HSCM & Anthemis invest in life insurance fintech Inclined

HSCM Ventures, the insurtech focused division of the Hudson Structured Capital Management reinsurance linked investment operation, has led a $15 million Series A round for life insurance fintech Inclined Technologies, with investor Anthemis also participating in the round.

Inclined Technologies Inc. has an ambition to democratise the $150 billion whole life insurance policy marketplace.

It wants to do this by leveraging its technology to help life insurance consumers to significantly enhance the value of their life insurance policies.

The $15 million Series A funding round secured by Inclined Technologies was led by HSCM Ventures, with participation from Anthemis Group and several other new and existing investors.

Inclined said that roughly $150 billion is currently borrowed against whole life policies today in ways that are inefficient.

This drives a suboptimal compounding of the cash value and ultimate death benefit of these policies, the startup believes, so Inclined wants to provide quick and efficient access to the equity policyholder’s have built in their whole life policy.

Inclined’s tech platform addresses two inherent market problems, “the “front end” problem of obtaining and structuring the raw data from whole life carriers, and the “back end” problem of efficiently managing the collateral in a way that can deliver assets at scale to our financial institution partners,” the start-up explained.

“Inclined is a mission-driven company that provides solutions to help policyholders access their savings in a more efficient and cost-effective way,” Inclined’s CEO and co-founder Joshua Wyss said. “We are excited to partner with HSCM Ventures and the rest of our investors to tackle the $1 trillion opportunity in whole life cash value access. With this capital, we will continue to improve the way people access the equity they have built in their whole life policy, while serving as a trusted technology partner to whole life carriers and financial institutions across the US. This is a market that has yet to benefit from modern technology.”

Vikas Singhal, Partner at HSCM Ventures, will take a seat on the Inclined Board of Directors and also commented, “We strongly believe in the Inclined mission and are excited to partner with the team. Inclined is engaging carriers, policyholders and lenders in a very aligned and coordinated manner and we see policy loan refinancing as just the beginning of what can be unlocked through those integrated relationships.”

Inclined aims to work with whole life advisors to provide policyholders with access to a secure and revolving line of credit collateralized by the cash value in their whole life policy, all within a fully automated experience.

The Inclined Line of Credit (iLOC) is flexible, meaning it can be drawn or paid back flexibly at the policyholders convenience.

This allows value to be realised by policyholders, while also turning the whole life policy into a financial instrument potentially more suited to lifestyles today.