The pandemic served as a driver for digital transformation across a number of industries. Within the insurance sector, evolving customer expectations has insurance players rushing to adopt digital solutions to streamline the customer journey. Policygenius has emerged as the leading online insurance marketplace where consumers can discover, compare, and purchase insurance. The platform covers life, home, auto, disability, and rental insurance options across the largest and most trusted carriers, providing an experience similar to Kayak for travel. However, purchasing insurance is a bit more complicated than booking a plane ticket and Policygenius offers access to 400+ experts to navigate the entire process. For carriers, the company’s proprietary technology provides the conduit to access the digital insurance ecosystem through a proven and battle-tested online sales and marketing channel; the company has facilitated $90B in life insurance policies sold since 2014 for 30M+ individuals.
AlleyWatch caught up with Policygenius CEO and Cofounder Jennifer Fitzgerald to learn more about the inspiration for the business, the company’s strategic plans, latest round of funding, which brings the total funding raised to $276.1M, and much, much more…
Who were your investors and how much did you raise?
Series E — $125M.
All existing major investors participated in the round, including KKR, Norwest Venture Partners, and Revolution Ventures. New investors included several of the largest annuity and life insurance carriers in North America, like Brighthouse Financial, Global Atlantic Financial Group, iA Financial Group, Lincoln Financial, and Pacific Life.
The investment of these carriers, along with additional investment by existing investors that also included AXA Venture Partners and MassMutual Ventures, shows the industry’s support of our track record and transformative vision.
Tell us about the product or service that Policygenius offers.
Policygenius is the one-stop digital platform for consumers to compare and purchase insurance. Since our founding in 2014, Policygenius has built integrations with the largest and most trusted insurance carriers in the industry and developed proprietary technology for quoting, underwriting, and fulfillment. Earlier this year, we announced the launch of our Policygenius Pro offering, which brings the power of the Policygenius life insurance platform — including leading-edge software, expansive carrier shelf, and award-winning operations — to B2B distribution partners.
What inspired the start of Policygenius?
Previously, I worked as a McKinsey consultant advising major insurance companies, alongside my cofounder Francois de Lame, when we identified that old-school carriers didn’t know how to connect with a modern consumer. We decided to launch Policygenius to bring digital convenience to the insurance purchasing process. Through Policygenius, consumers can compare insurance quotes online and are guided through the application and buying process by a licensed insurance agent, so they experience both digital convenience and have the benefit of a personal touch when making a major financial decision.
How is Policygenius different?
We have achieved true scale in insurance: Policygenius is on pace to be the single largest distribution platform for term life insurance this year.
We are the only tech-enabled brokerage and distribution platform to have successfully scaled and diversified across life and home and auto insurance. And now we’re offering these services in a B2B platform with Policygenius Pro, a service unlike any other in the industry.
We generate our own leads through a sophisticated, proprietary platform and handle them with our in-house operations team.
Our proprietary end-to-end technology platform is unlike anything else used or available in the insurance industry.
- Our purpose-built enterprise technology platform, Umbrella, powers nearly everything we do and is a differentiator for our business. We made a significant investment to build it from the ground up.
- It integrates with the leading life, disability, and home and auto insurance companies, and delivers an exceptional digital experience for both consumers and insurance companies. Umbrella allows us to see and manage the entire customer journey and seamlessly integrates everything we need to service them from first quote to final purchase.
- These unique capabilities enable us to scale more efficiently and accelerate our future growth.
What market does Policygenius target and how big is it?
The $1.3T U.S. insurance market is archaic, fragmented, and overwhelmingly complicated — there is a huge opportunity in the insurance space. There are nearly 6,000 insurance companies and more than 400,000 insurance agents competing for American customers and most are still operating entirely offline at traditional, brick-and-mortar offices. These local agents are offering a small handful of options and typically rely on a paper-heavy process. They are rarely licensed to offer life and disability insurance, which puts the work in the hands of the consumer to find solutions for each of their insurance needs. Policygenius provides the modern solution to these challenges — bringing these options to an easy to navigate, digital, one-stop platform for many types of critical insurance needs.
What’s your business model?
Our business is built on two primary growth drivers.
First, there’s our direct-to-consumer business, which we’ve built out for eight years, and through which we help millions of people shop for life, home and auto, and disability insurance.
Recently, we’ve taken our experience driving an industry-leading customer experience in the D2C space to launch Policygenius Pro, a B2B partnerships platform that provides our insurance solution to financial advisors, independent agents, community banks, credit unions, and more.
We spent years assembling a superior product shelf, developing highly efficient and customer-friendly sales and case management processes, and building proprietary technology that delivers industry-leading client outcomes. With Policygenius Pro, we’re able to offer those advantages to independent agents, financial advisors, and their clients.
What are your post-COVID office plans??
We have implemented a hybrid, flexible return-to-office model. Our offices in New York City and Durham, NC are both open and available to vaccinated employees who would like to come in, while employees who prefer to work remotely are welcome to do so. Over the long term, we will have three categories of employees: flexible-first, fully remote, and in-person. The majority of our employees will be flexible-first, meaning they can choose when and if they would like to work from an office or from home. Employees also have the opportunity to apply to be fully remote, while those with in-person-critical roles will work primarily out of the office. We keep a close pulse on employee engagement and feedback, and created this flexible system in response to employee preference.
What was the funding process like?
Fundraising teaches every leader determination and dedication. It’s easier when you have a trusted track record as we do, but as you get a lot bigger, the expectations are higher. The key to our capital raising success is the exceptional team we have at Policygenius.
What are the biggest challenges that you faced while raising capital?
It’s always a humbling experience to meet with potential investors — and even with this being a Series E for us, I still learned a lot. We were lucky to work with return investors and insurance companies who understand our business, but you still have to talk through what your plans are and how you’ll continue to innovate. It can be challenging to get past the ‘what if’s’ you run through in your mind.
What factors about your business led your investors to write the check?
We heard a lot of great feedback from investors as we went through this process, but one consistent theme was our continued innovation and our focus on the biggest opportunity in the insurance value chain: distribution.
Back when we founded Policygenius in 2014, we brought a digital shopping experience to comparing and buying life insurance. We built integrations with the largest and most trusted insurance carriers in the industry and developed proprietary technology for quoting, underwriting, and fulfillment.
Back when we founded Policygenius in 2014, we brought a digital shopping experience to comparing and buying life insurance. We built integrations with the largest and most trusted insurance carriers in the industry and developed proprietary technology for quoting, underwriting, and fulfillment.
We took that B2C system and expanded to launch Policygenius Pro earlier this year. This brings our powerful platform — including leading-edge software, expansive carrier shelf, and award-winning operations — to B2B distribution partners.
What are the milestones you plan to achieve in the next six months?
Earlier this year, we launched Policygenius Pro, which brings our powerful platform to B2B distribution partners. We’re looking forward to continuing to innovate and build out here, as well as launching new products — stay tuned!
What advice can you offer companies in New York that do not have a fresh injection of capital in the bank?
Make sure you’re focusing on what’s most important for you — and remember it may not be the same as what it is for others. For us, we could’ve cut costs by using an off-the-shelf technology platform, but we decided to invest in building our own from scratch. We may not have been able to spend elsewhere, but this early investment paid off for us in spades.
Where do you see the company going now over the near term?
As I mentioned, we just launched Policygenius Pro, bringing our powerful platform to B2B distribution partners, and we’re excited about that and continuing to innovate in our core business areas: life, disability, home, and auto insurance.
We also have some exciting new offerings coming soon!
What’s your favorite outdoor dining restaurant in NYC?
Lilia in Williamsburg, assuming it’s not freezing outside!
