Insurance & Insurtech Investment News – June 2022

Private capital continued to flood the insurance industry in June this year, driving total investments in insurtechs to new heights, even against a backdrop of investors shying away from riskier bets. The growing trend of on-demand health has continued into this month, plus the rise and rise again of start-ups in the insurtech space has seen the likes of Sonr become the key scouting partner for those wishing to pitch to innovation hub, Lloyd’s Lab.

Global Headlines 

Europe: 

• Insurtech firm Artificial Labs, has raised £9.5m in funding from MS&AD Insurance
• Swedish insurtech, Lumera, has acquired Ai-London to enter the UK’s life insurance market
• Oura smart ring, Gucci and Cardio Health partner to advance the luxurious metaverse
• Laka has announced further funding from Porsche Ventures, the VC unit of Porsche AG
• DynaRisk, a London-based Cyber-Insurtech company, closed its seed round raising over $7m

North America: 

• Sana, a health Insurtech firm, has closed a $60m Series B funding round
• US-based LexisNexis Risk Solutions has acquired Flyreel, a property Insurtech that uses AI and machine learning to enable self-service property inspections
• Branch, a start-up offering bundled insurance, has raised $147m in Series C funding
• RPM Ventures leads on funding round with Ohio-based Overalls tech company
• Ledger Investing, an Insurtech start-up, announced that it has raised $75m in Series B funding led by WestCap

Asia Pacific:

• Haxsafe launched in Asia for SMEs to procure easy and accessible insurance solutions
• Insurtech platform Pazcare raises $8.2m funding led by Jafco Asia
• EasySend Godo Kaisha in Tokyo, is set to strengthen EasySend’s presence in the Japanese market
• InsureMO and Unqork join forces to provide speed and agility to the insurance ecosystem

Middle East & Africa:

• VC fund Launch Africa Ventures today is announcing the close of its $36.3m fund
• Kenya’s MotiSure rides on micro-payments to drive personal mobility insurance growth
• Zambian Government receive a symbolic $5.3m in drought insurance pay-out

Central & Latin America 

• R5 Raises $7m in Equity Investment Round for vehicle-related Fintech, Insurtech in Colombia
• Akur8 and Sura announce their collaboration to improve pricing capabilities across Latin America
• Banco Compartamos borrows $50m from IDB Invest to help Female-run SME’s in Mexico

Europe 

Insurtech firm Artificial Labs has raised £9.5m in funding from MS&AD Insurance 

This funding round, led by Force Over Mass Capital, saw participation from existing investors, alongside new investors, including Mundi Ventures and MS&AD Ventures. Artificial Labs (Founder, David King) provides a platform integrating data for both brokers and insurers, where users are able to accept, refer or decline submissions based on risk and value in a value portfolio. Artificial Labs has now grown its strategic partnerships to include Convex, AXIS, Chaucer, Aon, amongst others, and this investment will be used for continued expansion across underwriting.

Source: Artificial Labs

Swedish insurtech, Lumera, has acquired Ai-London to enter the UK’s life insurance market 

Lumera is a platform focused on facilitating the digital transformation of ‘The Prudent Revolution’, meaning the overhaul of Europe’s life and pensions industry. The acquisition of Ai-London marks a new chapter for Lumera, enhancing its presence in the UK market, whilst simultaneously growing its technology portfolio with AI-driven, open and configurable platforms to enhance their customer experience.

Source: RPC

Oura smart ring, Gucci and Cardio Health partner to advance the luxurious metaverse 

Oura smart ring (co-founded by Petteri Lahtela), a personal biometrics device that tracks activity, heart rate, temperature and sleep, has partnered with fashion house Gucci, to release a £820 smart ring, with the strategic partnership program headed up by Hussain Ahamed. But this is not just a fashion statement, this collaboration coincides with the firm’s partnership with Cardio Health (Founded by Daniel Park) a South Korean metaverse gaming and fitness startup, who reward users with CardioCoin or vouchers for insurance. In conjunction, this will see a development of an IoT that connects exercise equipment to a platform which gamifies exercising, enabling users to earn digital currency, and redeem this as vouchers for insurance or healthcare services.

Source: Sonr

Laka has announced further funding from Porsche Ventures, the VC unit of Porsche AG 

Laka, a bicycle insurance firm, has announced further funding from Porsche Ventures, the VC unit of Porsche AG, bringing their Series A funding to a total of $13.5m. With no major European competitor for cycling and e-mobility insurance, this investment allows Laka to become the first-to-market with a highly adaptable and digital business model. Tobias Taupitz, CEO and co-Founder of Laka, says that this new funding will provide the chance for the company to expand into commercial fleet cover across the continent. “Companies who are shifting their fleet to greener transport and e-mobility are underserved by traditional insurers”, Tobias notes, and so Laka are well positioned to become a truly disruptive firm!

Source: Laka

DynaRisk, a London-based Cyber-Insurtech company, closed its seed round raising over $7m 

DynaRisk, a UK-based Cyber-insurtech company, closed its seed round at a time when increased demand for risk management tools are flooding the cyber-security market. DynaRisk is the first intelligence-led cyber-Insurtech provider for both personal and commercial businesses. This Insurtech company allows brokers to develop new business by streamlining renewals and providing over 450 million data points on companies globally. CEO Andrew Martin, says that “being able to offer our clients new ways to protect their policyholders in this increasingly fraught cyber landscape is central to our mission… We couldn’t be happier to have the backing of our investors”.  

Source: PR NewsWire

North America 

Sana, a health insurtech firm, has closed a $60m Series B funding round 

Sana, a health insurtech firm and co-founded by Will Young, has closed a $60 million Series B funding round, amidst a surge in demand for small business health insurance. This new funding allows continued growth for Sana, who has seen their customer base grow 200% over the past-year, and become an available platform to 25% of small businesses across the US. This Series B close has seen Sana raise $107 million in funding to date. This capital from top investors in the insurtech space, evidences Sana’s trajectory towards becoming a disruptive industry leader and challenging the ‘Big 5’ health insurance companies. Original investors Trust Ventures and Gigafund led this round, with Salen Churi, Trust Ventures partner, explaining that “Sana has a revolutionary all-access network so that members can keep their preferred providers as well as telehealth and access to the best health and wellness apps on the market”; with ‘the company improving the health care system and eliminating inefficiencies that strangle the economy.’

Source: Business Wire

LexisNexis Risk Solutions acquires insurtech Flyreel, a platform that uses AI and machine learning to enable self-service property inspections 

US-based LexisNexis Risk Solutions has acquired Flyreel, a property insurtech that uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to enable self-service property inspections. Denver-based Flyreel (CEO, Cole Winans) says its technology offers visibility into both the exterior and interior of properties, which in turn facilitates efficient underwriting renewals and claims processes. Among the benefits, insurers can more effectively determine appropriate premiums for each property, improve loss ratios, identify critical hazards upfront, capture details about insurable assets, and overall simplify the inspection process improving customer satisfaction across the board. 

Source: Insurance Journal

Branch, a start-up offering bundled insurance, has raised $147m in Series C funding 

Branch, a start-up offering bundled insurance, has raised $147m in Series C funding, alongside a $1.05bn valuation, proving critics wrong, and that unsteady markets are not impervious to growth. Branch, led by Steve Lekas, is unique in its offerings of bundled home and auto-insurance through an API and a single-transaction. Not only this, but Branch disrupts the insurance industry further through its partnership with mortgage and security system providers to integrate insurance at the point of sale. Ian Sigalow, co-founder and managing partner at original and continued Branch investor Greycroft, said his firm has backed the Insurtech in every round it has raised ‘since the beginning’, and will continue to do so.

Source: Tech Crunch

RPM Ventures leads on funding round with Ohio-based Overalls tech company 

RPM Ventures leads on funding round with Ohio-based Overalls tech company, to raise $4.6 million and bringing its total funding to $8.6 million. Overalls is creating a personalised and dynamic insurance model for employers across the US to deliver benefits to the modern workforce. Founded in 2021 by Jon Cooper and Emily Johnson at Redesign Health, Overalls’ insurance platform provides three core product areas: Hassle Helper, Pocketbook Protector and Mighty Moments. This huge funding victory follows the industry trajectory towards increasingly customer-centric platforms and user-friendly experiences in across all insurance products.

Source: Businesswire

Ledger Investing has raised $75m in Series B funding led by WestCap

Ledger Investing, an insurtech start-up co-founded by Aymeric Rabot and Samir Shah, announced that it has raised $75m in Series B funding led by WestCap. This new investment brings with it exciting opportunities for the start-up to expand its insurance capital marketplace, data infrastructure offerings and asset management services. Alongside connecting insurance risk with capital, Ledger Investing’s stated aims include ‘bringing unprecedented transparency, standardisation and automation’ into the insurance space. 

Source: Medium

Asia Pacific 

Haxsafe launched in Asia for SMEs to procure easy and accessible insurance solutions 

Chubb and JA Assure announced this month the launch of Haxsafe – a cyber-insurance portal focused on SMEs in Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore. Haxsafe offers an instant quote and policy issuance capability, underwritten by Chubb, with a robust risk management solution. Japhire Gopi, CEO at JA Assure, said, “Haxsafe will be a game changer for SMEs as it simplifies the insurance buying process for small business owners who simply do not have the time and resources to go through lengthy insurance purchase processes. I’m excited to make insurance more accessible to those who need it.”

Source: Taiwan News

Insurtech platform Pazcar raises $8.2m funding led by Jafco Asia

Insurtech platform Pazcare raises $8.2 million in funding led by Jafco Asia, at a $48 million valuation. Founded in 2021 by Sanchit Malik and Manish Mishra, Pazcare says it will use the funding to improve its product line and expand its solutions for employee benefits and group healthcare schemes. This B2B platform has continued from its successful Series A funding, with existing investors 3one4 Capital and Beenext returning to participate. Sanchit Malik said, “we believe health and life insurance penetration will be employer-driven and we want to play an important role in providing world-class benefits to Indian employees.”

Source: Economic Times

EasySend Godo Kaisha in Tokyo is set to strengthen EasySend’s presence in the Japanese market 

EasySend, an insurtech company focused on the digitalisation of the insurance sector and led by Tal Daskal, has established a Japanese entity, EasySend Godo Kaisha, in Tokyo. The aim is to further expand EasySend’s customer base and partnership with companies in Japan to promote the digitalisation of the financial industry as a whole. This growth will seek to leverage its knowledge and experience in the global market, while addressing Japanese laws and market needs. Accelerated by the Covid-19 pandemic, industries the world-over have been strengthening remote and non-traditional channels by digitising and automating procedures of day-to-day transactions. EasySend seeks to continue this trend across the finance industry, and will use its new entity to work effectively within the Asia Pacific region.

Source: IBS Intelligence

InsureMO and Unqoek join forces to provide speed and agility to the insurance ecosystem

InsureMO, with its Open API middleware platform, and Unqork (led by Sumit Malhotra), providing an enterprise no-code platform, join forces to deliver speed and agility to the insurance ecosystem. This is a revolutionary move at a time when challenges pertaining to legacy footprints and data silos remain a huge blocker to industry progress. InsureMO is the largest insurance middleware platform in the region, which enables various use cases across 30 countries globally. Powering more than $20 billion in premiums per year, Unqork provides complex software solutions through its codeless architecture, enabling enterprises to pivot towards internal innovation. This collaboration will enhance the capability of insurers, brokers, agents, MGAs and insurtech start-ups when handling high volumes and speeds of data influx in today’s digital insurance marketplace.

Source: PR Newswire

Middle East and Africa 

VC fund Launch Africa Ventures today is announcing the close of its $36.3m fund 

Pan-African venture capitalist fund Launch Africa Ventures, announced the closing of its $36.3 million fund in June. This fund has provided over 108 start-ups across 21 African countries with funding since its first close in September 2020. Fintech contributes heavily to Launch Africa’s portfolio; comprising over 38% of its total invested assets. The rest include e-commerce and marketplaces (16%), health tech (13%), logistics and mobility (12%), data analytics/AI (11%) and Edtech (7%).

Source: Tech Crunch

Kenya’s MotiSure rides on micro-payments to drive personal mobility insurance growth 

Kenya’s MotiSure is seeking to finally close the gap between insurance covers and affordability across the nation. This start-up, which targets motorcycle taxi operators and users of public transport, is building an insurance model around daily micro-payments for personal accident covers. “We are providing safety nets through insurance at affordable prices, and through easy to access channels,” notes MotiSure’s CEO & co-founder, Joel Macharia. The Micro Insurance Company (formerly MicroEnsure), which has operations in many emerging markets, is the start-up’s underwriter and key supporter of its funding rounds.

Source: Tech Crunch

Zambian Government receive a symbolic $5.3m in drought insurance pay-out 

African Risk Capacity Group (ARC) and African Development Bank provide drought insurance pay-out to Zambian Government, for the insurance plan taken under the Africa Disaster Risk Financing Programme Multi-Donor Trust Fund. Presented by representatives from the ARC, the insurance pay-out will aid in the country’s recovery from the extreme drought event during 2021/2022. Zambia’s Acting President, Her Honour W.K Mutale Nalumango, welcomed the pay-out and said “this will enable the timely emergency response activities in communities affected by drought, through the provision of cash transfers and food assistance.” She continued, “I urge other organisations such as the World Food Programme to come on board to help expand the ARC insurance coverage in Zambia by partnering with my government to take up replica and micro insurance.” 

Source: Reinsurance News

Central & Latin America 

R5 Raises $7m in Equity Investment Round for vehicle-related Fintech, Insurtech in Colombia 

R5, a Colombian provider of fintech and insurtech services, raised $7 million in an investment round led by Germany-based Global Founders Capital. Also participating were US-based Accion Venture Lab, Costa Rica-based Carao Ventures, US-based Endeavor Catalyst and Chile-based Magma Partners. R5 harnesses AI to issue car insurance and loans using vehicles as collateral in Colombia. Fernando Sucre, CEO of R5, said, “We are very proud of the growth rates achieved throughout the past three years. As to our loans, we plan to close 2022 with five times the disbursement volumes achieved in 2021.”

Source: MicroCapital

Akur8 and Sura announce their collaboration to improve pricing capabilities across Latin America 

Sura has partnered with Akur8 to improve its pricing capabilities on personal auto lines across Argentina, Chile and Colombia. Through this new partnership, Akur8 reinforces its presence in Latin America, and further accelerates its wider regional and global expansion. Akur8’s solution empowers pricing teams to make better decisions more efficiently, by automating rate modelling using AI technology and leveraging machine learning systems. “Forging a new alliance with Seguros Sura in Latin America is another step of Akur8’s global expansion. We are proud to form this new alliance with a top P&C insurer and to reinforce our presence in Latin America” noted Brune de Linares, Chief Customer Officer at Akur8.

Source: Businesswire 

Banco Compartamos borrows $50m from IDB Invest to help Female-run SME’s in Mexico 

IDB Invest, private-investment arm of US-based Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) Group, announced a local-currency loan totalling $50 million USD to Banco Compartamos, one of the seven business units of the Mexico-based Gentera. Compartamos provides loans, insurance and savings services to individuals as well as SME’s in Mexico. The loan is intended to help increase financing for these enterprises, with a focus on investing in companies led by women. As of December 2021, Compartamos held MXN 32 billion (USD 1.6 billion) in assets, with the majority of the bank’s clients are women.

Source: Micro Capital