Bdeo, a fast-growing technology company providing Visual Intelligence for the insurance and fleet industries, has raised an additional €7.5 million to accelerate its international expansion and strengthen its position across Europe and Latin America.
The new financing came from new investors Armilar, Hollard, The Centre for the Development of Industrial Technology (CDTI), and Íope Ventures, a new investment vehicle launched by Wayra and Telefónica Seguros. Existing investors K Fund and Blackfin also participated in the investment.
Bdeo was recently awarded the European Innovation Council’s ‘Seal of Excellence’, a recognition that the European Commission grants to only 160 companies each year, and also received grants from the Comunidad de Madrid and red.es as part of this new investment.
Reinforcing Bdeo’s reliable solution and user experience
Bdeo’s AI-powered Visual Intelligence solution remotely assesses damage to vehicles and homes to accelerate insurance claims and underwriting processes. The ease of integrating Bdeo’s technology into insurer operations, as well as the reliability of the results it delivers, are just some of the key factors that helped drive this new investment. The digital and agile experience Bdeo provides its users was another important factor, as policyholders everywhere now expect an agile, remote, and immediate experience throughout the insurance process.
“Based on the impressive results we have achieved and our capital efficiency given the challenging times we’re living in, it is reassuring to receive this trust from investors,” said Julio Pernía, CEO of Bdeo. “It is a significant boost of confidence for our team, and we are proud to continue working closely with the insurance sector and adapting to its needs and priorities, as we always have.”
“While insurers continue adopting new process automation technologies, aiming to decrease their loss ratios while increasing customer satisfaction, few solutions have the ability to become widely adopted. Particularly for underwriting and claims, there are key challenges related to the heterogeneous nature of the assets (such as vehicles and properties) and the scenarios being inspected, which feeds a complex pipeline of external parties and systems.
Bdeo has successfully created an easy-to-integrate platform that brings together the latest computer vision technologies coupled with proprietary data and asset data from leading providers. This assures an immediate impact on the insurer’s bottom line, which has been recognized repeatedly over time by Bdeo’s clients,” said João Dias, Principal at Armilar.
“At Wayra, we are delighted to invest in Bdeo through Íope Ventures with our partners at Telefónica Seguros. We believe in the disruptive potential of insurtech based on AI, which, as we know, is revolutionising the business ecosystem and, in this case, will enable greater agility and efficiency throughout insurance operations, thus providing a better service to the end user,” said Paloma Castellano, Director of Wayra Madrid.
“We at K Fund believe that Bdeo’s potential goes beyond the insurance industry; its damage detection and cost estimation technology can be applied to other use cases such as vehicle fleet management or property management, use cases that the company is already making progress with. We have no doubt that Bdeo will become one of the major references in artificial intelligence in Europe,” said Marc Clemente, Partner at K Fund.
“We’re more than happy to continue supporting Bdeo in its growth journey. We have immense confidence in the Bdeo team and are enthusiastic about continuing to collaborate with them on their expansion. Since day one, we have been deeply convinced of the pivotal role that Bdeo’s technology plays in empowering insurers to effectively manage claims and optimize their operational processes,” said Gabrielle Thomas, Investment Director at BlackFin Tech.
Growing presence in more than 25 countries
Over 50 insurers across more than 25 countries are already using Bdeo’s technology. The company has a growing presence across Latin America and Europe, particularly in countries such as Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, Nordic countries, the United Kingdom, Mexico, Colombia, and Argentina. Bdeo is proud to work with global insurance leaders such as Reale, Mapfre and Generali in Spain, Fidelidade in Portugal, Zurich, Allianz and BBVA in the Latin American market, and Hollard in South Africa.
In Spain, Bdeo already manages more than 50% of motor insurance underwriting and works with 8 of the 10 leading motor insurers in the market. In addition to accelerating its international expansion, Bdeo plans to continue developing its Visual Intelligence solutions to cover new use cases.