Waffle secures seed funding from Verve Ventures in its bid to simplify consumer insurance

Waffle, the all-in-one consumer insurance solution, has raised $5 million in seed capital in a financing round led by Verve Ventures, as the application launches in both IoS and web format in all 50 US states.

BetterLabs Ventures and Techstars also participated in the funding.

Waffle connects users with insurance providers to provide a range of coverage lines, with pet, travel, life, cyber and renter’s insurance available from launch, and auto and home coverage being made available by June. It is intended to address the complexity of choosing from the many different kinds of insurance available, which many adults, and especially Millennials, struggle to comprehend, Waffle said.

It partners with reputable providers to offer simple and customisable products with broad coverage and limited or no exclusions. Partners include: MassMutual’s Haven Life for life coverage; Blink by Chubb for cyber and home; Crum & Forster Pet Insurance; Arch RoamRight for travel; Clearcover for auto; Hippo for home; and Boost for renter’s.

Waffle's technology offering includes a proprietary holistic risk model named Galileo, a risk mitigation engine named Y.O.D.A. (Your Own Derisking Assistant), and a proprietary onboarding engine.

Quentin Coolen, chief executive officer and co-founder of Waffle, highlighted the frustrations typically experienced by people buying insurance products, citing less than ideal coverage, cost and the lack of risk mitigation.

“It doesn’t need to be this difficult or convoluted of a process, and that’s why we set out to make Waffle,” he said. “We want to provide people with a sense of security and safety when it comes to the things that matter most in their lives.”

Wassim Matar, managing partner at Verve Ventures, said the fund looks to invest in companies that are changing the way the world works, using science and technology.

“Waffle is doing just that by revolutionising how the average person insures the most important parts of their life,” he said. “Insurance affects everybody and everything, which is why we want to invest in companies like Waffle that are improving upon the very antiquated and out of touch system we currently operate under.”

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