Novee AI secures £1.6m in funding to enhance commercial and specialty underwriting

Novee AI has raised £1.6m in pre-seed funding to enhance its artificial intelligence (AI)-powered risk assessment platform.

The firm said it would use the funding to build an AI intelligence layer for commercial and specialty insurance, which will help underwriters assess and process broker submissions.

It is making the move after finding that underwriters are “burdened by manual, repetitive tasks that consume valuable time and limit their ability to write new business”.

Around 50% of their time is spent finding and assessing information across complex submissions and only one in five quoted risks are ultimately bound across certain classes of business, Novee AI said.

“Novee AI is building the AI intelligence layer for underwriting, giving insurers the speed, clarity and control they need to assess complex risks with confidence,” Haris Khan, chief executive and co-founder, said.

“This funding allows us to accelerate product development, expand across other classes of business and deepen our partnerships with leading insurers.”

Funding round

The funding round was led by 42Cap, an early-stage B2B SaaS investor, with additional backing from Insurtech Gateway, an investor in insurance technology ventures.

“With support from 42Cap and Insurtech Gateway, and in close collaboration with leading insurers, we’re not just streamlining underwriting workflows, but helping our customers unlock growth and write better business,” Khan said.

Julian Von Fischer, general partner at 42Cap, added: “Unlike existing efforts to merely digitise processes, Novee AI directly tackles the complexities of underwriting, empowering insurers to substantially enhance capabilities and scale operations.

“This allows it to significantly improve service levels, as well as revenues and profitability across the organisation. We are immensely proud to be a small part of their transformative journey.”

Novee AI’s platform integrates with existing systems, automating manual tasks and enabling real-time pipeline and portfolio analytics from all captured data.

Two London market insurers are actively deploying Novee across terrorism, property and energy lines. Further pilots are progressing with other insurers and MGAs.

“Current vendors often lack flexibility, lose critical context from submissions and are slow to adapt to underwriting needs,” Dom Nolan, investment manager at Insurtech Gateway, said.

”Novee’s system systematically captures how underwriters assess complex risks, embedding years of underwriting experience to add immediate value in weeks.”