Cachet — Insurance for the gig-economy lifestyle
We are beyond thrilled to announce the latest addition to the Icebreaker portfolio: Cachet — on a mission to simplify and disrupt the process of insurances by building a dynamically priced financial service marketplace for gig workers.
The global gig economy has grown substantially the past few years and so has the need and demand for flexible insurance solutions like Cachet. The global pandemic has forced people to work remotely, which has also forced companies to push their staff to work gig-based.
The number of people working part-time or full-time for online platforms like Uber, Airbnb or Fiverr has more than doubled in the last three years. The COVID-related economic slowdown will accelerate it even further. The problem with gig-based work at its core is the lack of flexible, gig-based solutions. For example, an Uber driver who drives 2 hours per month compared to another one who drives 50 hours per month pays the same price for motor insurance. Examples like this result in high turnover and churn of employees, which, in turn, results in high costs of services.
Dynamically priced insurance to gig workers
Cachet’s product enables insurers to sell dynamically priced insurance through its marketplace to gig workers in the ride-hailing industry.
“Cachet is a financial services marketplace for the gig workers. We aggregate and enrich cross-market data from gig platforms to enable businesses like insurance companies to sell better priced and personalised coverage based on the gig workers’ real work hours. Our purpose is to enable the gig and sharing economy lifestyle,” Hedi Mardisoo, CEO and Co-founder of Cachet.
The flexible insurance is based on individual car usage and driving habits, which has resulted in on average 50% savings to our customers, while ride-hailing companies enjoy savings in overhead costs for services and retention.
The story behind the founding team
Cachet was set in motion in September 2018 when the founders Hedi Mardisoo and Kalle Palling realised that things can’t continue the way they have been. Innovation should always bring about shifts in focus and individual solutions.
“We believe in the sharing/gig economy original vision, access over ownership. Critical barriers to realising the vision are lack of fair and flexible financial services, like insurance and government regulations. Regulations often fix or correct market error. By bringing together a single point of gig workers’ work-schedule, Cachet focuses on improving the first,” Hedi Mardisoo, CEO and Co-founder of Cachet.
Hedi and Kalle are veterans in the financial services industry. Co-Founder and CEO, Hedi Mardisoo, has an extensive background from managing international teams in banking, IT, and startups, with a speciality in cross-border scaling. Before founding Cachet, she spent over eight years at Swedbank as the Head of Corporate Affairs, where she built and scaled a communication structure for over 1500 employees in the IT-department. Other Co-founder, Kalle Palling, is a well-known Estonian politician who was the former Chairman of the Estonian Parliament’s EU Affairs Committee and was in total elected four times as a Member of Parliament in Estonia. He was also the main architect of the first gig economy regulation in the European Union.
Cachet aims to become a major player in insurance globally. The seed round was led by Icebreaker.vc and includes previous pre-seed stage investors like Techstars (in a follow-on investment), Barclays and Lemonade Stand as well as angel investors. With the investment, Cachet plans on growing their customer base, expanding their team and implementing new product features by hiring new tech talent.
Welcome to the Icebreaker portfolio, Cachet!
