Members of Ally Financial celebrate the firm’s listing on the New York Stock Exchange in April 2014.
Ally Financial traces its roots back to 1919 when General Motors started an auto-financing subsidiary, then known as GMAC. The firm is now approaching its 100-year anniversary, but it is in many ways a new company after a series of moves that recently culminated with its listing on the New York Stock Exchange in April 2014. Rebranded as Ally Financial in 2010, the reborn and remade company is focusing on its auto finance origins and looking to reduce costs and boost profitability during a new period of growth.
Detroit native Bill Solomon is Ally’s group vice president and general counsel. He’s been with GM, GMAC, or Ally since 1988 and served as a legal advisor during and after the recession, which hit financial-services firms hard. Now, he leads a legal team dedicated to supporting Ally’s strategic expansion and efforts to improve shareholder value. In 2006, GM sold a controlling interest of the company to Cerberus, and Solomon’s predecessor retired. Since then, he’s been working to centralize management while maintaining nine satellite offices to make the legal staff more efficient and capable of supporting what has become a complex financial holding company. Ally has approximately 7,000 employees and is a leading automotive financial-services company with a top direct banking franchise, as well as a corporate finance unit that provides financing to middle-market companies.
Over the past eight years, Solomon has worked to synchronize and coordinate legal efforts across those diverse business units. This fits in with overall company goals to streamline its operations and focus on its core auto finance and direct banking franchises. Over the past two and a half years, Ally has sold its international operations and all non-core assets. The legal department has decreased three-fold with current staff largely dedicated to auto finance and the bank, with the remainder providing legal services to the other business units and functions like HR, procurement, and capital markets, as well as handling record management, licensing, and corporate secretarial duties.