Honeycomb, a leading fast-growing digital insurer, has raised $36 million in a Series B funding round. Zeev Ventures led the round, which included new investors Arkin Holdings and Launchbay Capital. Existing investors Ibex Investors, Phoenix Insurance, and IT-Farm also participated.
This year, finding landlord insurance remains an increasingly challenging task due to the ongoing narrowing appetite among traditional insurers using a broad brush approach for underwriting. For example, when a major California insurer incurred losses in the state recently, it decided to pull out of the region completely and leave it to landlords and homeowners to find a solution. In other states, carriers who have not completely pulled out of the landlord insurance market have imposed new limitations, rendering their coverage non-viable or unavailable. Some will only insure properties built after 2004, despite more than 80% of U.S. residential properties being built before 2004. Honeycomb’s 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.
The company sells policies directly through its platform and via a growing group of best-in-class insurance brokers that can virtually bulk-quote an endless number of submissions in real time. This significantly improves a process that used to take weeks to complete and translates into greater profitability for brokers and meaningful value for customers.
Honeycomb now operates in 16 of the largest states in the U.S., covering about 60% of the U.S. market. And it insures over $21 billion worth of real estate assets and expects to triple that number in the next 12 months. To achieve these goals, Honeycomb plans to double its staff from the current headcount of 90 employees to 180 within the next 18 months.
KEY QUOTES:
“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.”
– Itai Ben-Zakan, co-founder and CEO of Honeycomb
“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. I am happy with this opportunity to lead the current round, as the company’s unique technological advantage positions it well to become the market leader in their space.”
– Oren Zeev, the Founding Partner at Zeev Ventures
