In the last decade, the number of Americans with life insurance coverage has declined nearly 15%. Today, nearly half the population has no coverage at all — and even those who do may not have enough to support their families.
That means about 60 million U.S. households are uninsured or underinsured, according to financial research association LIMRA. The average coverage gap is estimated at $200,000 per household, or $12 trillion across the board.
Enter ConsumerOptix. Founded in 2018 by serial entrepreneur James O'Hara, the Dayton-based insurtech startup is determined to bridge the coverage gap by changing how insurance distributors interact with their customers.
"This industry is doing a really poor job of engaging with consumers and employees," O'Hara told me. "You have to put yourself in the shoes of the consumer and say, 'How do we want to position these valuable offerings in a way that’s going to make sense?'"
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The startup's core product is Accelerate — a digital life insurance platform for everyday people. It's designed to address an age-old void: Most companies' basic insurance benefits aren't enough for employees, but finding extra coverage on the open market can be challenging.
"Your traditional home and auto agent may have 8,000 to 10,000 home and auto policies, but only 200 life," O'Hara said. "It's a different product; they’re not comfortable with it. We saw that as the opportunity to move the needle the greatest."
The Accelerate platform enables agents, financial advisors, RIAs and other brokers to offer life insurance coverage through multiple carriers. It also gives instant-decision quotes, meaning consumers can qualify for a $1 million-plus policy in minutes.
"Frankly, we're not concerned with using Facebook and Google to build our name," O'Hara said. "We're just powering existing insurance channels to sell life insurance."
Though ConsumerOptix found its footing in the employer benefits space, it has since pivoted toward individual consumers. That was its biggest evolution, O'Hara said — and in January, the startup teamed up with national distributor One Resource Group (ORG) to make it happen.
Now, it's paying dividends. Partnering with ORG introduced the Accelerate platform to more than 8,000 brokers in all states, enabling ConsumerOptix to surpass $1 billion in consumer life insurance benefits quotes since the start of 2021.
Most recently, ORG was acquired by Integrity Marketing Group, expanding its footprint to more than 400,000 brokers. That's a much larger net for the Accelerate platform, O'Hara said. In fact, it's 50 times larger.
"It opens up this massive distribution opportunity for us," he said. "Going from 8,000 brokers to 400,000 brokers is really moving the needle."
Looking ahead, ConsumerOptix is preparing to scale. The insurtech startup garnered $1.3 million in its first two capital raises, and Manhattan-based Atlas Advisors is leading a third. That raise should close by the end of the year, bringing ConsumerOptix's total VC investment north of $3 million.
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With the capital infusion, the startup plans to add at least four more people to its existing staff of five.
"It’s a substantial uptick, but only because the demand requires it," O'Hara said. "We're working one carrier right now, and we're putting major life insurance carriers on hold until we can bring additional people in to do it."
That will be critical as consumer interest in life insurance ticks up. According to O'Hara, the acceleration of life insurance applications in 2020 far surpassed the prior two decades — and Millennials and Gen Zers are at the forefront.
"The growth is coming from people that are 45 years of age and younger, and we have a solution that's breaking the model," he said. "We’re partnering with carriers to deliver a policy to a Millennial or Gen Z in 12 minutes, and that's where the market is going."
Founded in 2018 by James O'Hara and Brian Kipp, ConsumerOptix is an insurtech company that offers tech-enabled solutions for employee and consumer benefits. Its clients have included companies like Nationwide, Mass Mutual, McGohan Brabender and Unum.
