Jungle Ventures leads $46 million round in Turtlemint

NEW DELHI: InsurTech platform Turtlemint said it has raised funding from Singapore-based Jungle Ventures, its first investment in the category, bringing the startup’s Series D fundraising to a close at $46 million. The funds will be used to boost insurance distribution and innovation in India, the company said in a statement.

“This is our first investment in the Insurance tech space in India and we are very excited to partner with the team at Turtlemint. Micro entrepreneurs are the backbone of the Indian economy and we see Turtlemint playing a huge role in making them more digitally inclusive. India lags behind in improving the depth and breadth of insurance coverage and the recent initiatives by the government are in the right direction,” said Amit Anand, Founding Partner, Jungle Ventures.

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Founded in 2015, by Dhirendra Mahyavanshi and Anand Prabhudesai, Turtlemint has developed a network of over 1,00,000 insurance advisors that cater to more than 1.5 million customers in over 5,000 metros, cities and towns. It has partnerships with 30+ leading Indian insurance providers that include HDFC Life Insurance, HDFC Ergo, ICICI Lombard, New India Assurance, Reliance General Insurance, and new age entities like Go Digit.

“The funds raised would be utilised to further strengthen the Turtlemint platform by adding user-friendly new-age insurance products, developing engaging content for customer education, and enabling digitisation across all models of distribution – traditional and new. We have an endeavour to serve 50 M + customers in the next 5 years and we are on track to achieve the same,” said Anand Prabhudesai, Co-Founder, Turtlemint.

According to the company, the covid-19 pandemic has boosted overall consumer awareness and demand for health insurance and term life insurance.

"From this period onwards, we have seen our partners wholeheartedly embrace the digital platform and solutions, resulting in a 2.5x boost to their business. Our PoSP partners have made digital sales very effective in pandemic times," said Dhirendra Mahyavanshi, co-founder of Turtlemint.

Jungle Ventures' portfolio includes internet and software companies in India like Moglix, Livspace, TookiTaki and BookMyShow. It also recently led a Series B funding round of $10 Mn for Betterplace, India’s largest blue-collar workforce management platform.