Israeli insurtech company At-Bay has closed a $185 million Series D round of financing. The new funding round was co-led by Icon Ventures and Lightspeed Venture Partners, with participation from existing investors including Khosla Ventures, M12, Acrew Capital, Qumra Capital, the HSB fund of Munich Re Ventures, and entrepreneur Shlomo Kramer.
The Series D marks the company’s third round in the past 18 months and brings its overall funding to $272 million. At-Bay’s post-money valuation is now $1.35 billion.
According to website Pitchbook, At-Bay's valuation in its previous financing round in December was $323 million, which means that its valuation has risen fourfold within seven months. All the money invested in the current round will go to the company, with no secondary transaction. Including this round, the company has raised a total of $276 million. The company recently surpassed $160 million in annual recurring revenue on 800% year-over-year premium growth.
At-Bay was founded in 2016 by Rotem Iram (CEO), Roman Itskovich (CRO), Etai Hochman, and Tilli Kalisky-Bannett. The last two no longer have executive roles in the company. At-Bay employs 120 people, about 50 of them in Israel.
At-Bay's market, cyber insurance in the US, is growing rapidly as a result of the rise in cyberattacks, especially ransomware attacks, on companies and organizations. Most of the market is held by the traditional insurance companies. According to Iram, At-Bay insures some 10,000 mid-size companies in the US, and its uniqueness lies in being both an insurance company and a cybersecurity company.
"Before we take on a customer, instead of giving him a data security questionnaire, we run a simulation of an attack and check his vulnerability. That way we avoid insuring the 5% of companies with problematic data security, and can offer good rates and broader cover to the rest," says Iram. "In addition, we regularly monitor our customers throughout the year and run attack simulations, at the end of which we update them with the weaknesses we have found.
"As a result, our customers have been hit by seven times fewer ransomware attacks than the market average, and we can reduce losses, offer attractive prices, and grow. We carry out these simulated attacks using tools that we have developed and tools provided by partners."
In the event of a ransomware attack, do you advise customers to pay up?
"We endeavor not to pay a ransom if possible. Only in certain extreme cases in which the alternative is a potential collapse of the business will we advise a customer to pay. In the event that a customer decides to pay a ransom without consulting us, theoretically, under the contract, we can refuse to cover it. But we work with the biggest brokers in the insurance world, and it's important for us to keep up our reputation. So we try to meet the customer halfway and help him, as long as he doesn't do anything unreasonable, rather than try to get out of it through all kinds of technical clauses."
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on July 27, 2021
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