Q&A with Tomer Kashi, VOOM co-founder and CEO
What does VOOM do?
Tomer Kashi, VOOM co-founder and CEO
Kashi: VOOM is an Insurtech startup that provides innovative, usage based insurance solutions for the mobility space. VOOM partners with insurers to help them create new products and bridge the gap between their current solutions to today’s customers’ expectations and needs.
What advantages do you have over insurance companies in developing Insurance products?
Kashi: VOOM developed a unique Usage-Based Insurance platform, supported by a combination of a powerful AI-based risk analysis engine, proprietary born-in-the-cloud policy admin system and an effective API based distribution. This platform gives us several advantages over traditional insurance companies.
Our AI-based risk analysis engine enables us to better analyze risk, compared to traditional insurers, using telemetric data like driving or flying behavior, time of the day, weather conditions and more. It also allows us to use rides and flights data to offer insurance per km/min.
Our born in the cloud policy management platform enables us to quote and bind policies instantly, a capability that most insurance companies don’t currently have.
And our fully digital experience, with advanced APIs, enables us to reach customers at the point of sale, integrating insurance solutions in the right time and place of purchase.
Can you give me examples of products you have developed?
Kashi: SkyWatch.AI, the company’s drone insurance product, is a leading usage-based drone insurance that sold tens of thousands of policies. It offers on-demand, monthly or annual policies that can be purchased instantly online, via an app or affiliated brokers. Skywatch.AI is the first drone insurance product that rewards safe pilots – we use our AI driven risk analysis capabilities to give discounts to pilots who are flying their drones in a safely manner.
The product leads the drone insurance category in the US and ranked #1 on google’s organic search results under “drone insurance”.
We also developed a product for e-scooter rental and delivery platforms. That allows among other things e-scooter riders to easily add on a per km insurance for their ride on the e-scooter, directly from the e-scooter rental app.
What is Voom’s business model?
Kashi: Voom generally operates as an MGA (managing General Agent), which is a specialized type of insurance agent, that also performs some functions that are otherwise performed by the insurance company – underwriting, pricing, binding coverage and more.
We receive a percentage of the premiums that we generate.
In some cases though, we act as a pure software provider and license our policy admin system and risk pricing engine to insurance companies (SaaS).
What insurance companies are you working with?
Kashi: We are working with some of the leading insurance companies in the US and in Israel – STARR, the largest aviation insurance company in the US, Lloyds and Phoenix in Israel.
What investment were made in the company so far?
Kashi: VOOM has received a total of $7M in funding. Its most recent round of $5M in Series A was led by Arbor Ventures in May 2019. Additional investors include Plug and Play InsurTech, F2 Capital, and Verizon Ventures.
Tell me about your professional background and about other key figures in the company.
Kashi: Ori and I, the two co-founders met in the army, both of us are graduates of Talpiot program.
I am the CEO and Co-Founder of VOOM. Under my leadership, VOOM created its global risk engine and insurtech platform, secured partnerships with leading global insurance companies, and onboarded thousands of clients. I previously worked in the elite cyber unit of the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office, where I spearheaded inter-disciplinary technological projects. As a veteran of Israel’s esteemed Air Force program “Talpiot,” I hold an MBA from Tel Aviv University and a BSc in computer science and physics from the Hebrew University.
Ori Blumenthal – Ori is CTO and Co-Founder of VOOM. Prior to co-founding the company, he served in Israel’s elite Air Force Program “Talpiot” as a data analytics expert and in Israel’s clandestine Unit 8200 as a high-ranking officer, specializing in cybersecurity. He holds an MBA from Tel Aviv University and a BSC in physics and computer science from the Hebrew University.
Noa Urbach – Noa is the VP Strategy & Business Development at Voom. She has 15 years of international experience leading strategy, business development and partnerships teams in fintech startups and multi national high tech corporates. Before joining Previously Noa lived and worked for 7 years in the US, the UK and France. She holds a BA in Economics and Business Administration from the Hebrew University and an MBA from INSEAD.
