In two-and-a-half years, Ingenie, an auto-insurance broker using telematics technology, has grown to be a leading insurance brand for young British drivers. Targeting drivers ages 17 to 25, Ingenie uses black-box technology to offer customers discounts every three months, and education to make them better drivers, and has plans to enter the Canadian market this summer and the U.S. market in late 2014 or early 2015.
Canada, the United States and Britain share a social and economic issue: too many crashes by young people, said Richard King, Ingenie founder and CEO, during Celent’s Innovation & Insight Day today in New York. “One in five has a crash in their first six months on road,” King said.
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Ingenie, which was acquired in January by software, services and technology provider Quindell, installs the black-box telematics technology into the auto and assesses the drivers’ performance. According to Quindell, over the last year, the UK market has seen the number of telematics policies sold grow by 116,000, with Ingenie representing approximately 20 percent of black-box insurance growth. Ingenie coverage is underwritten by Ageas Insurance Ltd., Covéa Insurance and RSA.
“We can tell if that driver is an accident waiting to happen,” King said, stressing that Ingenie doesn’t use a fleet system, so it’s able to capture more data 10 points a second. But the differentiator for Ingenie is its feedback, community and targeted strategy, he says. “If you’re trying to change behavior, you have to really understand the problem.”
“Young people like the idea of a product just for them,” King said. Responding to the preferences of its demographic, Ingenie developed an app to deliver notifications every 10 days, if the car has driven enough miles, to alert customers as to what level of discount they’re likely to receive based on their driving behavior, and why. “Driving isn’t about having fun, but you have to keep them engaged,” King said. “I call it gamification with a lower-case g.’”
The Ingenie notifications feature a three-level format:
Green messages mean the driver is on track for a discount (46 percent of whom are less likely to make claim)
Red messages mean the driver is driving in a reckless manner (50 percent of whom are more likely to make claim)
Black messages mean the driver is highly dangerous (60 percent of whom are more likely to make a claim)
Ninety percent of Ingenie’s community engages with the app, and on average, customers check their feedback six times per month. The company found that of those receiving a black message, which is less than 5 percent, half immediately improve their driving behavior.
