Ethos: $200 Million Series D Funding And $2 Billion Valuation

By Amit Chowdhry • May 16, 2021
  • Ethos — an InsurTech leader that is transforming the life insurance space — recently announced it has raised a $200 million Series D investment round at a valuation of $2 billion. These are the details.

Ethos — an InsurTech leader that is transforming the life insurance space — recently announced it has raised a $200 million Series D investment round at a valuation of $2 billion in just a few years since launch. And revenue and users have each grown by more than 500% year-over-year and the company expects to issue $20 billion of life insurance coverage this year, surpassing all competitors as it achieves its mission to provide life insurance for everyone. 

The Series D funding round was led by General Catalyst. And past investors Sequoia Capital; Accel; GV (formerly Google Ventures); and Jay-Z’s Roc Nation also participated along with Glade Brook Capital Partners. Ethos is also backed by the investment vehicles of stars Will Smith and Robert Downey Jr. The funding raised to date totals $300 million. 

Ethos is the InsurTech leader in underwriting, administering, and distributing life insurance. And the company uses innovative machine learning and data science technologies to upend the traditional life insurance model. The company’s technology advantage breaks down barriers that have long inhibited customers from purchasing life insurance, including underwriting with no medical exams, blood tests or complex paperwork. This enables Ethos to approve many people who would otherwise be denied coverage or punitively treated regardless of financial status, health status or age. 

Ethos’ growth is to accelerate since its previous investment round in 2019. And in addition to its revenue and user growth, the company is nearing $100 million in annualized gross profit and increasing EBITDA in the next year. The company has also surpassed its competitors in both annualized revenue and gross profit and is the market leader in the InsurTech life insurance space. 

KEY QUOTES:

“We are on a mission to protect the next million families and will use this money to continue improving the best insurance customer experience ever created. This funding will help us enrich our technology and data platform, and help us launch new products to enable everyone an opportunity to protect their families.” 

— Peter Colis, Ethos CEO and Co-Founder

“We’re very excited to invest in the vision and team at Ethos. Traditional life insurance remains largely unchanged over the years. It’s an area that’s ripe for innovation, and Ethos’ successful execution demonstrates they are clearly ahead of all others in leading this digital transformation.” 

— Kyle Doherty, partner at General Catalyst

“The US life insurance industry is one of the largest markets in the world, but it has been slow to move online. Ethos offers a completely modern experience that finally brings the life insurance market online, and the company is growing very quickly as a result.”

— Nate Niparko, Partner at Accel

“Ethos has fundamentally changed the life insurance industry by providing a tech-enabled, vertically-integrated solution. We’ve been inspired by Ethos’ mission since we first partnered with Peter and Lingke at the seed, and we are thrilled to continue working with them and the team to make life insurance more accessible.” 

— Roelof Botha, Partner at Sequoia and Ethos board member