A company that started selling renters’ insurance in New York, then expanded nationwide, is set to start operating outside the U.S. for the first time in Germany.
Lemonade will sell contents and liability coverage in Germany that is comparable to renters’ insurance in the United States, according to the Financial Times. Axa will provide reinsurance for the Lemonade launch in Germany.
Lemonade is a widely recognized player in the so-called “insurtech” business: using technology to develop innovative approaches to insurance coverage.
For the first time, Lemonade will use what it calls Policy 2.0 in Germany, a shortened policy document with simpler language, Lemonade CEO Daniel Schreiber said. “We’ve reduced our policy from 40 pages to four,” Schreiber told the Financial Times.
Based in New York and Tel Aviv, Lemonade plans to expand further in the United States and throughout Europe, where the company has a regional base in Amsterdam.
“Dutch regulators are … forward looking and looking for ways to innovate,” Schreiber told the Financial Times. The Lemonade CEO, who is British, also told the Times one reason for launching in Germany instead of the UK is the “very uncertain” impact of Brexit, the pending exit of the UK from the European Union.
Schreiber told the newspaper that Lemonade plans eventually to operate throughout the European Union: “Once you have a license … you are basically free to sell in all 28” countries in the EU.
Big-name investors in Lemonade include SoftBank, Allianz and Google Ventures, now known as GV. The latest funding round in April totaled $300 million and valued Lemonade at more than $2 billion.
Schreiber declined to comment on Israeli media reports that an initial public offering of stock is under consideration at privately held Lemonade, which has raised $480 million of equity capital so far. [Financial Times] – Mike Seemuth