Insurtech Socotra secures $5.2m funding from MS&AD, Nationwide and 8VC

San Francisco-based Socotra, an insurtech startup, has raised an additional $5.2 million in funding from Mitsui Sumitomo, Nationwide and venture firm 8VC.

The additional capital following its $5.5 million Series A brings the total funding to $18 million for the company, which is understood to be the creator of the first cloud-native insurance core platform.

Investors included Silicon-Valley based technology investment firm 8VC, which also led the Series A, the venture investment arm of insurance and financial services provider Nationwide, and MS&AD Ventures, the venture arm of Japan-based insurer Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance. Previous investors include a subsidiary of USAA, which invested in a seed round and again in Socotra’s Series A.

Socotra has created a cloud system with open configuration and APIs, enables carriers to manage complex interactions throughout the lifecycle of policies, including single line, single state or multi-line, multi-country. According to the company, its platform offers carriers lower costs, faster product releases, and easy integration with future technologies.

In April 2018, Socotra partnered with Berlin-based digital insurance startup Coya to build an “advanced and differentiated insurance offerings”.

“The insurance industry is experiencing a technology revolution, and the winners will not be powered by today's legacy technologies. Socotra has built the most complete productized SaaS platform in the market, and they have a world class engineering team. We’re excited to contribute to Socotra’s continued success,” said Jon Soberg, managing partner, MS&AD Ventures.

Erik Ross, vice president and leader of Nationwide’s venture capital team, added: “We have been closely following Socotra’s progress for 18 months, and have been continually impressed by the company’s clarity of vision and speed of execution. We’re excited to be investors and even more excited about how our relationship could evolve to the benefit of our members.”

Dan Woods, CEO of Socotra, said: “In addition to a repeated commitment from 8VC, we’re thrilled that Socotra’s mission is supported by such respected industry giants as MS&AD and Nationwide. With this new capital, we will accelerate product enhancements and reach even more insurers trapped by artifact IT systems.”

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