ARMD wins Norton Rose Fulbright Insurathon 2021

Global law firm Norton Rose Fulbright is delighted to announce ARMD as the winner of Insurathon 2021.

Now in its fifth successive year, the Insurathon promotes innovation in the insurance sector. It aims to support the finest start-up and scale-up technology businesses looking to develop a business concept in the insurance space.

The Norton Rose Fulbright InsurTech practice brings together the expertise of the firm’s tier 1 corporate insurance and tier 1 FinTech directory-ranked practices (Legal 500 UK, 2021) and advises start-ups, scale-ups, VC and PE firms as well as insurance companies, innovating and investing in the InsurTech sector.

ARMD won best pitch and was awarded £25,000 investment and £25,000 of pro bono UK legal and regulatory advice from specialist lawyers within the firm’s market-leading corporate, regulatory insurance, intellectual property and data privacy practices.

ARMD offers a complete tool protection solution for tradespeople to deter tool theft and gives them the ability to get back to work quickly. ARMD’s offering is a radical reinvention of the way that tradespeople can protect their livelihoods and provides an inventory management app, smart IoT sensors and smart insurance.

Sotera Heritage was named runner-up and awarded £10,000 of pro bono legal advice. Sotera is developing data-backed insurance for the fine art and specie market, using AI to determine what unusual objects are, and creating secure digital provenance for art, antiquities, and unusual objects. Sotera’s social impact focusses on using their system to protect at-risk collections, combatting the looting and illicit trade in antiquities and art.

Five entrants were selected as finalists including:

• InsurX
• ARMD
• Sotera Heritage
• Innovatrix Capital Limited
• Lossbook

All finalists benefitted from three 45-minute pro bono legal clinics hosted by the firm’s corporate and regulatory insurance, intellectual property and data privacy teams.

The event was judged by a four-member panel from Norton Rose Fulbright’s London office, which comprised:

• Rod Harrington, Chief Operating Officer and Chair of the firm’s investment committee
• Sarah McKellar, Partner and member of the firm’s investment committee
• Raj Karia, Partner and Head of Corporate, M&A and Securities, Europe, Middle East and Asia
• Madeline Bailey, Co-head of Technology Consulting

Devin Chawda, co-founder of ARMD, commented:

“We are delighted to win this year’s Insurathon, especially given the quality of the other finalists, and are honoured to now join this elite group of former winners. It’s great to have our efforts acknowledged and this award further validates the unique ecosystem we have built. We’re developing new ways of protecting tradespeople, such as embedding tool insurance together with the tools they need in order to work, all in an effort to reduce the significant trade sector protection gap. We have come a long way, however there is still a lot to do, so it’s very reassuring to have the world-renowned Norton Rose Fulbright team alongside us on our journey."

Tobias Stone, co-founder of Sotera Heritage, commented:

“For us, it is perfect timing to begin working with Norton Rose Fulbright. It was clear just from the questions when we pitched that they have a huge wealth of knowledge about insurance and Insurtech, and will no doubt become valuable partners as we launch and scale our business.”

Nicholas Berry, a corporate and regulatory insurance partner who heads up Norton Rose Fulbright’s InsurTech practice, and leads the Insurathon events, commented:
“We were delighted to be able to host this event in-person once again so participants could get the full benefit of our legal clinics. Congratulations to the winners ARMD and the runners-up Sotera Heritage, we look forward to working with Devin, Tobias and their teams. We will have now provided over £200,000 of support to start-ups through our Insurathon events and it has been great to see the success of our past winners and the UK Insurtech market more generally.”

Previous Insurathon winners include Anansi, Riskbook (now Supercede), Concirrus, Pluto Travel, Mackenzie Intelligence Services, Flock Cover and Nexus Mutual.