Jones Wins Place at Innovation Center of Kamet, the Investment Arm of AXA Ventures in Paris. The Competition Was Led by Leading Venture Capital Firm JVP (Jerusalem Venture Partners) and AXA – One of the World’s Leading Insurance Companies, in Cooperation with Deloitte, HFN, Earnix and Startup Nation Central.
Jerusalem. February 22, 2017 – Israeli startups GetmeIns and Seegnature shared the top prize in the Insurtech Israel competition, a first of its kind competition in Israel for startups in the field of insurance technology. JVP decided to double the grand prize, investing over $2 million in the winners. The grand prizes were awarded by JVP Managing Partner Gadi Tirosh and Partner Yoav Tzruya.
GetmeIns operates in the field of fraud prevention, and has developed a unique platform to lower Loss Ratio for insurance companies. GetmeIns applies methodology from the world of intelligence to the insurance industry to prevent fraud before it occurs, saving companies the time and money it takes to investigate claims. GetmeIns uses “intelligence as a service” designed to predict fraud upon purchase. This is done by combining various disciplines, including correlation analysis, open sourcing, signal processing, photogrammetry, and others.
Seegnature empowers consumer-facing enterprises to close transactions remotely by verifying clients’ identity and getting their signatures on documents in real-time. Seegnature increases closing ratios, reduces processing time, and increases customer satisfaction. Using machine learning, Seegnature also analyzes big data used in the deal closure phase and can provide valuable real-time insights to insurance agents on how to more efficiently close deals.
Israeli startup Jones’ participation in the Innovation Center in Paris of Kamet – the strategic investment arm of AXA Strategic Ventures – was announced by Stéphane Guinet, Founder and Managing Partner of Kamet, and Michael Niddam, Executive Partner, Kamet. Jones is a startup which allows small businesses to buy liability insurance at the click of a button, insurance which becomes less expensive as the business gains more experience. Today, new business owners are paying as much as three times above standard insurance rates. Jones operates as a third party insurance platform for every contract, all with a single click.
The Audience Choice Award was presented to LeO by Dorit Salinger, Executive Director of the Capital Market, Insurance & Saving Authority. It was voted upon by 150 employees of the Capital Markets Authority, Insurance and Savings Department. LeO serves as a personal assistant for all insurance issues. The service utilizes Data Analysis and Artificial Intelligence to offer policies tailored to the needs of users at the very moment they are needed. LeO aims to completely change the insurance experience for millennials by making it simpler and more user-friendly. The platform was developed as a chatbot and currently operates via Facebook Messenger to remind users of upcoming policy expiration, send smart updates and aid in claims. LeO is already working with a number of U.S.-based insurance companies.
The Insurtech Israel competition was launched in November 2016 amongst great interest from the international insurance industry. Over 80 startups from a cross-section of innovative technological solutions from the world of insurance entered the competition – the majority (90%) from Israel, but also from the U.S. (7%) and Europe (3%). The five finalists Included: GetmeIns, Jones, LeO, TrueNorth, and Seegnature. The competition was led by JVP and AXA, one of the world’s largest insurance companies, in cooperation with Deloitte, Earnix, the Herzog, Fox and Neeman (HFN) law firm and Startup Nation Central. The winners were selected by a team of judges including representatives from JVP, AXA, Kamet, along with the competition partners.
Submissions to the competition spanned a variety of areas: Health IT (19%), Customer Engagement (16%), Risk Management (14%), Cyber-security (14%), AI (8%), Big Data (7%), Blockchain (5%), Automotive (4%), Customer Management (4%), IOT (4%), Analytics (3%), Distribution (1%), and Wearables (1%).
“Insurance companies will need to adapt at the same pace as our ‘new economy’ is adapting,” said JVP Managing Partner Gadi Tirosh. “The variety of applications that entered the competition and the winners themselves have only confirmed for us that Israel will be a significant hub of innovation in this field as well.”
“Insurance is a very slow moving industry, but Kamet is committed to working with entrepreneurs to create new models,” said Stéphane Guinet, Founder and Managing Partner of Kamet. “Together with outstanding entrepreneurs, we’re building a model that can complement what AXA as an insurance company is doing globally. You’ll see us a lot in Israel – we love the energy and entrepreneurial spirit here.”
“Implementing technology in the insurance and savings industries is a necessity, and it’s taking place as we speak, changing the way that we all relate to our insurance and savings,” said Dorit Salinger, Director of Capital Markets, Insurance and Savings Department, Ministry of Finance of Israel. “The day is approaching when companies will provide mobile technology to allow us to purchase insurance, underwrite medical costs, file claims, or receive payments, all at the click of a button. We are very interested in seeing innovative technology implemented across all sectors, in particular those areas under our regulatory supervision.”
“It’s a great honor to win this competition hosted by one of the leading VC’s in Israel,” said Eugene Greenberg, Founder and CEO of GetMeIns. “For us, this is a double victory: we intend to integrate AI capabilities to the core of our business, to raise more funds in Israel, and, by the end of the year, to open up an office for business development in the U.S. with at least three active customers.”
“The platform we created allows companies to remove obstacles when closing complex deals,” said Yair Ravid, Founder and CEO of Seegnature. “This win will help us introduce our platform to the U.S. financial markets, specifically to insurance companies and banks on the east coast. We intend to begin sales activities with a team in the U.S., while leaving our R&D in Israel.”
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About JVP:
Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP) is a global venture capital fund out of Jerusalem. Established in 1993, JVP has raised over $1.1 billion across 8 funds, and has been ranked numerous times by Preqin as one of the top-ten consistently performing VC firms worldwide. Among the pioneering firms of the Israeli venture capital industry, JVP has been instrumental in building some of the largest companies out of Israel, facilitating 12 Initial Public Offerings on NASDAQ and numerous industry sales. With a view to building industry leaders, JVP invests in early through growth stages in the spaces of cyber-security, big data, fintech, enterprise software, storage, mobile, media and IoT.
About AXA Strategic Ventures (ASV)
AXA Strategic Ventures (ASV) is the venture capital platform backed by AXA, the leading global insurer and asset manager. ASV manages €230m ($260m) and can invest up to €15m ($17m) equity across both early and growth stages. ASV invests in technologies relevant to the insurance and asset management industries such as enterprise software, Fintech as well as consumer technologies and marketplaces (i.e travel, health, auto and property related businesses). With local teams in San Francisco, New York, London and Paris, ASV has invested so far in 24 early-stage start-ups.
About Kamet
Kamet is the insurTech start-up studio and incubator of AXA. It is dedicated to create new disruptive companies in the $5 trillion insurance, protection, asset management and assistance space. Kamet dedicates its €100m funding to seed very early stage teams, and support them through a profound and structured incubation program to go successfully though each stage of their development. Since its inception in January 2016, Kamet has been supporting multiple teams in France, in the UK and in Israel.
For More Information: Pnina Ben-Ami | VP Marketing, JVP | pnina@jvpvc.com