After choosing Denver over Washington D.C. to house its engineering team, Pie Insurance has announced a major Series B that will help the company double its staff by the end of this year.
The insurtech startup, founded in 2017, today announced the completion of a $45 million Series B funding round. Participating investors include SVB Capital, Sirius Group, Greycroft, Moxley Holdings, Aspect Ventures and Elefund.
Pie provides workers’ compensation to small businesses, like restaurants and landscaping companies, through its online platform that can provide a quote within two minutes.
The company will use the funds to expand geographically, add new distribution sources and continue to improve its workers' compensation offerings.
Pie is now available in 19 states covering more than 60% of the U.S. workers’ compensation market and expects to expand nationally by the end of 2019. To date, Pie has raised $61 million.
“I’m so proud of what our team has accomplished in a short period of time,” said Pie Co-Founder and CEO John Swigart. “We’re grateful to work with such supportive investors to take Pie to the next level and fundamentally change the way small businesses get workers’ compensation insurance.”
According to a release, Pie sold its first policy in March 2018, and in the first 11 months since its launch, the company has generated more than $10 million in written premium.
“We are impressed by the momentum Pie has achieved in less than a year,” said Tilli Kalisky-Bannett, Partner at SVB Capital. “We’re thrilled to join this phenomenal team in their next phase of growth.”
Pie currently has 55 employees spread across Denver and Washington D.C., with 80 percent of the employees sitting in Denver.
In an interview with Colorado Inno in October, Swigart said the Denver startup market was the primary reason the company chose to expand here.
“We decided on Denver, because there is a slightly better market to build up there. It’s not quite as startup friendly for engineering in D.C.,” he said at the time.
With the funding, the company will look to grow its staff to 120 employees company-wide by the end of 2019. A spokesperson for the company said most of those hires would be made in Denver.
The company has worked out of office space at 1860 Blake St. in LoDo, having previously worked out of a co-working space at Industry. With the expected growth, the company will look for additional office space in the city.
