🔒Insurity’s acquisition spree still leaves it firmly planted in Hartford

For most of its 36-year history, Insurity has been a low-profile Hartford success story.

But a string of acquisitions — five in the past 12 months — has changed all that.

Much like an actress proclaimed an “overnight success” when her 14th film wins an Oscar, Insurity has been making headlines at every turn.

From humble beginnings in 1,000 square feet of rented space on Wethersfield Avenue, the pioneering insurtech startup steadily gained high-profile insurance clients for its cloud-based software products while keeping its own profile low.

Its core mission — using technology to simplify insurance — has been attractive, landing Insurity deals with more than 300 clients, including 15 of the 25 largest insurance carriers. Eight of the 10 largest U.S. auto insurers are clients.

Still, for most outside the inner circles of insurance industry IT decision making, Insurity’s claim to fame was as a real estate risk-taker when, in 2004, it moved its then 300 employees into office space at the newly renovated Sawtooth Building on the Colt Gateway campus.

The firm’s steady growth remained mostly below the radar until June of 2019 when Insurity was acquired by a San Francisco-based private equity firm, GI Partners.

The new owners promoted Insurity’s then-CFO Chris Lafond to CEO. The marching orders were clear, Lafond explains: “Be aggressive.”

Six months later, Lafond’s team acquired SpatialKey, a leading provider of geospatial analytics, data enrichment, and risk intelligence solutions for the property and casualty sector.

The deal fits like a jigsaw piece with Insurity’s 2017 acquisition of Valen Analytics, an advanced data and analytics provider for property and casualty insurers.

“Data and analytics is a key focal point in our strategy of delivering differentiated and high-value products to our clients,” Lafond said.

Unique market niches

Nailing down the analytics piece served to position Insurity for more rapid growth in 2020.

Over the summer, Insurity made two deals that again added complementary pieces and propelled the Hartford firm in new directions.

In July, it acquired Texas-based Virtual MGA. Just a few weeks earlier, it had acquired Florida-based Epic-Premier. Together, they give Insurity access to new markets by offering front-office and back-office services to the largest wholesale brokers, syndicates, and managing general agents — a type of insurance agent who has underwriting authority.

In October, Bill It Now joined the Insurity family. The Westport-based firm provides billing and other private-labeled services to insurers, agents and administrators, also in the property and casualty space.

In November, Insurity acquired CodeObjects, a California software firm with a portfolio of property and casualty customers. Its main product, InsuranceEnterprise, consists of a policy, billing and claims suite. CodeObjects also sells a virtual assistant — InsurBot — powered by artificial intelligence.

The rash of acquisitions continues an expansion strategy of picking off small privately-held companies with unique market niches.

In 2015, Insurity added Oceanwide; in 2016, it added Tropics Software and Systema Software.

Each of the acquired entities retains its brands and operates as “an Insurity company.”

Lafond says there could be more acquisitions ahead, suggesting Insurity will go wherever a deal seems the right fit for the growing firm.

Winning market position

In explaining Insurity’s approach, Lafond uses the phrase “speed to value” to encapsulate the firm’s commitment to complex solutions that are relatively quick and simple for the client to implement.

It’s an approach that stretches throughout Insurity’s growing line of products, from its core systems to its newest specialty solutions.

The insurance industry has long been dogged by legacy systems. To some extent, the pandemic has forced a reevaluation of technology and rewarded innovation to accommodate an escalating array of new products, Lafond said.

Insurity’s cloud-based solutions, emphasis on innovation and access to capital create a winning market position, he said.

But Lafond recognizes Insurity’s window of opportunity may be limited. He acknowledges private equity firms usually look for liquidity opportunities to recover their investment within five years. And Insurity has already been in the GI Partners portfolio for 18 months.

Lafond shrugs off any suggestion of added time pressure. Any business is always for sale for the right price, he says. He sees his role as growing the firm, no matter what the ownership.

No details are available on any of the private transactions, nor on Insurity’s sales or earnings figures.

The string of acquisitions has pushed the firm’s employee base from about 700 to more than 1,000 spread out across the globe.

Lafond says integrating the new acquisitions has been a challenge during the pandemic. He says he looks forward to in-person meetings as soon as travel conditions permit.

Still, from Insurity’s headquarters, he’s just minutes from many of his firm’s largest clients. That proximity to clients – and to the world’s best market for insurance employees – are among the reasons Lafond said he expects Insurity’s headquarters will remain firmly planted in Hartford.