A visit to the VINtek website yields a series of firsts owned by the Philadelphia-based automotive financing solutions company. There's a reason, after all, the company refers to itself as the "Lien Machine." When it comes to electronic liens and titles, also known as e-Title or ELT, vehicle identification decoding, title administration and used vehicle valuation, VINtek set the standard in just about every category.

Larry Highbloom founded the company in his basement 20 years ago and has been developing the technology, including software as a service and imaging services, to cash in on and enhance the conversion ever since. Because that process saves paper and money--dropping lenders' cost to process paper titles from $8-12 per account to $1-4 and saving large states big money in document storage--VINtek has continued its growth. In 2010, revenue grew 30 percent, which doubled company revenues since 2008 and now boasts more than 1,600 lenders as customers. The company also signed 700 new clients, a more than four-fold increase in new customer contracts since 2009.

Highbloom, who started out protecting lenders from automobile dealer fraud, received early stage funding from Ben Franklin Technology Partners in 1991 and began working with the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation on converting its liens and titles to an electronic database in 1998. In 2006, PA was the first state to mandate participation in its electronic lien program and 13 other states have followed since. With 36 other states to make the change, VINtek is positioned for even more growth.