We’re pleased to announce our investment in Vitaance, and to back Ana, Christian and Bernard in their journey bringing well being to the forefront of life insurance.
The multi-trillion life insurance sector has traditionally faced the same problems over the years. Customers show low trust in the industry due to its overall lack of transparency, which then translates into low perceived value on the customer end. As a result, there is a large percentage of uninsured individuals, both in terms of personal or work-related insurances. Large enterprises seem to be the exception, offering employees life insurance as an extra perk and part of their compensation package.
But that is not enough for the industry to thrive, and it doesn’t tackle the problems keeping more customers from investing in its products.
Vitaance comes in as an interesting player in an otherwise stagnant market. It offers a life insurance solution, sure, but it also boasts the promise of improving customers’ quality of life through financial, emotional, and physical wellbeing. Their customer-first platform plays a key role in making a (traditionally) intangible product more tangible by generating engagement and rewarding employees for being active and healthy.
The timing for Vitaance’s product offering is just right. Insurance has become one of the hottest spaces to invest, and Europe in particular has seen a major inflection the past year, with several new unicorns (such as Alan or Zego) and a new record in insurtech funding for 2021 (expected to more than triple versus 2020). And the market opportunity in this particular vertical is clear, in light of intense competition for talent (e.g. businesses trying to differentiate through add-on benefits), and people laying newfound importance on both their physical as well as their mental health.
We’re thrilled to welcome Vitaance to the Shilling family, and surely believe they’re the right people to build up a big name in insurtech, with a founding team combining insurance knowledge with experience in developing tech products, and the network in the industry to make this business great.
Our thesis for this investment feels quite clear: an outstanding, passionate team looking to disrupt a sleepy, underserved market with a fairly priced product that delivers a great consumer experience through technology and much more. We’re thankful to be in business with them, and excited to partner with our friends at Kindred, Softbank, K Fund, Astorya and Antai to power the future of life insurance.
Read more here.
