Aviva, Hillhouse Capital and Tencent have announced plans for a new digital insurer, Aviva Hong Kong; Aviva and Hillhouse will own 40% with Tencent owning the remaining 20%; the new platform will focus on selling digital life insurance in Hong Kong and will also offer additional investment products. Source
New insurtech startup, Zensurance, has raised $1 million in seed funding from Ferst Capital Partners; the funds will be used to help grow the business and hire new employees; Zensurance is an online commercial insurance broker which offers a full range of products to small businesses, with a particular focus on digitizing businesses and technology startups. Source
The LendIt Insurtech Forum is today at 4 PM EST; the Forum will help to introduce the LendIt audience to one of the most innovative companies in property and casualty insurance, and a leading insurance association focused on this innovation trend; Lemonade CEO Daniel Schreiber and Adam Kerns of the American Insurance Association will be interviewed by Thalia Smith of Deloitte about innovation currently taking place and how these new companies are affecting the traditional players in the insurance market; register here. Source
Bloomberg Intelligence provides insight on Asia's fintech market in 2017; in internet finance Alibaba and Tencent have a strong market position with high barriers to entry set for the growing market; blockchain is expected to remain at the forefront of fintech development with use in online money transfers, electronic payments, banking and internet finance; insurtech will also be important with technology focused on sales distribution, product development and client engagement; data tracking, artificial intelligence and internet of things technology are also expected to be factors for insurtech. Source
Lemonade provides part two of its 2016 Transparency Chronicles with statistics on its first quarter in the market; notes some positives and negatives including confusion around marketing the firm as a peer-to-peer insurance provider; says they are an artificial intelligence and behavioral economics company or a tech company doing insurance; highlights from the first quarter include: average homeowners and renters premiums of $165.5; 123 homeowners policies; 63% of customers 25 to 34 years old; males accounting for the majority of customers at 76.5%; a claim managed in three seconds by artificial intelligence. Source
ZhongAn Insurance, China’s first internet-only insurer, raised $1.5 billion in its IPO; ZhongAn priced its 199.3 million new shares at HK$59.70 ($7.65) each, the top of a HK$53.70-HK$59.70 range; the IPO is the world’s first “insurtech” public offering. Source
Join LendIt for a webinar about blockchain technology and how it can streamline operations for wealth managers and insurance back office operations; register here for the August 14 webinar at 2:00 PM EST; presenters include Jayant Khadilkar, global head of analytics and technology at Tiger Risk, and Ryan Rugg, business development at R3. Source
Online auto insurance company, EverQuote, has raised $23 million in Series B funding; the funding is part of a pre-IPO plan to provide liquidity to its founders and employees; the firm will also use the funding to hire 120 employees focused on sales and data; plans also include directly selling insurance on the platform with the use of proprietary data from the firm's app, EverDrive. Source
Insurtech firm Lemonade is expanding to 46 new states and the District of Columbia; launch in Washington, Wyoming and Mississippi will be delayed because of statutory wait times; firm will continue to focus on its main product which includes insurance for homeowners and renters. Source
Insurtech firm Trov has announced a $45 million investment from a Series D fundraising round; the platform plans to use the funds to expand its products, further develop its technology and enter new global markets; investors in the recent fundraising round included Munich Re/HSB Ventures, Oak HC/FT, Suncorp Group, Guidewire, Anthemis and Japan's Sompo Holdings; the single item insurer is already active in Australia, the UK and the US with its next expansion planned for Japan. Source