Patent ID: 8606695

Claim:
A computer-implemented business analysis apparatus comprising: a business analysis module programmed for use in association with a small business entity seeking to identify at least one credit product and programmed for executing, by a processor, a business analysis tool in connection with a transaction processor of a decision making engine, wherein the business analysis tool is programmed for: (i) receiving, by a processor, risk data associated with the small business entity, wherein the risk data include: (a) at least one data set including at least one personal credit score associated with the small business entity; (b) at least one data set including at least one debt-to-income value associated with the small business entity; (c) at least one data set including at least one value representing an amount of time that the small business entity has been operating in business; (d) at least one data set including at least one industry type value associated with an industry in which the small business entity operates; and, (e) at least one data set including a corporate entity type value associated with a type of entity through which the small business entity operates; (ii) calculating, by a processor, a separate sub-section risk score for each of the personal credit score, debt-to-income, time in business, industry type, and corporate entity type sub-section risk data sets received by the processor; (iii) calculating, by a processor, an overall risk score associated with the small business entity in response to the calculated sub-section risk scores by aggregating the separate sub-section risk scores into the overall risk score; and, (iv) matching, by a processor, at least one credit product with the small business entity in response to at least the calculated overall risk score or at least a portion of the sub-section risk data.