If you work for a big (re)insurer/broker and would like to share your innovation journey, successes, learnings, drop me a line. We’re recording and publishing interviews weekly from now through to Vegas.
On that note, this is what I’ve been up to this morning.
Recognise a familiar face?
Right, time to rattle through the headlines.
All whilst on the train.
With my wife and boy sitting across the table.
And me doing my best to act like I’m not up against a deadline to get SøNws out before the weekend 😅
Big Corporate. Resilient Futures.
It was great to see Munich Re Ventures announce a new $125m fund from its founding limited partner, HSB.
The plan is to invest in Built World startups focusing on equipment and technology that de-risks and optimises performance in property, industry, and related supply chains, as well as cybersecurity and technologies driving toward a resilient future.
I love this for 3 reasons:
Super interesting seeing where Munich Re are placing their bets
Additional funding to MR Ventures is a great signal of support (in what is an interesting and challenging time for CVC)
A positive signal to the wider startup ecosystem – from ‘insurtechs’ to a much broader scouting remit
Keeping with big corporate and resilient futures, Aviva was another to talk cyber this week.
It has partnered with CyberCube to enhance its cyber risk management by integrating AI-driven threat intelligence into its underwriting processes.
This will enable Aviva to identify companies within its portfolio that exhibit traits making them susceptible to specific cyber threat actors. And, in turn, proactively manage cyber risks and provide tailored advice to higher-risk clients. Nice.
One to watch
Miami-based Gail is building an AI platform purpose-built for financial services, including insurance. Its AI agents handle calls, chats, and SMS act as virtual frontline staff for banks and insurers.
The big difference for these guys is they’ve gone deep into one vertical – training their AI to navigate the regulatory complexity and terminology of the industry.
For me what really stands out is they’ve just come out of stealth, secured $8.2m as a Seed round, and already work with 200+ clients, managing nearly 5 million conversations daily.
Not. A. Bad. Start.
The company was founded by twin brothers Matthew and Michael Vega-Sanz, who previously built and sold Lula – an insurtech used by thousands of businesses.
It’s good for Rnwl. It’s good for Go.Compare. And it’s great for UK insurtech. We need more of these success stories.
Word on the street is the deal is a £3m up front consideration with a potential upside of £63m in five years. Not sure how this was calculated or how attainable it is but let’s hope for Goncalo de Vasconcelos this is how it works out.
On the bigger money front we saw Travelers has agreed to sell its Canadian personal insurance and most of its commercial insurance operations to Definity Financial for approximately $2.4bn.
The transaction, expected to close in early 2026 pending regulatory approval, will add about C$1 billion in personal lines and C$600 million in commercial premiums to Definity, making it Canada’s fourth-largest property and casualty insurer.
Less on the M&A front and more AI eating jobs kinda news.
It looks like McKinsey is cutting over 10% of its staff. Woah. This is big. In fact this is the biggest layoff in McKinsey’s history.
It’s been attributed to its doubling down on AI, especially its in-house tool Lilli, which boosts consultant productivity by 30% but reduces need for human roles 🤷
Old. New. Newest.
But that’s not all. There’s a tonne of activity in the market at the moment and always way (way) more than we’ve got time (and your attention?) for. So, what else caught our eye? Well a good mix of established, growing and brand spanking new ones!
First up is the team at TMHCC who are helping brokers to get instant, bindable quotes and issue policies in under 5 minutes. They’ve partnered with the folks at Appulate to integrate the ArtisanEdge platform to enhance their General Liability offering.
What next? We caught up with our good friend Gary Leyden from Instech Ireland last week and chatted a bit about Kota (previously Yonder). The Irish-founded employee benefits platform has landed a healthy $14.5m Series A.
Unsurprisingly, they seem to have got the technical and financial foundations in place, gained traction and are now looking to really kick on. There’s been a good deal of news from Ireland and some super interesting plans from Gary and the team so check them out if you haven’t already.
At the ‘shiny brand new’ end of things comes Belgium-based, Ravical. They’ve announced a €7.3m pre-seed round. That’s pretty decent in insurtech terms, but perhaps less surprising when you look at the solution.
The company develops AI agents to automate routine and repeatable tasks by combining deep domain expertise, firm-specific knowledge, and client context. The future is a more scalable and cheaper workforce…
Finally, we have two updates on propositions with genuine social impact.
Their mission is simple to articulate: “to transform the bereavement experience by seamlessly integrating technology and empathy into a digital platform that supports families through the complexities of loss.”
They’ve developed a comprehensive platform that combines practical assistance with emotional support, ensuring no one has to navigate loss alone.
If you haven’t had to deal with the challenges of losing a loved one you can imagine it’ll be helpful. If you have, you know how valuable it is.
It’s early days, but the team have a platform live, onboarded their first users and got some insurer clients under their belts. Check them out.
The other company in this space is Empathy, which has raised a $72m Series C, and launched the Empathy Alliance – a new coalition of insurers and investors that are dedicated to changing standards and support for bereavement. Great work.
Global Clients. Lots of Travel.
I genuinely love how global Sønr has become in the past few years. We seem to have clients absolutely everywhere.
Whilst it makes for far too much travel for such a small company, it is amazing to get to see and experience so many places. To that point, it was a delight to be back in Amsterdam last week.
Even more fun to join this beautiful group up on stage talking all things partnership and innovation.
A big thanks to ITC Europe for the invite and for the opportunity to mix up the format – we did half panel, half open mic. Genuinely a GREAT session and reckon with the likes of Arslan, Bessem, Yann, Usha and Ambra on stage, we could have chatted all day.
Unfortunately we’re not going to make it to Insurtech Insights USA next week in NYC, but no doubt Kris, Emil and the crew will put on a brilliant show and we’ll be planning a US trip in the near future…
…speaking of which, it’s over to the Future of Insurance USA (12-13 June) in my old stomping ground, Chicago.
I’ll be hosting one of their rountables this year – again another shift in format that I’m keen to explore – and the perfect chance to meet up with a good bunch of Sønr clients whilst out there.
Looks like there’ll also be a hackathon, womens’ breakfast, lakeside 5km (I’m sold) and, if it’s anything like last year, a pretty spectacular rooftop drinks session.
If you’re keen to join you can save $200 with a special Sønr code: 2WEEKSTOGO200 – ➡️https://bit.ly/4kePamz
From there on to Columbus, Ohio, for the Scout conference. More on this one next time. Again a very different format to the others and it promises to be a great event.
Then home.
Needless to say, if you’re based in or near Chicago or Columbus, do get in touch. I’d love to meet up with some friendly faces.
Right. That is me. Done.
The train is pulling into Bristol.
The sun is shining.
I reckon I just about got away with it.
