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First Federal Bank Announces Agreement to Sell Third Party Origination Division to Mortgage Forward, a CUSO in the Great Lakes Credit Union Family of Companies

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LAKE CITY, Fla. and CHICAGO, June 5, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — First Federal Bank, headquartered in Florida, and Mortgage Forward, in Illinois, jointly announced today that they have signed a definitive agreement for Mortgage Forward to acquire First Federal’s Third-Party Origination (TPO) division, including QRL Financial.

The TPO division will augment Mortgage Forward’s long-term strategy to expand its national mortgage lending platform and strengthen support for clients seeking competitive, borrower-focused mortgage solutions. Through the acquisition, the division will have additional resources to continue and expand support for new and existing clients.

“We are pleased that this agreement allows our talented and dedicated team supporting TPO clients and institutions to continue to flourish,” said John Medina, President and CEO of First Federal Bank. “First Federal’s 2026 strategic plan emphasizes efficiency and execution which includes a strong commitment to the retail mortgage market. This agreement allows us to hone our focus.”

With the acquisition of the TPO group, Mortgage Forward will better serve TPO clients by offering additional technology and expanded products. Mortgage Forward will continue to invest in digital solutions coupled with CUSO expertise.

“This acquisition strengthens Mortgage Forward’s commitment to delivering innovative mortgage options for TPO clients. We are excited to welcome the talented First Federal Bank team and build on their strong foundation for future growth,” said Chip Adkins, President of Mortgage Forward.

With growth-oriented leadership, the company and its new division will continue to be recognized as best-in-class in the industry.

“This acquisition aligns with our vision for Mortgage Forward and our commitment to supporting credit unions and all mortgage partners nationwide. Together, we will expand our capabilities while maintaining the service and relationships our partners value,” says Michael Abraham, Chief Strategy Officer of Great Lakes Credit Union.

The parties anticipate this transaction to close in the third quarter of 2026.

About First Federal Bank & QRL Financial Services

First Federal Bank, headquartered in Lake City, FL, is a leading financial institution committed to serving the needs of its customers and communities. With banking locations across the southeast, First Federal Bank is a community-owned bank that provides a wide range of consumer and commercial banking solutions, services, and loans. QRL Financial Services provides mortgage solutions to financial institutions nationwide, out of Madison, WI. With over $4.4 billion in assets, First Federal’s family of brands has a steadfast focus on innovation and customer satisfaction. The bank has been consistently recognized with an “Excellent” rating from BauerFinancial, Inc. for over 20 years. Newsweek named First Federal the “Best Regional Bank” for 2024, 2025, and 2026. To learn more, visit www.ffbf.com.

Member FDIC. Equal Housing Lender.

About Great Lakes Credit Union (GLCU) 

Founded in 1938 and headquartered in Northern Illinois, Great Lakes Credit Union is banking for a greater good. As a not-for-profit financial cooperative with more than $1.4 billion in assets, GLCU is proud to serve more than 105,000 members in Chicagoland and surrounding areas, and to give back to its members and communities through education, volunteerism, and partnerships. Learn more at www.glcu.org

About Mortgage Forward

Mortgage Forward, LLC is a credit union service organization in the Great Lakes Credit Union Family of Companies specializing in nationwide mortgage solutions. The organization helps credit unions, financial institutions, and originators expand mortgage offerings, strengthen operational efficiency, and deliver exceptional experiences across the full lending lifecycle. Learn more at www.mortgagefwd.com.

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SOURCE First Federal Bank

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Vobile Signs Strategic Cooperation and Commercial Agreements with UNN to Build AI Factories in Brunei Darussalam

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SANTA CLARA, Calif., Sept. 4, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Vobile, a global leader in digital content protection and transaction services, has signed strategic cooperation and commercial agreements with Unified National Networks Sdn Bhd (UNN), an integrated national telecommunication network operator of Brunei Darussalam.

Christopher Phan, Acting Chief Executive Officer of UNN, and Yangbin Wang, Chief Executive Officer of Vobile, Inc., signed the agreements at a ceremony held at UNN’s Tungku Submarine Cable Landing Station on September 3, 2026. The ceremony was witnessed by Yang Mulia Haji Hairul Mohd Daud bin Haji Abd Karim, Deputy Permanent Secretary (Infocommunications), Ministry of Transport and Infocommunications, and UNN Board Director.

“The development of AI-ready infrastructure is of critical importance, not only for our two organizations but also for the future growth of Brunei’s digital economy,” said Heiko Trost, Chief Digital Officer of UNN, at the signing ceremony. “We view this relationship with Vobile as far more than a conventional customer-provider engagement. We see it as a partnership built on shared ambition, innovation and mutual success. Together, we have the opportunity to create meaningful value for Brunei, strengthen the nation’s digital capabilities, and explore new opportunities across the region.”

“DreamMaker helps film and television studios, independent producers and creators use AI technologies to create video entertainment while protecting their intellectual property and finding new ways to generate revenue from their work. This is especially important as AI transforms the global creative industry,” said Ben Smith, Executive Vice President of Vobile. “By combining UNN’s infrastructure with Vobile’s AI capabilities, we can help establish Brunei as a leading AI economy in Southeast Asia while delivering sustainable economic growth for the nation.”

UNN’s new AI-capable data center, designed with liquid cooling and high power density to support NVIDIA’s latest GPU systems, will allocate 25MW of capacity to Vobile. An additional 25MW is reserved for Vobile’s future expansion. This enables Vobile to run AI factories that scale its DreamMaker platform and related services to meet growing demand from clients including film and television studios, independent producers, and content creators.

About Vobile

Vobile is the global leader in digital content protection and transaction services, trusted by the world’s premier entertainment companies, platforms, music labels, sports leagues, and publishers. Using AI technologies, Vobile’s solutions make creative content more valuable. Founded in Silicon Valley, Vobile has operations across North America, Asia, Australia, and Europe. For more information, visit www.vobile.com.

Contact:
Vobile
PR@vobile.com

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SOURCE Vobile, Inc.

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MongoDB, Inc. to Present at Upcoming Investor Conferences

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NEW YORK, Sept. 4, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — MongoDB, Inc. (NASDAQ: MDB) today announced that it will present at three upcoming investor conferences:

Citi 2026 Global TMT Conference. The presentation is scheduled for Wednesday, September 9, 2026 at 8:50 AM Eastern Time.Goldman Sachs Communacopia + Technology Conference 2026. The presentation is scheduled for Thursday, September 10, 2026 at 10:10 AM Pacific Time (1:10 PM Eastern Time).Piper Sandler Growth Frontiers Conference. The presentation is scheduled for Tuesday, September 15, 2026 at 11:30 AM Central Time (12:30 PM Eastern Time).

A live webcast of each presentation will be available on the Events page of the MongoDB investor relations website at https://investors.mongodb.com/news-events/events. A replay of the webcasts will also be available for a limited time.

About MongoDB

MongoDB is the real-time, intelligent data platform for modern applications in the multi-cloud and AI era. Headquartered in New York, MongoDB helps organizations move faster, build smarter, and simplify complex architectures on a unified platform for operational data, search, real-time analytics, and AI-powered retrieval, coupled with MongoDB Voyage AI’s industry-leading embedding and reranking models. The platform is available as a fully managed service with MongoDB Atlas or self-managed with MongoDB Enterprise Advanced or Community Edition. Millions of developers and more than 70,000 customers, including approximately 75% of the Fortune 100, rely on MongoDB for their most important customer-facing applications. To learn more, visit mongodb.com

Investor Relations
Jess Lubert
ir@mongodb.com

Media Relations
MongoDB
press@mongodb.com

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SOURCE MongoDB, Inc.

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AI Can Help CIOs Reclaim Capacity as 83% of IT Spend and 66% of Staff Time Go Toward Keeping the Lights On, Says Info-Tech Research Group

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IT teams are expected to drive innovation, strengthen resilience, and support growth while most of their time and budget remain committed to maintaining existing systems and services. Info-Tech Research Group’s recent blueprint, Harness AI to Reduce the Cost and Effort of KTLO in IT Operations, helps CIOs identify where targeted AI investments can reduce the KTLO burden, reclaim capacity for higher-value work, and build practical AI skills.

ARLINGTON, Va., Sept. 4, 2026 /CNW/ — Routine IT operations and maintenance consume 82.6% of IT spend and 66% of IT teams’ time and effort, according to Info-Tech Research Group’s IT Spend & Staffing Benchmarking data. That allocation leaves only a fraction of IT capacity available for new technology initiatives, operational improvements, and transformation.

To help organizations address this imbalance, Info-Tech has published its Harness AI to Reduce the Cost and Effort of KTLO in IT Operations blueprint. The resource helps CIOs identify AI-enabled opportunities to reduce the cost and effort of keeping the lights on (KTLO), quantify their potential value, assess organizational readiness and risk, and build a portfolio of initiatives for launch.

“KTLO has always been treated as an unavoidable tax on IT, but that mindset is outdated,” says Fred Chagnon, principal research director at Info-Tech Research Group. “Targeted AI investments can help CIOs reduce low-value manual work, reclaim budget and staff time, and reinvest both in innovation. The result is an IT organization that runs smarter and has more capacity to deliver value.”

Info-Tech cautions that common cost-cutting responses can deepen the KTLO problem. Running hardware and software beyond end of life can increase technical debt and security risk; using outsourcing primarily as a cost-reduction strategy can overlook its value in reclaiming capacity and accessing specialized expertise; and eliminating growth or transformation initiatives can starve the business of future value.

Five AI Tactics for Reducing KTLO Cost and Effort
Info-Tech’s research identifies five AI-enabled tactics that IT leaders can assess based on their operational priorities, technology environment, and organizational readiness:

Intelligent incident management and AIOps: Detect anomalies, correlate events across operational silos, support predictive maintenance, and automate common remediation activities.Autonomous patch and vulnerability management: Automate patch prioritization, deployment, and verification to reduce manual effort and support more consistent compliance.Smart data classification, cleaning, and curation: Reduce duplicate and outdated data, storage bloat, and manual data management while strengthening the governed data foundation required for AI.Generative AI service desk and conversational self-service: Deflect routine Tier 1 requests, improve access to support, and free service desk staff to focus on more complex work.AI-assisted script, documentation, and code generation: Accelerate scripting and documentation, preserve knowledge about legacy systems, and reduce the effort required to maintain them.

Info-Tech’s Four-Step Framework for AI-Enabled KTLO Reduction
Identifying a potential use case is only the starting point. CIOs also need to understand its expected value, implementation requirements, and organizational risks before committing resources. To guide that evaluation, the Harness AI to Reduce the Cost and Effort of KTLO in IT Operations blueprint applies a four-step assessment process across all five tactics:

Uncover opportunities. Identify manual, repetitive, and resource-intensive KTLO activities that could benefit from AI and automation.Quantify the value. Estimate the labor time and costs associated with each activity, then project potential cost reductions, reclaimed effort, and time to value.Assess readiness and risk. Evaluate organizational constraints such as data quality, integration requirements, process maturity, skills, change readiness, and implementation risk.Blueprint for launch. Define viable initiatives, accountable teams, expected outcomes, and actionable milestones, then consolidate them into a Quantified KTLO Reduction Initiative Portfolio.

KTLO reduction can also serve as a workforce development opportunity. Applying AIOps, automation, and generative AI to familiar, measurable processes gives IT teams practical experience in a controlled environment and prepares them to lead broader AI initiatives across the organization.

The Harness AI to Reduce the Cost and Effort of KTLO in IT Operations blueprint and its supporting Quantified KTLO Reduction Initiative Portfolio provide CIOs with practical guidance for turning assessed opportunities into executive-level investment proposals. By connecting projected cost and effort reductions with readiness, risk, time to value, and implementation milestones, the research helps leaders move KTLO discussions from short-term cost cutting to measurable reinvestment in innovation.

For exclusive and timely commentary from Info-Tech’s experts, including Fred Chagnon, and access to the complete Harness AI to Reduce the Cost and Effort of KTLO in IT Operations blueprint, please contact pr@infotech.com.

About Info-Tech Research Group
Info-Tech Research Group is the “get things done” partner for over 30,000 IT, HR, and marketing leaders worldwide. The fastest growing research and advisory firm, Info-Tech enables leaders to make well-informed decisions and transform their organizations through AI, strategic foresight, step-by-step methodologies, practical tools, industry-leading advisory, and training programs. For nearly 30 years, tens of thousands of private and public organizations have trusted Info-Tech to lead their most important initiatives through periods of change and deliver outcomes that truly matter.

To learn more about Info-Tech’s HR research and advisory services, visit McLean & Company, and for data-driven software buying insights and vendor evaluations, visit the firm’s SoftwareReviews platform.

Media professionals can register for unrestricted access to research across IT, HR, and software, and hundreds of industry analysts through the firm’s Media Insiders program. To gain access, contact pr@infotech.com.

For information about Info-Tech Research Group or to access the latest research, visit infotech.com and connect via LinkedIn and X.

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SOURCE Info-Tech Research Group

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