Israeli insurtech co Honeycomb raises $36m
Israeli-US digital insurance company Honeycomb announced today that it has raised $36 million in a Series B financing round led by Zeev Ventures, with the participation of new investors Arkin Holdings and Launchbay Capital. Existing investors Ibex Investors, Phoenix Insurance and IT-Farm also took part in the round. This brings to $55 million the total amount raised by the company to date.
Honeycomb was founded by CEO Itai Ben Zakan and CTO Nimrod Sadot. The company began selling real estate insurance in the US in June 2021 and currently operates in 16 states, making up 60% of the US market. Honeycomb has issued policies insuring real estate worth $21 billion and expects to triple that amount over the next 12 months. Honeycomb issues landlord insurance in a market worth an estimated $34 billion annually in the US.
The company expects to double its workforce from 90 to 180 over the next 18 months with many of the new hires planned for the company’s development center in Herzliya.
Honeycomb’s proprietary AI-driven technology enables granular risk management, underwriting “at the individual building level,” and providing consistent coverage at a better price for well-maintained properties. Honeycomb streamlines the customer and broker experience, leveraging unique proprietary underwriting technology, and offering insurance coverage that adapts to ever-changing client needs. Given its tech advantage, Honeycomb does not need to impose “blanket limitations” on the age of the properties it insures or similar categorical restrictions.
The company sells its policies directly via its platform and through a growing group of insurance brokers, who can virtually “bulk-quote” an endless number of submissions in real time, improving a process that used to take weeks to complete, and translating into greater profitability for brokers and meaningful value for customers.
Ben-Zakan said, “The new funding will be used to further improve the end-user experience, driving enhanced profitability to our broker partners, and broadening the type and size of policies offered. We plan to deepen our technological advantage with proprietary AI models leveraging unique first-party data and expand into new insurance markets, turning Honeycomb into a one-stop shop for everything related to commercial real-estate insurance in the U.S.”
Zeev Ventures founding partner Oren Zeev added, “Honeycomb is an example of an insurtech company that solves a major problem in a huge market, thus allowing it to increase ARR at a fast pace and progress to operational profitability in a short time.”
Published by Globes, Israel business news – en.globes.co.il – on May 7, 2024.
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