A Chicago-based insurance technology company with a large presence in St. Petersburg has raised $82 million and plans to use part of the funding to fuel local growth.
Kin Insurance announced earlier in March it raised the funds led by Virginia-based QED Investors. It's the first close of what it expects to be a $100 million Series D. According to Chicago Inno, the company has raised $215 million to date.
The company originally announced in November 2019 it would open an office in St. Petersburg, which now employs roughly 70 people. There are about 90 Kin employees across Florida.
"You have a deep bench of insurance carriers right here in the Tampa Bay marketplace, so it does make a really attractive environment recruiting people in that experience," Angel Conlin, chief insurance officer at Kin and fellow St. Petersburg resident, said. "We’re working with both insurance and technology, and are able to get incredible talent for both."
Kin offers a direct-to-consumer home insurance model focusing on insuring homes impacted by severe weather events. It has operations in Florida, California and Louisiana.
While there is no particular breakdown for where the latest funding will be allocated, it will be used largely for staffing, including in the Tampa Bay region and across Florida. Conlin said there is no set goal for hitting a certain amount of additional employees by the end of the year, but they are hiring "for everything" including engineers, product development and insurance industry talent.
"Those funds are really going to be growing the business, to allow us to keep doing what we’re doing and staffing employees," she said. "Right now 20 to 25 percent of our staff is in the Florida area, so I would say there definitely would be a significant percentage to go to the state."
This is not the first tech startup to double down on its investment after raising big funds. In July 2021, Atlanta-based Flock Safety raised a $150 million Series D, allocating $10 million to go toward the Tampa Bay region.
"There are a short number of venture-backed companies hiring in Tampa, and then you attach an important mission," Flock Safety CEO Garrett Langley said in a previous interview with Tampa Bay Inno. "So it becomes, 'Do you want to work at a venture-backed company with a broader mission?'"
