Cover (YC W16) Helps You Insure Anything With the Snap of a Photo

by Y Combinator3/14/2016

90 percent of all
property insurance policies end up getting finalized over the phone. Wouldn’t it make sense for them to start there, as well?

Cover is a startup launching out of our Winter 2016 class that provides a mobile-first solution to quickly and easily get a price quote for insurance coverage. Using the Cover app for iOS or Android, you simply take a photo of the property you want insured. Cover connects you with an insurance brokerage in your area best suited to insuring that piece of property.

Cover currently handles 300 requests to help insure cars, homes, pets, electronics, jewelry, phones, computers and more each week.

Many people currently begin the insurance buying process through web
aggregators, which are often time-consuming and require more information than is necessary.
Ultimately, these services resell that data to a variety of different
brokerages, resulting in weeks or months of unwanted spam. Cover provides a straightforward alternative to this system, by connecting you with one partner that will provide the best service and rate, without involving any other middlemen.

Cover first joined the YC community as part of our first ever Fellowship batch. Subsequently, they joined Y Combinator as part of the W16 class.

Cover’s cofounders previously worked as management consultants in the finance, risk, and insurance practices of a large consultancy firm. The team has
both an intimate understanding of the insurance industry, and expertise
at building and distributing mobile products — a rare combination that gives them a unique advantage in running Cover.

Author

  • Y Combinator

    Y Combinator created a new model for funding early stage startups. Twice a year we invest a small amount of money ($150k) in a large number of startups (recently 200). The startups move to Silicon