this morning to galvanize strategy to make the company a top service provider for auto finance institutions, forwarding companies and repossession agents.

“They’ve built something really great here,” Metaxas told Auto Remarketing. “I wanted to make sure coming in that I wasn’t disruptive and could be as productive. Any time a new guy comes into an organization, you want to make sure that good prevails.

“The team reacted really well. The company and customers are all very positive. We did a good job positioning and taking that next step for our growth,” he continued.

How is DRN positioning itself for growth? Metaxas first shared the approach he is taking with lenders.

“DRN is a solution to deliver greater and more productive asset value that hits their balance sheets in a positive way,” Metaxas explained. “Our network — the value network we’ve created and this is really important — allows lenders to take advantage of a network effect of using technology to be able to accelerate their time to the recovery of their asset. It’s really big.

“We deliver that benefit which drives a more effective bottom line, which drives lower risk, which drives more profitable organizations,” he stressed. “My message is squarely focused on driving profitability for the auto finance customer.”

Metaxas acknowledged that lenders haven’t necessarily considered their recovery divisions as ones that can assist with profits.

“Auto finance customers tend to look at this function as an expense-line driven function,” Metaxas pointed out to Auto Remarketing. “They don’t look at it as a return on asset-driven function. My goal is to change that mental state. I’m looking for auto finance executives to have the conversation about using technology and this network we have a disruptive force to change the dynamics of this legacy approach they’ve used for years in their business.”

When Metaxas isn’t discussing what DRN can do for lenders, he’s out communicating with repo agents who may or may not already be in the company’s network.

“For the agents, it’s time for them to step up the conversation and focused on the same thing,” Metaxas emphasized. “They need to be talking to their lenders around dollars and how they can recover dollars, because they’re in a position using our technology and the network we’ve built to not only recover dollars on the back end post-charge off, but also on the front end.”

All told, Metaxas considers the entire recovery industry to be quite similar to what happens within the investment community.

“If you really think about what our technology does and what our agent network brings to the table, it brings to the repossession side of the business a dynamic that’s very similar to the brokerage industry,” Metaxas began.

“If you think of an assignment very much like an order of stock, my agent in the network represent all of the brokers,” he continued. “Based on their skills, capabilities and how they drive determine their ability to get that asset recovered quickly just like a broker can have clients lined up with the money to go make stock buys. The agents are in a position to create a more efficient realization on that assignment these lenders have out there.

“I’ve got to get people believing and seeing how putting DRN’s technology on the front end actually accelerates the delivery of the asset from a time, value and risk standpoint,” Metaxas went on to say.

Metaxas arrived at DRN after a long career as a senior executive with LexisNexis in New York. He thinks his background with a wide array of database metrics made the transition to DRN easier.

“When you think about things in the auto finance market, underwriting is very much a risk mitigation function,” Metaxas explained. “Repossessions are very much a broad recovery function. There is a lot of alignment with what I did at LexisNexis regarding understanding the data around people, who they are, their movements and how to look at that to gain insight so an organization could take action.

“The ability to position solutions — in this case, in the auto finance industry — so they can take action that can drive more productivity from a financial standpoint is the bottom line,” he added. “I believe very much what we do in our mission is all about driving a faster incentive value for a return on their asset as well as mitigating the risk of loss.”

Metaxas reiterated to Auto Remarketing what DRN’s LPR 2.0 is designed to do. The cloud-based solution can allow all affiliates in DRN’s network to participate in the repossession assignment simultaneously and can allow the lender to take all of their assignments and make available to thousands of points of presence at the same time.

“Today the majority of the business has been focused on putting assignments after they’ve been charged-off,” Metaxas acknowledged. “In 2012, it’s about putting the assignments on the front end. We’re seeing more organizations begin to do that. These are the folks could be in the position of transforming their auto finance companies to what I’ll say is the 22nd century because we need to get way beyond where we are today.

“We need to get out of the legacy approach,” Metaxas stressed to Auto Remarketing. “There are some people out there who are willing to do that and I’m really impressed with those folks on the auto finance side, willing to dip their foot in the water and look beyond the confines of expense management and look more at profit maximization as the way they run their shop.”

Possibly arriving during the third quarter, Metaxas indicated that DRN will roll out several solution improvements.

“It will take our game up several levels. Nobody will have what we’ll have. People are going to be really, really impressed both on the client side and the agent side,” Metaxas projected.

With all of the enthusiasm Metaxas has about the present state of DRN and its future, he was quick to point out how the company was created by former CEO Cort DeHart, who departed to pursue other opportunities.

“I am very thankful for what he created in the four years he was here. What Cort built, we’re taking to another level. Cort moved on to pursue other options in this space. Cort is an entrepreneur. He knows how to take things from nothing and build them into something. That’s what he’s doing again in this market,” Metaxas stated.

“We’re very positive about the legacy Cort left. I’ve got something really good here to make incredible,” Metaxas concluded.