France based catastrophe insurance company Descartes Underwriting which specializes in insurance policies to protect large businesses against natural disasters and catastrophes announced having raised $120 million. The company made the announcement on January 31 further adding that the funding came from investors.
The company failed to state its market valuation following the recent funding round however, the company’s chief executive officer, Tanguy Touffut, said it is any value above $500 million.
The insurance firm offers ‘parametric services’ which automatically pay out on property damage when a certain trigger like fire in a particular location happens. This service can offer quicker payouts than traditional policies which use loss adjusters to compute the size of losses, a process which can take months.
The company uses satellite imagery to identify damage. The CEO said demand for its products has increased due to restrictions which came with the COVID-19 pandemic.
“In some cases, it was impossible to send loss adjusters on the ground to assess the damage. If you were not using a parametric approach, there was no way to be able to understand the amount of the claim” added the CEO.
The insurer will be using the cash from investors to expand its labor force more so software engineers, and subscribe to new data sources.
