Next Insurance raised a whopping $250 million in new venture financing – a major cash infusion after a year of acquisitions and other actions to further growth.

“This latest round of financing is a validation of our vision, which is to make it dramatically easier for small business owners to get the insurance coverage they need by removing friction from the customer experience,” Guy Goldstein, co-founder and CEO of Next Insurance, said in prepared remarks.

FinTLV Ventures and Battery Ventures led the Series E financing round. CapitalG, Group 11, Zeev Ventures, Founders Circle and G Squared also participated. As part of the new financing, FinTLV Ventures founder and Managing Partner Gil Arazi and Battery Ventures General Partner Michael Brown will join as board observers.

Next Insurance has raised $881 million to date including the new round. That well surpasses the $523 million in venture capital Root raised and the nearly half-billion dollars Lemonade pulled in before their respective initial public offerings in 2020. Other InsurTechs in recent months have raised far less and gone public through reverse merger transactions.

Next Insurance claims its valuation with the new venture capital financing has now reached $4 billion.

Next Insurance, an InsurTech launched in 2016, uses AI and machine learning to simplify the business insurance purchasing process, something it claims drives down costs by up to 30 percent compared to traditional policies. The company is based in Palo Alto. It began as an MGA for small and medium-size businesses and has since become a licensed insurance carrier.

Over the last six months, Next has made two acquisitions, including AP Intego, a Massachusetts-based digital agency that provides small commercial insurance products. Next also snatched up Juniper Labs, a provider of alternative open data and underwriting technology, with a goal of developing enhanced machine learning capabilities to boost the customer experience.

Next has also added strategic partners, including Amazon Business Prime, with which it will expand the reach of its commercial insurance policies.

Next Insurance claims to have a growing customer base of more than 200,000 clients.

“We’re not done improving the lives of small business owners, but we’re proud of what we’ve accomplished thus far,” Goldstein said.

Source: Next Insurance