InsTech - insurance & innovation
00:00:08 · Zoya, Matthew Grant, Richard Gunn
[00:00:08] S0: Hello. Welcome or welcome back to the InsTech podcast. Zoya here, and this week, Matthew Grant is joined by Richard Gunn. Richard's been with Hyperexponential since its earliest days, and he's now leading their fast growing US operation from Brooklyn. In this episode, he talks candidly scaling from five people to more than 220, building culture across continents, and what it really takes to win in The US insurance market. We also dive into how HX is reshaping pricing, triage, and portfolio intelligence, plus the practical ways AI and Asian technologies are already changing underwriting, product development, and go to market teams. If you've been wondering how carriers can stay profitable in softening markets, what vibe coding actually means in real life, or how a UK born InsureTech becomes by the markets for the market in The US, well, you're going to want to keep listening. So settle in, pour yourself a coffee, and enjoy the conversation. [00:01:16] S1: Richard, great to be talking to you. Last time we met, we were actually in a pub in London. This time, you're on the other side of the world, but great to have you on board for a discussion. [00:01:26] S2: Likewise. Good to be here and dialing in from New York. [00:01:29] S1: Well, know, we're British, so we have to weather. What's like in New York just now?
00:01:29 · Matthew Grant, Richard Gunn
[00:01:29] S1: Well, know, we're British, so we have to weather. What's like in New York just now? [00:01:33] S2: Very true to form. It's suddenly become winter, I would say, New York, which I actually quite like. I like the fact that New York commits to each of its seasons, and it's it's definitely committing to winter now. It was snowing yesterday having been kind of T shirt or light jumper weather beforehand. So, yeah, there's my stereotypical British introduction by the weather. Thank you for teaming me up, Matthew. [00:01:53] S1: Well, we're also delighted to get you back. We've had four episodes pretty much over the history of the company, actually. Had Santhirasenan, your co founder back in 2019, episode 52, and then he came back in 2023, and then we had Marcus Ryu, who or still is, a partner at Battery Ventures, talking about why they invested in you last year, and we kind of complete the circle with having you on today. So, a lot to catch up on, I think, a fast moving company. And also, given your successful fundraising in the past, great to hear how things are going. [00:02:25] S2: Yeah. No. Great to be here, and a lot has changed. I joined seven years ago, but as a business, we had our eighth birthday last Friday in London. [00:02:35] S1: You've been with the company seven years. You went to the eighth birthday party, so you joined one year into the company. How big was HX then when you joined?
00:02:35 · Matthew Grant, Richard Gunn
[00:02:35] S1: You've been with the company seven years. You went to the eighth birthday party, so you joined one year into the company. How big was HX then when you joined? [00:02:42] S2: So I think I was the fifth person to join HX. I was the first non engineering hire. So broadly, my role was to work alongside the founders. So was there as we were working out kind of what product market fit looked like, I guess, and how to sell it. One of my kind of early kind of projects, if you will, at HX was to apply for the Lloyd's Lab back in the day and to take us through that program. And then, yeah, since then, we were able to find partner market fit and sell to a few customers, and my role has kind of evolved as as a result of that. [00:03:16] S1: How many people today in the company? [00:03:18] S2: 220 something, two twenty one, I think, the last count. Yeah. [00:03:23] S1: It's a lot of change, as you said, seven years, and we'll talk a little bit about your own personal experience, but you're heading up the US operation out there now. I think last time we spoke, you had 20 people out there in The US on the ground. Obviously, a big market for you.
00:03:23 · Matthew Grant, Richard Gunn
[00:03:23] S1: It's a lot of change, as you said, seven years, and we'll talk a little bit about your own personal experience, but you're heading up the US operation out there now. I think last time we spoke, you had 20 people out there in The US on the ground. Obviously, a big market for you. [00:03:35] S2: Yeah. That's right. So I moved over here a year ago and started building out a US team. Two of the hardest things to get right when you expand into a new geography. One is to get the culture right, and two is to win your first customer. Immersively, we had a little bit of an unfair advantage on winning your first customer because we were able to sell to some large US carriers from The UK, particularly through COVID, kind of decreased the geographical kind of barrier there. And I moved over to start building out a US pod, start building out a US team. And, yeah, over the last twelve months, I've scaled up to about 20 people. They are continuing to hire, which is exciting and exhausting. But, yeah, I'm based over here, based down in Brooklyn and New York. [00:04:15] S1: We'll come back to the experience of moving to The US and compare and contrast to The UK. But we should just baseline it. Hyperexponential HX was initially known as a pricing platform. I know you've expanded a bit since then, so how do you describe yourself in terms of what problem are you solving for your clients today?
00:04:15 · Matthew Grant, Richard Gunn
[00:04:15] S1: We'll come back to the experience of moving to The US and compare and contrast to The UK. But we should just baseline it. Hyperexponential HX was initially known as a pricing platform. I know you've expanded a bit since then, so how do you describe yourself in terms of what problem are you solving for your clients today? [00:04:32] S2: Yeah, sure. So, you're right. We are kind of most commonly known for our pricing and rating capabilities. Our mission has always remained consistent over the last eight years. Lots of things have changed, but our mission hasn't, which is to build the decision infrastructure for the insurance ecosystem. And that started with majoring on pricing and rating. In terms of the problems that we look to solve for and kind of broaden our aperture of how we try and help insurers now, it's really around winning the right risks, making better pricing decisions, and then maximizing portfolio profit, So everywhere from ingestion through to quote and then subsequent kind of portfolio optimization. So that's seen our product capabilities, even over the last twelve months alone, evolve from just the pricing and rating capability that many of our customers know us for towards having triage as well as portfolio intelligence capabilities on the on the kind of the back end of that decision making process, as well as releasing a whole host of AI capabilities and AI agents to come sit on top of that decision infrastructure.
00:04:32 · Richard Gunn, Matthew Grant
[00:04:32] S2: Yeah, sure. So, you're right. We are kind of most commonly known for our pricing and rating capabilities. Our mission has always remained consistent over the last eight years. Lots of things have changed, but our mission hasn't, which is to build the decision infrastructure for the insurance ecosystem. And that started with majoring on pricing and rating. In terms of the problems that we look to solve for and kind of broaden our aperture of how we try and help insurers now, it's really around winning the right risks, making better pricing decisions, and then maximizing portfolio profit, So everywhere from ingestion through to quote and then subsequent kind of portfolio optimization. So that's seen our product capabilities, even over the last twelve months alone, evolve from just the pricing and rating capability that many of our customers know us for towards having triage as well as portfolio intelligence capabilities on the on the kind of the back end of that decision making process, as well as releasing a whole host of AI capabilities and AI agents to come sit on top of that decision infrastructure. [00:05:30] S1: How do people buy from you? Is it still the pricing platform? You have to buy the pricing platform and they buy the add ons, or are the add ons something people can get in their own right?