Tech Spotlight: Next steps for the Global Insurance Accelerator
May 30, 2015 by Jamie Johnson
A 100-day adventure came to an end last week for six startups going through the Des Moines-based Global Insurance Accelerator.
While the six teams officially graduated Wednesday, they still have work to do to remain viable. The same goes for the accelerator, which has another two years to go under its original mission.
About two weeks ahead of the accelerator’s demo day, I spoke with Managing Director Brian Hemesath about his plans for the accelerator. Here’s some highlights from that conversation:
“One of the things that I’d like to change with that (accelerator) model is the demo day is not the end. The end is the customers and the investments that follow,” Hemesath said.
Hemesath said he has four main tasks to prepare for next year:
• Recruiting more mentors. Hemesath said he would like to double the accelerator’s mentor pool from its current list of about 80 available mentors.
• Finding the next group of startups. “That won’t be easy. Insurance startups aren’t exactly falling out of the sky. You’ve got to dig them up,” he said.
• More investment. The accelerator was backed by seven Iowa insurance companies, which helped fund the $40,000 in seed funding the accelerator gives to each startup. Hemesath said he would like to see more jump on board.
“Can we now be a $60-, $70-, $80,000 seed round for insurance startups. … A lot of the startups we want to attract, the ones that can really take advantage of the connections that are made immediately are the ones that are post-product. … It gets a little bit tougher to say come in for 40 grand for 6 percent. They start to do the math and say ‘that’s a huge down round for us.’ “
• Changing the program. “We are still, today, as far as I know, the only insurance accelerator in the world. I don’t think that will stay that way for long. We have to continue to innovate ourselves.”
Those program changes, he said, include breaking up initial mentor meetings into groups, such as angel investors, community builders and industry professionals.