The Future of Insurance – Tomer Kashi, Co-Founder & CEO, Voom

Tomer is CEO and Co-Founder of VOOM. VOOM is an InsurTech pioneer, crafting cutting-edge, usage-based insurance solutions for the future of mobility.

Among VOOM products are VOOM&Fly/SkyWatch - the leading digital drone insurance product in North America, VOOM & RIDE - the world's first pay-per-mile motorcycle insurance product, and VOOM & Drive - auto insurance tailored for the unique needs of gig drivers.

Before VOOM, Tomer spearheaded award-winning, interdisciplinary technological projects in the Israeli Prime Minister's Office cyber unit. Tomer is a graduate of Israel's elite technology program "Talpiot", and holds an MBA from Tel Aviv and a BSc in computer science and physics from the Hebrew University.

Highlights from the Show

• Tomer is a computer scientist and physicist by background, and started his work in an elite unit in the Israeli Defense Force's technology unit, and met his cofounder, Ori
• After completing their service, they wanted to start a new business, and eventually started a drone insurer, SkyWatch, which is the largest drone insurer in North America today, and Voom, a mobility insurer
  • SkyWatch saw success because they built a best-of-breed risk assessment platform, as well as a core system that allowed great flexibility in distribution (including embedded), data and more that they call the Voom Core
  • Voom is focused on mobility insurance, like motorcycle, ride-sharing solutions and other auto and mobility related insurance products
• The strategy has been to identify a specific category, look at what would be needed to truly delight customers and serve their needs, and try to deliver that, which they've used to go into several spaces beyond their initial drone product
• One example is how they've address motorcycle coverage
  • Many motorcycles (70%) are occasional-use products, so paying for coverage for regular use seems not to make sense
  • Voom offers the first pay-per-mile motorcycle product, based on sending a photo of your odometer to calculate mileage
• For traditional insurers to innovate in small segments (relative to their overall scale) is hard because the lift isn't enough for the size of their bottom-line, so customers end up being overlooked and stuck with products and CX that becomes outdated
• They think of changes in mobility in three ways:
  • New platforms - beyond cars, moving into drones, e-scooters and more
  • Increased connectivity - data connections impacting underwriting, loss prevention and more (like their pay-per-mile motorcycle product)
  • New utilization - changes in ways of using platforms, like ride-sharing changing how cars are used
• The future of mobility insurance isn't something Tomer claims to know what will happen in the long term, despite all the predictions out there, but he does see some things emerging and some things as technology proof
  • Regardless of autonomy, some people will still want to drive for the pleasure of it, including motorcyclists
  • New ways to use mobility products will keep emerging, and they will require coverage designed for that specific solution, like when Uber or Turo came to be

This episode is brought to you by The Future of Insurance book series (future-of-insurance.com) from Bryan Falchuk.

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Music courtesy of Hyperbeat Music, available to stream or download on Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music and more.