Vishal Sankhala, who led product at digital life insurer Ethos and previously worked at Facebook and Uber, left Ethos in late 2023 and founded Outmarket. The startup applies artificial intelligence to help insurance agencies and brokers automate repetitive paperwork and administrative processes.
“Ninety-five percent of insurance in the U.S. and worldwide is still sold through [human] agents, and when you look at sort of like how the process is today, it’s very manual,” Sankhala told TechCrunch, highlighting the market opportunity in a large industry.
Why focus on commercial insurance?
Outmarket concentrates on commercial lines because those policies tend to be highly customized and nuanced for each business. Companies must choose among many coverage options — from general liability and workers’ compensation to directors and officers (D&O) liability — and tailor solutions to their specific risks.
Sankhala notes that “there are over 250 different types of coverages that are out there, depending on what business you are and what risk you have and what you want to cover. For each of those, the process is very different. The application forms you need to fill out, the documents you need to read.”
What the product does
Outmarket’s AI automates time-consuming administrative work, enabling brokers — including large organizations such as Marsh and Aon — to more quickly evaluate options and recommend appropriate policies. That allows human agents to focus on tasks that require personal attention, like emergency response and client relations.
Since launching a new product 14 months ago, the company says it has signed more than 300 insurance agencies as customers, including 25% of the top 100 agencies.
Funding and valuation
Outmarket announced a $34.5 million Series B round led by SignalFire, with participation from Fika Ventures, Permanent Capital Ventures, TTV Capital and Dash Fund. The round follows a $17 million Series A round four months earlier; a person familiar with the investment said the company was valued at $355 million in the new round.
Competition and market potential
Other startups building AI operating layers for insurance brokers include Fulcrum AI and Further AI. Sankhala points to the scale of the opportunity: the U.S. property and casualty insurance market alone generates over a trillion dollars in annual premiums, leaving ample room for solutions that help agencies work faster and smarter.
Why it matters
Outmarket demonstrates how AI can be applied beyond customer-facing features to automate structured, document-heavy workflows in insurance. By reducing manual administrative burden for brokers, the technology has the potential to increase efficiency in a large but traditionally slow-moving sector.
