CIT Group announced the appointment of James Paterson as vice president of Business Development for CIT Commercial Services, a provider of factoring services in the U.S. He will report directly to Mitch Cohen, executive vice president and western regional manager of CIT Commercial Services.

Paterson has been assisting companies in the middle market achieve their growth capital needs for more than 20 years. During that period, he has worked in both New York and Los Angeles as an investment banker, commercial banker and merchant banker at Credit Suisse, First Boston, GE Capital, Jefferies and Ocean Capital Partners.

“James has extensive industry and transaction experience and I’m excited to welcome him to our team,” said Cohen. “Leveraging CIT’s reputation as one of the leading providers of working capital solutions to the consumer products sector with a deep understanding of the retail and wholesale distribution markets, James will play an important role as we expand the working capital solutions of CIT Commercial Services into adjacent verticals.”