Announcement

After much thoughtful consideration, we have decided to call time on InsurTech Ireland.

This has not been an easy decision, and we are very proud of what we, Gerry de Vere and Stan Nazarenko with the support of Eddy Van Cutsem and others, have achieved over the past seven years.

We believe that to continue delivering real value to our growing community, we need committed resources and unfortunately, we are no longer in a position to dedicate the time and effort required. Gerry is a co-founder in a busy InsurTech start-up and Stan has returned to the highly regarded reinsurer where we first met as colleagues over a decade ago.

In addition to Conor Sweetman, Suzanne Mills and Lorcán Hall, there are also many others who have been a critical part of our story, as supporters, speakers, sponsors, partners and active community members. We want to thank them all, but first indulge me a little while I share just some of the highlights of that great story.

As InsurTech start-up founders in 2017 we spent lots of time and money travelling to London, specifically to attend the excellent events run by Robin and Matthew at InsTech London. That inspired us to create an Irish version, and with their blessing InsurTech Ireland was born.

We started by defining the mission and vision for InsurTech Ireland.

Our mission has been to connect professionals, start-ups, and enthusiasts in the field of insurance technology, facilitate networking and learning opportunities, and drive the growth and development of InsurTech in Ireland.

Our vision has been to create a vibrant and inclusive community that empowers individuals and organizations to thrive in the ever-evolving Irish InsurTech landscape through education, networking, and collaboration.

We believe we have come a long way towards achieving both.

It all started when, with some trepidation, we reached out to our networks and beyond announcing our initial event for October 5th 2017. Our very first speaker was Pedro Écija Serrano, followed by Mick Cooney, Hesus Inoma and Stuart King. That would still be an impressive lineup now, seven years later. It was an overwhelming success, and we knew then that we had to continue to build and support this nascent Irish InsurTech community. A high bar was set. We also realised that we had to keep finding interesting and engaging speakers and persuade them to get involved. We have had many wonderful speakers both Irish and international and our goal was always to present people who are really innovating, not just talking about innovating.

Sustainability in Insurance has been a key theme for InsurTech Ireland. In June 2024 we co-hosted an important invitation-only event at DLA Piper with Insurance Partner Naoise Harnett, and with the UN Sustainable Development Goals Academy. Thanks to considerable work from Lorcán Hall, we were humbled to have an outstanding lineup which included two speakers, Professor Patrick Paul Walsh and Dr. Elena Proden, who were directly involved in the creation of the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Naoise, along with Sinéad Clarke from Milliman and Antony Ireland from Better Insurance Network, also spoke at what was a truly world class event. This carried on the Sustainability theme from a previous event in January 2023, where speakers included Cathal Carr from Renaissance Re, Kathryn Meng-Elmes from Energetic Insurance, Tim Smith from Hannover Re and Dave Power from Dogpatch Labs.

While not something we publicised, our independent voice has also been valued over the years by the Department of Finance who have asked us to deliver Ministerial briefings on InsurTech. Most recently, we presented to Minister Neale Richmond in April 2024.

The overlap between Fintech and InsurTech was at the forefront in February 2024, when we joined forces with JP Morgan to discuss Payments, AI and Data Privacy. Michael Fox, Sumanth Sunkari and Isobel Clarke focused on the importance of trust and safety in payments technology. They were followed by Aoife Sexton from Trūata who talked about why Data Privacy, in addition to being a legal requirement, it is also a strategic imperative. Aoife shared some intriguing statistics and some truisms around the use of AI. This segued with Daniele Magazzeni's discussion of how AI can be most effectively used within financial services. Trisha Wilson then had an interesting fireside chat with Sam Coyne from Currenxie about their start-up experience here in Ireland. Joao Pinho delivered the closing comments and it was really encouraging to see the networking between the Fintech and InsurTech stakeholders present.

A very special highlight for us was delivering Ireland’s first and only to-date, InsurTech Pre-Accelerator program back in November 2021. This was in conjunction with a great team from Dogpatch Labs led by Dave Power, along with Aidan Mahon from the Institute of Technology, Carlow (now South East Technological University). We took full advantage of our network to bring in outstanding mentors including, Dr. Hayley Maynard, Alison Sargeant, Lucy Coutts, and Hesus Inoma. The start-ups that took part were, ApplyOn, CyberPie, Equine MediRecord, Gatepost, Itus Secure Technologies, nSurely, Penny FS Technologies and UPackage.

From March 2019 to June 2021, we worked with underwriter, trainer and podcaster Conor Sweetman who produced 57 episodes of the excellent InsurTech Radio podcast. Conor interviewed many Irish and International business leaders, and all episodes are still available here.

During 2019, we were excited to be a part of the Hannover Re Intrapreneurship Programme (HIPE). Sponsored by Debbie O’Hare, then MD of Hannover Re Ireland, this programme involved Hannover Re staff from all over the world and was run by Dogpatch Labs in Dublin over three phases during the year. Hannover Re discovered Dogpatch through attendance at our InsurTech events and this led to the design and delivery of a first-rate program, proving that Ireland is a great place to innovate in insurance. Two of the ideas nurtured and developed in that programme have been brought to life, including hr | bluebox, a L&H data analytics service available to the company’s global clients.

Always eager to be ahead of the curve, in November 2019 we had Naoise Harnett, Insurance Partner at DLA Piper (then with a different firm), discuss the potential impacts of the upcoming Brexit, and we covered GDPR preparation in March 2018 with John Keyes, from the Office of the Data Protection Commissioners.

It was standing room only in November 2018 when we had a masterclass on innovation initiatives specifically in Reinsurance. Dr. York von Falkenhayn came over from Hannover Re in Germany, to tell their story of Journey Re, another global innovation success story that was partially hosted in Dublin. Karl Stanley spoke about Renaissance Re's partnering with start-ups, and Stan then conducted an excellent fireside chat with Adrian Jones, visiting from SCOR in Paris, who discussed their innovation strategy including B3i.

We covered Insurance regulation in Ireland in May 2018, and were privileged to hear from the excellent Denise Delaney, from the CBI (Central Bank of Ireland, the Irish Regulator). She was very engaging and took questions from the enthusiastic audience. Paul Prendergast, founder of Blink, spoke about being in the very first cohort of the FCA's sandbox in the UK, and Ciara O'Grady from Deloitte, gave us great insight into the process of getting regulatory approval here in Ireland.

Over the years at InsurTech Ireland we have also hosted some special bespoke events, among those were the following.

In September this year, we organised a roundtable discussion for a contingent from Fintech Wales, to learn about the Irish InsurTech ecosystem and to discuss opportunities for collaboration. From Wales we had, Sarah Kocianski, Eamon Tuhami, Daniel Sawko, Mark John, Rachael Bayona, Iain Quick and of course John O'Loughlin. Representing Ireland were, Eddy Van Cutsem, Donna Ryan, Mark Sexton, Sheelagh Brady, Aidan Mahon, Greg Doyle, Sree Nagabhushana, Michael Crawford, Summayah Mirza, Brian Ó hOisín and Dave Power.

June 2023 saw us deliver a half day seminar for a visiting group of students and faculty from the Risk Management and Insurance Program at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, led by Bill Sofsky. They were joined by Irish university students and interns currently working for leading insurers in Ireland. The group were treated to some excellent talks on a very broad range of insurance related topics and we discussed diversity, equity and inclusion in detail. Helping us showcase the Irish Insurance ecosystem that day were, Fintan Kennedy, Lesley Tully, Mick Cooney, Donna Ryan, Dolores Murphy, Jenny McDonnell, Caolan Barrett, Áine Coady and Dave Power. In October this year a group from UNC Charlotte visited London, and we are especially grateful to the wonderful Caroline Bedford of EDII for organising their visit to the LLIBA

In April 2019, we hosted a special event to showcase the Irish InsurTech ecosystem to a visiting delegation from the French Federation of Insurance (FFA). The featured Irish InsurTech/RegTech start-ups were, Corlytics, Cyber Plus Solutions, Describe Data, Digisure, Docosoft, Hublio, Piprate, Ucompare and Xtract.

Looking back, there have been so many great events and fond memories but we’ll stop there and again say how much we appreciate the efforts of everyone involved.

We are still keen to support the InsurTech and start-up communities in Ireland and globally, so time permitting, if we can help with our respective networks and insurance industry/start-up experience, please reach out to us individually. If you or others are interested in taking on the mantle of InsurTech Ireland and maintaining an independent and impartial voice in the ecosystem here, let us know.

Though our formal community activities are concluding, the spirit of innovation and collaboration that defined InsurTech Ireland remains. We encourage all our community to continue to nurture the relationships and insights gained through our shared journey. Remember that it is important to give first and that rewards come in many ways and over time.

“Be it in life or business, I implore you to always seek to be the giver first. If you can give without expectation, you’ve got everything to gain.” – Gary Vaynerchuk

So long, and thanks for all the fish! ;u)

Gerry & Stan