Full Episodes | Insurtech Leadership Podcast

From Ultramarathons to Market Shifts: Scott Sambucci on Leading Innovation

Introduction

What happens when a bank finds the right technology but can't touch it for nine months? The procurement bottleneck in regulated financial services isn't just an inconvenience. It's a competitive disadvantage measured in quarters, lost sponsors, and dead deals.

Scott Sambucci, Managing Director of North America and Europe at NayaOne, has spent 25 years selling into and building technology for financial institutions, from CoreLogic to Blend Labs. Now he's leading the US and Canadian expansion of NayaOne's sandbox-as-a-service platform, the same infrastructure the UK's Financial Conduct Authority chose to power its own digital sandbox. In this episode, Scott breaks down why the vendor delivery problem is the real blocker to innovation in insurance and banking, and how air-gapped sandbox environments compress proof-of-concept timelines from months to weeks.

Guest Bio

Scott Sambucci is Managing Director of North America and Europe at NayaOne, where he leads market expansion for the London-based sandbox platform. Before joining NayaOne full-time in January 2024, he spent 25 years in Silicon Valley building and scaling technology companies in financial services, including executive roles at CoreLogic and Blend Labs. Scott is also founder of SalesQualia, a sales coaching firm, and teaches Sales & Marketing at Hult International Business School. A 200-mile ultramarathon finisher, he applies the same relentless-forward-progress mindset to enterprise sales and team building.

Key Topics

• The vendor delivery infrastructure gap — Banks and carriers need 6-12 months of third-party risk management, security, and compliance review before they can even pilot new technology, leaving them perpetually behind nimble competitors.
• How air-gapped sandboxes collapse procurement timelines — NayaOne's off-estate digital sandbox lets institutions run proof of concepts in weeks because the environment is completely separated from production systems, eliminating the need for individual vendor security reviews.
• The "vet once, test many" model — Once a bank approves NayaOne as a vendor, any future technology (from Y Combinator startups to CrowdStrike) can be tested inside the sandbox without repeating the TPRM process.
• Insurance-specific use cases: claims modernization — P&C carriers are using the platform to test AI-driven FNOL triage, claims routing, fraud detection, and payment automation across the full claims lifecycle.
• Multi-LLM side-by-side assessments — Banks are running comparative evaluations of ChatGPT, Gemini, and other LLMs inside the sandbox, the only way regulated institutions can safely touch these systems before committing.
• Integration testing with core systems — The platform replicates Guidewire, Duck Creek, Salesforce, and ServiceNow environments so carriers can validate interoperability before making a purchasing decision.
• Relentless forward progress as a leadership framework — Scott draws a direct line from 200-mile ultramarathons to building a US operation from scratch: plan station to station, leverage the team, and own everything that happens.

Notable Quotes

"What you've built here is a utility that every financial institution is going to need, whether they know it or not right now." — Scott Sambucci, Managing Director, NayaOne

"There's nothing more frustrating than making good progress with your sales demo, having good early conversations, but then being told it's just gonna take nine months for you to fill out all this paperwork." — Scott Sambucci

"By nature, every bank out there is going to be twelve months behind their competitive landscape because those competitors don't have those same guardrails yet." — Scott Sambucci

"No one's coming to help you. No one can pick you up and take you to the finish line. It doesn't matter how good or bad you feel — you just have to keep moving." — Scott Sambucci

Resources

Guest:

• NayaOne: https://nayaone.com/
• Scott Sambucci on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottsambucci/

Host & Organization:

• Joshua R. Hollander on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuarhollander/
• Horton International (USA): https://www.horton-usa.com/
• Insurtech Leadership Podcast (LinkedIn Showcase): https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/insurtech-leadership-show

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There’s Never Been a Better Time to Build in Insurance

How is private equity approaching the insurance technology opportunity differently than traditional venture capital? What happens when risk capital wants to move upstream in the value chain, and AI enables it to actually get there?

Guest

Joe Zuk is an Operating Partner at Altamont Capital Partners, where he leads corporate and business development across a portfolio of insurance and insurance services companies. With 23 years of industry experience, Joe spent 10 years as a reinsurance broker and underwriter, then 8 years with two MGAs building P&C verticals and corporate development functions. At Altamont, he oversees portfolio companies including Accelerant Holdings, Augment Risk, Embark General, Fleming Holdings, Ascendex Underwriters, Kuvare Holdings, and Hadron Holdings.

Key Topics

The Insurance Stack is Compressing - Risk capital (reinsurers, ILS, carriers) is moving upstream toward origination. Traditional 8-layer distribution is collapsing into 3: origination, translation, risk capital. AI is the enabler, but relationships still matter.

AI Solves Operational, Not Structural, Problems - The industry went through shiny object syndrome with AI. Real ROI comes from mundane efficiency: submission triage, claims processing speed, underwriting augmentation from unstructured data. Not flashy, but measurable.

Why PE Beats VC for Insurance - Insurance requires patience, regulatory expertise, and operational discipline. VC timelines are destructive. PE operating partners understand the regulatory cadence and can navigate it competently.

The Founding Team Playbook Has Changed - Today's insurance startups need a CTO or head of data as a founding hire, not just an underwriter and a producer. Talent comes from adjacent industries (fintech, healthtech) not just insurance veterans.

Now Is the Best Time to Build - Technology maturity, available talent, incumbent inefficiency, and collapsed barriers to entry mean founders can build insurtech companies that compete on quality and speed with much larger organizations.

Hiring for Curiosity Over Credentials - Altamont prioritizes intellectual curiosity and adaptability, especially for tech-forward roles. Domain expertise still matters, but learning velocity matters more.

Trust Cannot Be Automated - AI compresses workflows, but it doesn't compress trust. Relationships, sales, and concierge service remain core differentiators in insurance, even as the stack contracts.

Notable Quotes

"AI can compress workflows, but it doesn't compress trust."

"The insurance stack is compressing from eight layers down to three: origination, translation, and risk capital."

"We went through a period of shiny object syndrome with AI. The real ROI is in the mundane operational efficiency."

"I believe there's never been a better time to be an entrepreneur in the insurance market."

Resources

• Altamont Capital Partners: https://altamontcapital.com/

• Joe Zuk: https://joezuk.com/

• Follow Joe: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joezuk/

• Horton International: https://www.horton-usa.com/

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#InsurTech #Insurance #InsuranceInnovation #Leadership #ExecutiveLeadership

The Retention Gap: Why Carriers Lose Policyholders They Priced Correctly

Introduction

What happens when carriers can predict where risk exists but have zero control over how that risk changes after the policy is written? Valkyrie Holmes, CEO and Co-Founder of Faura, returns to the Insurtech Leadership Podcast to answer that question with a new playbook: turn policyholders into active risk managers, and retention follows.

In this episode, Holmes unpacks Faura's retention engine for high-risk consumers, the two-page resilience report reshaping how homeowners engage with their own property risk, and why MGAs have become her favorite distribution partners. The conversation covers carrier trust, first-party data strategies, composable platform architecture, and what it takes to lead a scaling insurtech as the youngest person in every room.

Guest Bio

Valkyrie Holmes is the CEO and Co-Founder of Faura, a climate risk intelligence platform that evaluates property survivability across all five NATCAT perils: wildfire, hurricane, hail, flood, and earthquake. Holmes skipped college, interned at NASA and SpaceX, and co-founded Faura in 2023. The company has raised $3.5M in seed funding from Harlem Capital, Building Ventures, MetaProp, and Dorm Room Fund, won the State Farm Pitch Competition at InsureTech Connect, and secured a strategic partnership with Insurity to embed resilience analytics into P&C underwriting workflows.

Key Topics

• The Retention Engine - Faura's new approach to turning policyholders from passive premium-payers into active risk managers through engagement and behavioral data

• Two-Page Resilience Reports - Homeowner-facing reports that prioritize easy action items first, building momentum before introducing harder mitigation steps

• QR Codes and CA Compliance - How carriers use Faura's walkthrough module as a compliance tool for state-mandated wildfire discounts in California

• First-Party Property Data - Filling modifier gaps in carrier datasets by partnering with homeowners for ongoing risk information in exchange for incentives

• MGA Strategy - Why MGAs move faster, require less consensus, and have become Faura's ideal distribution partners over tier-one carriers

• Composable Platform Architecture - Building a system flexible enough to customize endpoints, reports, and fields for any carrier, broker, or distribution partner

• Differentiation in High-Risk Markets - What carriers need beyond price to retain policyholders as competition increases in FL, CA, and emerging catastrophe zones

Notable Quotes

"Historically, many carriers have been very good at predicting where risk exists, but have very little control over how that risk changes after the policy is written."

• Valkyrie Holmes, CEO/Co-Founder, Faura

"If you're re-entering a market or trying to take up market share, what is the reason someone stays with you over switching to another carrier for a fifty-dollar premium reduction next year?"

• Valkyrie Holmes

"Talk to everyone. Talk widely. And then narrow to your mission."

• Valkyrie Holmes

Resources

Guest:

• Faura: https://www.faura.us/

• Valkyrie Holmes on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/valkyrieholmes/

Host & Organization:

• Joshua R. Hollander on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuarhollander/

• Horton International (USA): https://www.horton-usa.com/

• Insurtech Leadership Podcast (LinkedIn Showcase): https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/insurtech-leadership-show

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Stop Mailing Checks: How Card-Based Payouts Are Reshaping Claims

Introduction

What if the biggest friction point in insurance isn't underwriting or distribution, but the moment a policyholder actually gets paid? For an industry built on the promise of financial protection, the claims payout process remains stubbornly analog, slow, and vulnerable to fraud.

In this episode of the Insurtech Leadership Podcast, host Joshua Hollander sits down with Andrew Jernigan, Head of Insurance, North America at Pliant, to dissect how card-based payout infrastructure is reshaping claims operations. From single-use virtual cards that eliminate fraud vectors to tokenized wallet payouts that meet policyholders where they already transact, Jernigan makes the case that modernizing the last mile of claims isn't just an ops upgrade, it's a revenue strategy.

Guest Bio

Andrew Jernigan is the Head of Insurance, North America at Pliant, a card-as-a-service platform modernizing claims and benefit payouts for insurers and payers. Prior to Pliant, he was the founder and CEO of Insured Nomads, a company built to serve globally mobile professionals with embedded insurance and financial wellness products. Jernigan brings a rare combination of carrier-side operating experience and fintech product instincts to the claims payout problem.

Key Topics

• Card-Based Claims Payouts - How single-use and virtual cards replace checks and ACH transfers, reducing settlement time from days to seconds

• Fraud Reduction Through Card Infrastructure - Why single-use cards with merchant category restrictions eliminate common payout fraud vectors

• Interchange as a Revenue Lever - The economics of card-based payouts: insurers can generate interchange revenue while reducing operational costs

• Tokenized Wallet Payouts - The near-term future where claims land directly in Apple Pay or Google Wallet, removing the need for physical cards entirely

• Branded Payout Experience - How carrier-branded payment cards turn the claims moment into a customer experience and retention touchpoint

• Implementation Simplicity - Why modern card-as-a-service platforms can integrate in weeks rather than the months-long cycles of legacy payment systems

• Communication as Retention Strategy - The hidden cost of poor claims communication and why payout speed alone doesn't solve the customer experience gap

Notable Quotes

"Use other people's money. That's literally the best advice in payments."

• Andrew Jernigan, Head of Insurance, North America, Pliant

"People are tired of believing that insurance is going to be like pulling teeth. They're waiting for innovation to happen."

• Andrew Jernigan

"It's not just speed. It's control. A single-use card means the money can only go where it's supposed to go."

• Andrew Jernigan

Resources

Guest:

• Pliant: https://www.pliant.io/

• Andrew Jernigan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewjernigan/

Host & Organization:

• Joshua R. Hollander on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuarhollander/

• Horton International (USA): https://www.horton-usa.com/

• Insurtech Leadership Podcast (LinkedIn Showcase): https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/insurtech-leadership-show

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A Radical Approach to Claims: Why Automating the Process Beats Augmenting the Adjuster

Introduction

What happens when you stop trying to make claims adjusters faster and instead redesign the entire workflow from first notice of loss? Most insurers are layering AI co-pilots on top of legacy processes, but Ravin AI is arguing for something more disruptive: a fully automated claims pipeline that collects evidence, detects fraud, applies business rules, and routes decisions before a human ever touches the file. In this episode, Eliron Ekstein, Co-Founder and CEO of Ravin AI, breaks down how their Ravin Inspect platform automates up to 80% of auto claims, and why the economics of full automation are fundamentally different from incremental efficiency gains.

Guest Bio

Eliron Ekstein co-founded Ravin AI approximately eight years ago out of Shell Ventures, where he led new business development in Shell's Digital Ventures unit in London. What began as a concept for scanning vehicles at petrol stations has grown into a $35M+ funded insurtech operating across multiple continents. Eliron holds an MBA from London Business School and has spent the past decade digitizing automotive and transportation workflows. Ravin AI now serves insurance carriers, fleets, and remarketing customers globally with its patented DeepDetect technology.

Key Topics

-Full Automation vs. Co-Pilot Augmentation — Why Ravin's "pilot, not co-pilot" approach delivers fundamentally different economics than AI tools that assist adjusters within existing workflows.

-Ravin Inspect: End-to-End Claims Pipeline — How the platform gathers policyholder data, vehicle images, location, speed, and fraud signals upfront to build a complete claim file before human review.

-80% Auto-Adjudication Target — The threshold at which automation rewrites carrier unit economics, from staffing models to cycle times to customer satisfaction scores.

-Purpose-Built AI vs. Generic GenAI — Why domain-specific computer vision and decision logic outperform general-purpose large language models for claims adjudication.

-Integration Without Disruption — Ravin's approach to plugging into existing core systems and claims platforms without requiring carriers to rip and replace.

-International Market Entry — Lessons from expanding an Israeli-founded insurtech into the U.S. and Australian markets, including regulatory and go-to-market differences.

-Fraud Detection as a Byproduct — How automated evidence collection at FNOL creates a stronger fraud signal than retroactive investigation.

Notable Quotes

"Our pilot is not a co-pilot — it will run the claim up until the very last minute where you have to give a final approval."

— Eliron Ekstein, Co-Founder & CEO, Ravin AI

"We can actually gather all the relevant data from you — images, location, speed, fraud detection — and build a complete file that already includes business rules according to which you can settle the claim."

— Eliron Ekstein

"This is more of a radical approach that results in significant benefits, significant speed."

— Eliron Ekstein

Resources

Guest:

Ravin AI: https://www.ravin.ai/

Eliron Ekstein on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/elironekstein/

Host & Organization:

Joshua R. Hollander on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuarhollander/

Horton International (USA): https://www.horton-usa.com/

Insurtech Leadership Podcast (LinkedIn Showcase): https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/insurtech-leadership-show

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If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe on your favorite platform and leave a review. The Insurtech Leadership Podcast is available on YouTube, Podbean, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify.

Why 90% of AI Pilots Stall (And How to Escape Pilot Purgatory)

Episode Overview

How many insurance organizations have launched an AI pilot, watched it work in the lab, and then watched it quietly disappear in production? Today we're dismantling the myth that AI adoption is a technology problem—and making the case that it's a workflow problem.

Guest

Jake Sloan, VP of Global Insurance at Appian, is an operator first. He has run large-scale insurance operations, owned a $150M P&L, and delivered transformations that only happen when you understand how work actually moves—handoffs, exceptions, controls, and accountability. At Appian, he leads the insurance vertical for a process automation and low-code platform focused on claims, underwriting, and operational process orchestration.

Key Topics

• Pilot Purgatory: Why 90% of AI Projects Stall — Pilots work in controlled environments. Then reality hits: no data pipeline, no workflow integration, no governance, no frontline buy-in. Organizational alignment—not technology—is the breaking point.

• The Orchestration Layer — Appian's core thesis: build an orchestration layer first. It sits between your legacy monolith and the next chapter. Additive, keeps work flowing during transformation, and creates the foundation where AI and automation actually stick.

• Email as Infrastructure — Underwriters spend 40%+ of their day in inboxes. The AI mailbox use case embeds AI into a workflow that extracts data, routes work, makes decisions, and triggers actions. Underwriters gain 2–3 hours a day back.

• Claims Velocity: Days to Hours — One global insurer went from 24–72 hours (FNOL to assignment) to minutes. Digital intake feeds orchestrated workflows. AI triages, categorizes severity, flags fraud risk. The adjuster gets a complete, pre-organized package.

• Alignment = Culture, Not Just Tech — Appian's workshops put business, IT, data, and operations in one room to design the ideal state and work backward. Underwriters don't get replaced—they become superhuman. Admin work gets stripped away.

• The Talent Problem Is a Workflow Problem — Entry-level insurance work is repetitive email categorization. When AI handles the mundane, these jobs become analytical and attractive again. The organizations winning reskill existing teams and position domain expertise as more valuable.

• The 90-Day Deployment Mindset — Pick one workflow. Build the orchestration layer. Plug in AI. Show ROI in 90 days. Then iterate.

Key Quotes

-"When you go to scale it, it's like, well, we don't have the data pipeline. We don't have the workflow. We don't have the governance. We don't have the buy-in from the frontline team. And so it just stalls."

-"It's not about the AI itself. It's about the workflow that the AI sits inside."

-"We're not here to replace underwriters. We're here to make them superhuman."

-"Get started. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. Start with a use case, build the orchestration layer, plug AI into it, show value in 90 days."

Resources

• Appian: appian.com

• Jake Sloan LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacobpsloan]

• Joshua R. Hollander, Host: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuarhollander/

• Horton International: https://www.horton-usa.com/

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#InsurTech #Insurance #InsuranceInnovation #FutureOfInsurance #ExecutiveLeadership

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#InsurTech #Insurance #InsuranceInnovation #FutureOfInsurance #Leadership #ExecutiveLeadership

API-First Insurance: When Brands Become Insurers

Episode Overview

What does it actually take to run a digital insurance operation at the system level—not at the chatbot layer, but at the transaction layer? Joshua R. Hollander speaks with Wayne Slavin, CEO and Co-Founder of Sure, about the infrastructure required to deliver true digital insurance in an AI-agent world. Wayne describes Sure's role as "what Visa and Mastercard were in the early days of credit cards"—building the rails for digital insurance distribution.

Key Topics

1. What "Digital Insurance" Really Means

Digital insurance is not about moving forms online or replacing phone calls with web interfaces. True digital insurance is straight-through processing from quote to policy issuance to payment—mirroring the speed and frictionlessness of e-commerce transactions. Wayne explains: "If that transaction requires some asynchronous process, some process that is interrupted, that we are actually not doing digital insurance." The benchmark: the entire process happens within minutes, not days or weeks.

2. API-First Infrastructure vs. Legacy Core Systems

Sure's platform differs fundamentally from monolithic core policy administration systems (like Guidewire or Duck Creek) because it was built API-first with data normalization at its foundation. Legacy cores encourage over-customization, which locks insurers into inflexible, non-compliant systems. Sure's approach standardizes policy data across product types (homeowners, renters, fine art, landlord), enabling rapid changes and integrations. Unlike legacy systems, Sure doesn't force carriers to choose between their existing tech and innovation—it coexists alongside legacy infrastructure.

3. Model Context Protocol (MCP) and AI Agent Integration

In February 2026, Sure announced the industry's first MCP server integration, enabling Claude AI agents to interact directly with Sure's infrastructure. MCP is a standardized protocol that allows AI agents to connect to business systems without custom integrations for each use case. This means insurers and brands no longer need 6-12 months of engineering to embed insurance; AI agents can quote, bind, manage, and renew policies conversationally.

4. Why Non-Endemic Brands Will Build Insurance

The next major insurance distributors won't be insurance companies. They'll be brands, e-commerce platforms, fintechs, and technology companies with massive customer bases. Wayne's economic thesis: if a brand can convert customers to insurance at 20-30x the typical rate (vs. giving customer data to a third party), the unit economics change entirely. Large brands now have a path to retain customers and data while building insurance revenue.

5. The Transaction Layer as Moat

Insurance isn't like retail or travel—regulatory consequences are real, policy admin systems are complex, and compliance layers must operate end-to-end. Sure's competitive advantage lies in building the foundational transaction layer that carriers either cannot replicate internally or would take years to engineer. This infrastructure layer is what enables AI agents to work reliably within compliance and regulatory constraints.

6. Insurance as an Ecosystem

The future isn't a single insurer offering multiple products—it's an ecosystem where brands, platforms, and technology companies collaborate on insurance delivery. AI agents, powered by Sure's infrastructure, enable this distributed, composable insurance ecosystem.

Key Quotes

-"What digital insurance really means is truly a straight-through process where you're starting to get a quote that quote will be a real quote. It's not an estimate. It will become a real policy. You will pay real money. You will get a real coverage document. And the timing of all of that is pretty close to what you expect from regular old e-commerce."

-"The next big insurance distributors won't be insurance companies. They will be brands. They'll be technology companies. They'll be fintechs. They'll be AI companies. They'll be companies that are currently sitting on large customer bases that don't have insurance products today."

-"Before MCP, if an AI agent wanted to interact with an insurance system, you'd have to build a custom integration for each system, each use case. MCP standardizes that."

Resources

• Sure: https://sure.com

• Wayne Slavin LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wayneslavin

• Horton International: https://www.horton-usa.com/

Subscribe & Connect

Tune in to the Insurtech Leadership Podcast for deep-dive conversations with insurance executives, founders, and innovators shaping the future of insurance technology.

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuarhollander/

• Podcast Showcase: https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/insurtech-leadership-show

#InsurTech #Insurance #InsuranceInnovation #Innovation #FutureOfInsurance #Leadership #ExecutiveLeadership

No Fault, No Claims Adjuster, No Friction: Randel Bennett on the Future of Guarantees

What if your insurance product didn't need a claims adjuster?

When you remove the blame from the coverage equation, everything changes. In this episode, Randel Bennett walks through how no-fault embedded insurance—specifically parametric insurance woven into the solar energy business—is reshaping how performance guarantees work in commercial infrastructure projects.

About the Guest

Randel Bennett is CEO and co-founder of Qixent, a Chicago-based insurance exchange platform and licensed MGA enabling carriers and partners to launch and distribute insurance products at speed and scale.

Randel's insurance career spans traditional carriers (Allstate in product management), startup ventures (co-founder of Sigo Seguros, focused on non-standard auto for Hispanic buyers), and reinsurance infrastructure (VP of Strategic Partnerships at Swiss Re, working with dozens of MGAs and insurtechs on alternative distribution and new product development). He is currently pursuing an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and holds a degree from Florida International University.

Key Topics

No-Fault Embedded Insurance: From Blame to Guarantee

Traditional insurance asks: "Whose fault was it?" No-fault embedded insurance removes the blame entirely. By embedding a parametric trigger (a predefined event and payout) directly into a service or product, you convert insurance into a guarantee. When solar panels underperform due to weather, the data triggers an automatic payout—no claims adjuster, no friction. The customer gets paid faster; the carrier transfers weather risk cleanly.

Data as the Foundation of Underwriting

The critical edge in performance guarantees is determining expected production with precision. Qixent uses weather data, historical production records, satellite imagery, and panel specifications to establish a baseline for each project. This data-first approach allows predictable, sustainable pricing and removes the guesswork from underwriting. As Randel notes, "data is really the core of everything that we do."

Annual Reconciliation vs. Event Triggers

Qixent's model allows flexibility: real-time payouts for significant weather events, but the dominant approach in commercial solar is annual reconciliation. Over a 12-month period, Qixent compares actual production to expected production. If weather caused a shortfall, the guarantee covers the gap. For 20–25 year projects, this cadence keeps both sides—EPC and asset owner—on stable, predictable footing.

From Commercial Solar to the Energy Transition

Qixent's 3–5 year vision extends beyond commercial solar into residential solar, battery storage, EV charging, and fleet electrification—any space where a performance obligation faces weather, grid reliability, or supply chain constraints. The underlying infrastructure is designed to be vertical-agnostic: "If we can measure it, we can guarantee it."

Founder Lessons: Humility, Problem-Market Fit, Co-Founder Complementarity

Randel's advice to insurance professionals considering entrepreneurship: Lead with humility (startup resources are scarce; you become the team). Solve a real, unmistakable problem (the performance guarantee gap in clean energy was Randel's unsee-able insight). Find a co-founder who complements your blind spots (Randel brings insurance and relationships; Glenn brings technology and operational rigor). And protect work-life balance—burnout tanks companies faster than capital constraints.

Notable Quotes

• "In the no-fault embedded space, we're removing the blame entirely... When their solar panels underperform due to weather, for instance, the data says, hey, this is what happened. And that triggers a payout. And that's it."

• "Data is really the core of everything that we do... because of that, we can price it in a way that's affordable and sustainable for the long term."

• "We're not just a tech company. We're an insurance company that uses technology. And that distinction matters."

• "When you come from a large organization, you're used to having resources at your disposal... When you go to a startup, you are the team. You are the infrastructure. And that requires a level of humility that a lot of people aren't prepared for."

• "If we can measure it, we can guarantee it. That's the big vision."

Resources & Links

• Qixent: https://qixent.com/

• Randel Bennett LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/randeljb/

• Randel Bennett Email: randel@qixent.com

• Horton International: https://www.horton-usa.com/

• Joshua R. Hollander LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuarhollander/

• Insurtech Leadership Podcast Showcase: https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/insurtech-leadership-show

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Consolidation Without Chaos: How ALKEME Integrates and Grows at Scale

Introduction

In this episode of the Insurtech Leadership Podcast, host Joshua Hollander sits down with Curtis Barton, CEO and founding visionary of ALKEME Insurance, to explore how ALKEME built one of the fastest-growing brokerage platforms in the country - not by outspending the competition, but by out-integrating them. Curtis shares the unconventional origin story behind ALKEME, his philosophy on alignment, and why firms that invest in people, systems, and technology will define the next era of insurance distribution.

Guest Bio

Curtis Barton is CEO and founding visionary of ALKEME Insurance. He began his insurance career in 1996 and founded Venture Pacific Insurance, a regional brokerage in Southern California, before co-founding Brokkrr, a digital lead generation insurtech platform. Curtis orchestrated the complex merger of seven independent agencies to form ALKEME, championing a people-powered, tech-enabled business model. Under his leadership, ALKEME has grown to a top-25 brokerage with over 1,000 employees across 50+ locations nationwide.

Key Topics

• Integration-first vs. rapid roll-up - Why ALKEME chose to build a unified platform from day one rather than stack EBITDA through fast acquisitions, and how that decision shapes every partnership conversation.

• One class of stock, true alignment - ALKEME issues a single class of equity to every partner - no preferred, no investor stock. Curtis explains why this structure is the foundation of cohesive alignment.

• The compression problem in brokerage multiples - How the spread between entry and exit multiples has collapsed, creating liquidity risk for agencies that relied on financial engineering over operational improvement.

• Why agency owners join (not sell) - Most principals aren't looking for exits - they're looking for resources, technology, and scale they can't build alone. ALKEME's pitch is about what changes after close.

• SOPs, systems, and reinvestment as growth levers - How deploying standardized processes and technology into historically under-resourced agencies unlocks organic growth at the producer level.

• AI as augmentation, not replacement - ALKEME's approach to AI: position producers to be the most valuable asset in the transaction by giving them better tools, not replacing them with automation.

• Building leadership that scales - Why Curtis believes no one is a "forever employee" and how ALKEME constantly evolves its leadership to match the company's growth trajectory.

Quotes

• "We just decided to do our own thing and do it differently. We ended up recruiting nine of my friends out of a cluster that we were all part of that had their own agencies."

• "One dollar of organic can give you seven of inorganic capacity, and you've got to look at it from that perspective."

• "There is no preferred, there is no investor stock. They have the same exact share that I have that any of our partners have. And that's called alignment."

• "Most of these people don't want to sell their agency. They just know that they're going to get outscaled and out-resourced."

• "We were already edging towards a people-powered, tech-enabled business, and we talk constantly about how do we position our people to be the most valuable asset in the transaction."

Resources

• ALKEME Insurance: alkemeins.com

• Curtis Barton on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/curtis-barton-8103682/

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Auto Insurance: Stabilizing or Stuck?

Introduction

In this episode of the Insurtech Leadership Podcast, host Josh Hollander sits down with Gemma Ros, CTO at The Zebra, to unpack their 2026 State of Auto Insurance Report. They explore what's driving premium divergence across states, how affordability pressure is reshaping consumer behavior, and where regulation, loss costs, and distribution dynamics collide.

Guest Bio

Gemma Ros is CTO at The Zebra, one of the largest insurance comparison platforms in the United States. Born in Spain, Gemma built her career across engineering and data roles before joining The Zebra, where she leads the technology organization responsible for data infrastructure, product engineering, and AI capabilities. She brings a unique perspective as both a technologist and an insurance industry insider who sees real-time consumer shopping behavior at scale.

Key Topics

• State-by-state premium divergence — Auto insurance premiums are not stabilizing uniformly. Regulatory environments, loss cost trends, and competitive dynamics are creating vastly different realities depending on where you live.

• Affordability pressure and coverage erosion — Consumers facing higher premiums are choosing higher deductibles, lower coverages, and state minimums — creating knock-on effects for uninsured/underinsured motorist exposure across the market.

• Carrier growth signals in ad spending — When carriers increase advertising, it signals growth appetite and competitive pricing — a cue for consumers to reshop their policies.

• Rate filing dynamics — New rates are being filed and going into effect daily, making the market a moving target for both consumers and distribution partners.

• Telematics and ADAS impact on underwriting — Usage-based insurance and advanced driver assistance systems are beginning to reshape how risk is priced, though widespread impact is still unfolding.

• Autonomous vehicles and insurance implications — The shift from driver liability to product/manufacturer liability as autonomy scales, and what that means for carriers.

• Taking AI from fun to material impact — Gemma's 2026 engineering theme: moving AI adoption from experimental to scalable, repeatable, and operationalized across the entire engineering organization.

Quotes

• "It's never a bad idea to shop around. Educate yourself — you might be leaving money on the table."

• "If you start seeing a lot more ads for insurance companies on TV or on podcasts, that's a good time to reshop — the carriers are signaling they want to grow."

• "My main theme for 2026 is taking AI from fun to material impact."

Resources

• The Zebra's 2026 State of Auto Insurance Report: Available at thezebra.com

• The Zebra: thezebra.com — insurance comparison platform

Subscribe & Review

If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe to the Insurtech Leadership Podcast on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. Leave a review — it helps other insurance and technology professionals find the show.