The French start-up Alan concluded a series A round of $ 28.3 million a few months ago. Index Ventures leads the way, Xavier Niel participates as well as existing investors CNP Assurances, Partech and Portag3 Ventures LP.
Alan wants to make Medicare as simple as subscribing to a software-as-a-service product. It starts with clear prices and transparent repayment policies. For example, you can cover a 30 year old employee for 55 € a month.
The price will be exactly the same for all types of companies. The only thing that changes is that you will pay a little less for younger employees and more for older employees. Each employee can choose to cover his other significant for the same price, and his children for an additional 40 € per month.
And then, Alan follows the startup playbook. The overall user experience is much more enjoyable than the interface of a traditional health insurance.
You have a modern dashboard where you can monitor and view all your health expenses, a mobile app and good customer support. You can also add life insurance to CNP Assurances from the same interface.
This simple promise seems to work quite well as Alan now covers 7,000 employees in 850 companies. As you can see, startup is focused on small businesses because it is easier to switch them.
Alan's co-founder and CEO, Jean-Charles Samuelian, also said that small companies are underserved by major insurance companies. There is no reason that you pay more because you work for a small business.
With today 's funding round, Alan wants to offer the same product on a scale. The company plans to increase from 22 employees to 80 employees by December 2018.
"The goal is to reach 100 million euros in recurring annual revenue as quickly as possible," said Samuelian. The startup currently generates between 5 and 6 million euros of annual recurring revenue.
Finally, Alan wants to expand beyond France and address other European markets. While the United States seems to be a big market, they are already very busy. Samuelian thinks that there will be a greater opportunity in building a European society. It will take a little time because the regulations are different in each European country.
Recently, Alan has focused on building a solid infrastructure, process optimization and automation of tasks. In many ways, Samuelian still thinks of Alan as a technology company. "We want to build the Apple or Google of Europe," he said.
Alan can beat competitors in price and flexibility by building a technological product that actually works – that's how you can serve 7,000 people with a light team.
Disclosure: I share a personal connection with an officer of CNP Assurances.