Wintrust Commercial Finance announced John Benoit joined the company’s direct originations group as vice president of business development.

Benoit will be located in WCF’s south Louisiana office, focusing on direct originations in the Gulf Coast region and will join the national team led by Joe Thompson, executive vice president and COO.

“Wintrust Commercial Finance is truly excited to bring John’s depth and variety of experience to our business,” Thompson said. “The build out of our direct platform is the next step in our growth and having worked with John twice previously, I know he will do a great job in helping us build on our momentum from 2015.”

Benoit brings 17 years of commercial finance experience to WCF. Before joining the team, he was vice president of business development at Regions Equipment Finance.

Wintrust is a financial holding company with approximately $22 billion in assets.