27-Year-Old, Jihan Abass Raised $3.7 Million in Funding for Her Startup   

Jihan Abass, a 27-year-old Kenyan entrepreneur, is upending the insurance industry in East Africa with her insurtech platform, Lami Technologies. 

 Abass is an entrepreneur with a background in finance who has an MBA from the University of Oxford and a degree in finance from the CASS Business School in London. 

With the help of quickly produced digital insurance products, she started Lami in 2018 with the intention of boosting insurance penetration throughout Africa.

Griffin, a flagship product of Lami, has reduced the time it takes to get car insurance to under two minutes. Recent seed extension fundraising for Lami totaled $3.7 million, with Harlem Capital, a venture capital firm based in New York, serving as the round’s lead investor.

Newtown Partners and angel investors like Peter Bruce-Clark, Caribou Honig, Jay Weintraub, and Exotix Advisory also contributed to the round. 

This financial infusion brings Lami’s total funding from investors to $5.5 million after receiving initial funding of $1.8 million last year.

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What the funding will be used for?

According to Abass, the money will be used to expand into other nations including Egypt, Nigeria, and Uganda as well as build businesses, products, and technologies. 

A second insurtech firm that leverages mobile technology to reach underprivileged people in Africa, Bluewave Insurance Agency, was recently acquired by Lami as part of the company’s expansion plans.

By 2022, it is anticipated that the acquisition will increase business by 65,000 current policies and bring hundreds of thousands of new residents to Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Nigeria, Gambia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. 

Additionally, it will increase Lami’s clientele in Malawi, where Bluewave’s microinsurance platform offers coverage to over 60,000 smallholder farmers.

Lami is dedicated to closing the insurance gap in Africa by using techniques and tools that reduce the cost of insurance, such as “bite-sized” charges. 

The startup’s most recent fundraising and growth initiatives show how committed it is to spreading insurance across the continent and fostering innovation in the insurance industry.

The firm is concentrating on using technology to improve the efficiency and convenience of the insurance process for customers in addition to growing its operations and customer base. 

Lami is able to provide rapid and simple access to insurance products by automating the entire process, making it simpler for customers to safeguard themselves and their assets.

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