Socotra’s platform will assist KOBA in offering its usage-based insurance internationally and expand its portfolio to other products such as insurance for boats and motorcycles
Socotra, the modern core platform provider for innovative insurers, today announced that KOBA Insurance, an insurtech MGA pioneering usage-based insurance products in Australia, is migrating its insurance program onto the Socotra policy core platform.
Currently, KOBA is one of the first insurers to offer pay-per-kilometer personal auto insurance in Australia. Since launching nationwide last November, KOBA is rapidly evolving the car insurance narrative; growing 50% month-on-month, helping Aussies pay-per-KM for over 1,000,000KM across Australia and more importantly, providing a connection between a driver and insurer like never before. Traditional insurance only covers expenses to get you back on the road. But that is not enough. KOBA believes that modern car companies and smart insurers of the future will be about making you safer, helping you avoid accidents, and focus on building a true car-care relationship.
With a data-driven focus, KOBA is nimble and is innovating distribution and product solutions for niche markets. In June 2022, KOBA also launched a car share product in partnership with Uber-owned Car Next Door. KOBA plans to expand its portfolio to include other usage-based insurance products for boats, fleets, rideshare vehicles and motorcycles.
Socotra gives KOBA a platform for international scalability and the ability to introduce new products and innovations quickly as KOBA evolves its distribution model. Socotra also provides cloud-native capabilities and the flexibility to plug in multiple raters, claims systems and a single platform to launch any insurance product for any geography or distribution channel.
“KOBA is empowering mid-sized carriers to activate and scale innovative insurance products—from day one,” said Andrew Wong, founder and CEO of KOBA. “By partnering with Socotra, we are laying down a rock-solid technological foundation to rapidly launch multiple usage-based insurance products, flexibly white-label them for mid-sized carriers, and scale our insurance-as-a-service platform internationally.”
Usage-based insurance (UBI) is auto coverage that uses data collected from the driver’s vehicle and analyzed by the insurer to determine policy cost. The better the driver, the better the discount.
KOBA’s Insurance as a Service Platform provides carriers access to their line of white-label products on a subscription basis.
Mid-sized insurance carriers have been reluctant to launch usage-based insurance products because such offerings require them to redesign not only their technology platforms, but also their processes and organization structures. But KOBA will enable mid-sized carriers around the world to sell white-labeled versions of its innovative and tech-driven products, without having to spend the time, money and effort to create these products themselves. KOBA will provide insurance-as-a-service with its out-of-the-box pricing models, raters and go-to-market strategies.
KOBA, which designs products for value-driven customers, was the winner of the Excellence in Insurtech award at the seventh annual FinTech Australia Finnie Awards in 2022. It won Mozo Expert Choice Awards’ “Car Insurance Best New Product 2022” and “Excellent Value Car Insurance 2022,” as well as “Best Insurtech Innovation 2022” by Australia’s Finder Awards. It was also recognized, alongside Socotra, as one of the 10 leading insurtech companies in Australia by Insurance Business Australia.
“I applaud the team at KOBA for their vision of accelerating innovation for mid-sized carriers,” said Dan Woods, founder and CEO, Socotra. “KOBA understands that data is central to better assessing risk and giving customers the types of experiences they have with other technology services daily. With Socotra, they’re creating usage-based insurance products that deliver immense value and cost savings for their customers.”