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My — now largest — investor came into my office and wanted to make real innovation in healthcare. I told him to make real changes you have to be a fully licensed insurer.Roman Rittweger, CEO and Founder of ottonova
This interview is an overdue follow-up with ottonova, the first German health insurer founded in almost 20 years. In September 2017 we had the English world premiere of ottonova and promised a follow-up. Well, only 4 years later we got to it. But neither of us wasted time and Roman has a fascinating story to tell.
This interview runs for more than 40 minutes, get a snack and a drink
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Without the success of Oscar the buildup of ottonova would have been much harder… I am grateful to them… The investors could see that it could workRoman Rittweger, CEO and Founder of ottonova
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We have a Net Promoter Score of 70, where the industry average is 14.Roman Rittweger, CEO and Founder of ottonova
The Founder
This interview is an overdue follow-up with ottonova, the first German health insurer founded in almost 20 years.
Roman Rittweger (https://www.linkedin.com/in/romanrittweger/) is the CEO and Founder of ottonova, not an insurtech, but a fully licensed insurer (https://www.ottonova.de/).
Roman had a long and successful career, before founding ottonova. As he says in the interview, in insurance everything takes longer.
Roman is a doctor by training, with a Ph.D. in medicine, as well as an MBA from INSEAD. He also served as Platoon Leader in the German mountain troopers and was a consultant with ATKearney and McKinsey, before starting his own companies. He is also a member of the supervisory board of naontek AG, a corporate startup offering digital services to health professionals.
When you are a private health insurer in Germany, you basically live forever.Roman Rittweger, CEO and Founder of ottonova
The Startup
ottonova is a novelty and the first all-digital health insurer founded in Germany. Before ottonova, there was no new health insurance company founded in Germany for almost 20 years. They took on the long journey and got their license in 2017. Since then they build up their business. You can learn more here: https://www.ottonova.de/en/expats
We do not report all our funding rounds instantly. We raised more money than is on CrunchBase.Roman Rittweger, CEO and Founder of ottonova
Venture Capital Funding
So far ottonova has raised more than 90 mn US$ up to Series D (https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/ottonova-holding-ag) and is a licensed health (re-) insurer in Germany. ottonova will start new talks for growth equity talks end of 2021.
We are a full stack insurer, but we also have a re-insurance license.Roman Rittweger, CEO and Founder of ottonova
The Video Interview is set to go live on August 5th 2021, at 17.00 CET
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The Audio Interview from 2017
The original interview — the first English interview of ottonova — was published on September 14th, 2017.
We had to get 40 mn € from our investors, before BaFin let us start.Roman Rittweger, CEO and Founder of ottonova
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The Interviewer
This interview was conducted by Jörn “Joe” Menninger, startup scout, founder, and host of Startuprad.io. Reach out to him:
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Transcript
[0:00] Music.
[0:08] That I owe you were podcast and YouTube blog covering the German startups.With News interviews and Live Events.Hello and welcome everybody this is Joe from celebrated Arrow your startup podcast and YouTube blog from Germanyas well as two words first internet radio station dedicated to startups andtech companies wherever you’re watching this or listening to this make sure to hit the like And subscribe button this time I do have a follow-up interview because,back in the days in 2017 I did the word premiered the first English interview of a newly founded All Digital Health insurer calledottonova and since we have a lot to talk so this episode is running a little bit longer than usual more than 40 minutes so guys get a snack and get a beverage and enjoy the interviewthis time I have the founder here after approximately four years to do follow-up hey Holman how you doingI’m great and I’m happy to be here to follow up with this his story from four years ago.
[1:19] I vividly remember that I said hey let’s do next year follow-up well it took four years but nonetheless,we made a follow-up kept the promise so that’s totally fine and that is typical for health insurance for insurance as an industry.Things take a bit longer than in other Industries even when we do start up.
[1:42] I’m totally sure we get to talk about this fridge we want to make one thing clear you’re not inintertek company you are a fully licensedhealth insurance company meaning you take the risk on your own books and you’re not an insurance broker or something right absolutely we are full stack insurer and we have digitized everything from acquisitionto all the customer experience while you are on board you know and everything is digital and so in that respect we are on intertekbut if your Compares with other intro text to just take a specific part of the value chain yes we are full stack Health insurer.With a license with a insurance and reinsurance license for Europe.Insurance and reinsurance we may add that insurance is a risk management business there arespecially qualified people who study Insurance mathematics and then they try to minimize the risk but nonetheless all the insurershave to do some type of reinsurance and at those three insurance companies the risk gets even more Diversified across differentinsurance companies is approximately correct.That is absolutely correct so the interesting thing is that we ourselves are reinsured for catastrophic risk in an hour.
[3:10] Pull of Our Lives,but we are also having a reinsurance Liza’s ourselves so and I’m going to can talk about this later on when we work in corporations and we do a white label cooperation with another player.They can have the risk in their books and we can take a reinsurance I’ll take when we can re ensure that risk.And so basically in that case you’ve basically parcel out the business and you know every site takes 50% or another percentage.And that’s a way to use reinsurance also for white label business and insurance.
[3:48] Before we get into real interview I would be curious what would be a catastrophic risk for what you are really in short your typical case would be.
[4:03] That somebody’s insured with us and.
[4:08] And the person gets a baby and the baby has.
[4:16] Extremely expensive rare disease.
[4:20] So if somebody has an extremely expensive rare disease and once is knocking at our door we have you know we can actually deny this person to enter their health insurance,so we check the risk that the people who are born into our health insurance so basically people who aren’t born as.Kids of our insured persons and they have the right to enter the health insurance right away so this case you know could be a disease where disease that will cost,Insurance 200,000 Euros a year for that risk we are insured so so from our specific.
[4:59] My mom’s per year per person we ensure that risk with the reinsurance now,but does that happens very rarely obviously but if it would happen it would not be good for our risk pool and so that’s why we’ve enjoyed,if you’re big enough for two health insurance and we’re getting there then you need less and less for insurance because you basically the whole pool will basically take care of the risk.
[5:25] And this reinsurance actually then is.
[5:31] Charged I assume until this kid is growing up and then they are different regulations how much you earn what insurance you’re going to take and so on and so forth but in Germany you have to have some typeof health insurance required by law rightso basically our insured persons have the health insurance with us and we re ensure a specific small part so if one person gets a buffer specific threshold of cost per yearwe can then get that money back from the reinsurer I see it fascinating stuff never dealt with itinstead of rate that I owe before but we already deep in discussing what ottonova is but let us first get you get a little bit.
[6:20] You personally introduced to our audience as always your LinkedIn profile is down here in the show notes and people can reach out to youdirectly if they looking for insurance they would be better off looking at the company website of course we also provide a link to their andI saw you two have a totally fascinating CV because you have been a platoon leader in the German armythen you went on to study medicine your md and PhD in medicine then you became consultant with a the guys likebbdo 80 Carney and McKinsey and then you founded the startup kit can you take us along this fascinating Journey.
[7:04] Absolutely when when I finished high school in Germany there was still the draft so I decided instead of being bored in the Army I would take the,a bit longer routes to become an officer of the reserveand at the end of that I was a platoon leader and the Mountaineers so at least I was doing ski tourism the mountains and fun things in the mountains while I was in the army.And one question I used to ski absolutely I’m still skiing and during the covid times I took up cross country skiingbecause lips were close to you know and ski touring and cross-country skiing still love that here if you live in Munich like I dothat’s one of the classical things to do in the winter time.
[7:50] And what I did learn apart from skiing and mountain and ski touring what I did learn in the Army was to lead.
[7:59] And that’s obviously something that if you do a start-up and our CEO is something that is important for you I didn’t need it in the in the time in between too much.But at came in handy when I started this turned up after the my time in the Army has studied medicine leading left that was totally engulfed in medicine like everybody is because it’s like it’s the most fascinating topic that you can study I would argue.Even having having studied economics afterwards with an MBA.
[8:32] And I loved it but I still felt maybe there is something else in life so I did a internship at McKinsey and I love that even more and.The core of the of my changing career afterwards was really the reason was that I personally love to do new things Innovation as much as my thing and new things and.You are a great physician if you’ve done the same thing over and over again a couple of thousand times I mean that’s the positions that I would look out for if I have a problemyeah that’s a medical practitioner you practice you practice you repeat you repeat and you get better and better and better right and this is not the perfect profile for person like mine like me,who wants to do new things and develop discover new things and do this discovery Journey.And so that’s much better and Consulting because you get a new project all the time right and so you keep on learning keep on learning keep on learning.So I did a lot of Consulting learn a lot about the Health Care system because I only consulted in healthcare being a physician and.
[9:43] In the course of that I started my first dog up after that I what I’ve learned and Consulting that I said you know there’s something we need to have better service in Germany.And I started a game and and disease management company basically a Service Company who does the service the medical service for health insurance.And we were like really pioneering the space in Germany and,basically many of the leading insurers as customers.And the company still exists in the new economy we were quickly quickly hyped and prepared an IPO,which we scrapped at the end of the new economy and quickly sold the pieces to Germany’s largest private payer at the time to dig up file which is part of the Munich re group.And I stayed there for two more years and learned a lot about how Private health insurance works,but also learned that I didn’t really like it I like didn’t like the way it worked at the time and so I left again and I feltwhat is it that I really need to do next in my life many people were reaching out and one offer that I had was from bbdo consulting which is really a.
[11:00] Branding agency or marketing agency that want to do basically build up their own Consulting business.And for me that was a great chance to learn a lot more about marketing and sales and branding because I realized my first startup that this is the most important part you can.You know invent come up with a good idea but if you can Market it if you can sell it if you can’t make it.Interesting for for other parties than going to be successful.So I spent two years with the video as a partner for the Consulting practice.But really help them grow the business but at the same time I learned a lot I learned from my.From my direct reports who are much smarter than me and branding and marketing and sales obviously I was much more experienced in healthcare so I was a good mixture.
[11:57] And I learned a lot but in the end I’m an entrepreneur and I don’t want to work in somebody else’s company,that’s how I started my own consulting company and ran that for ten years looking for the next big thing that I could do and in the process in organizing my own,conference which was called Innovations and investments in health careand I had great speakers from the us coming over there at Woodland in the Adlon hotel and at the Soho house we did the conference and it was great fun and I stayed on top of the latest development that wayotherwise you know I might have been you know very deep down and work for Pharma companies which.
[12:41] Was you know good financially but doesn’tgive you you know the inside for the next up to do and so I also work for somebig startups were doing big rounds now in healthcare which I can still up still cannot name but so I was there at the space and I came up with the idea for ottonova to start a German,digital health insurance much like Oscar was at the time in the US.That was also my my advantage that the investors newest car and knew it was a success case.Seven questions here when would be it’s more than just a copycat of a scar and secondly what was your importance.
[13:30] Your personal.Value of Oscar how did you perceive them and how important was it for you as he said the investors already knew them with this crucial to success of Oscar for ottonova.Yeah and I didn’t need Oscar for the idea to be quite Frank as so basically I had the idea and built that up and then I realized there’s quality as you know there’s something in the US that is much bigger than that,so I had thought about this for a long time because I was a frustrated.Innovator is selling the Innovations to health insurances and so it was I had learned that you need to be the health insurance itself to be really innovative.It’s pretty much like like you know in the computer space where Apple said you need to have the software and the hardware to be really innovative,and the same experience was true for me in health insurance you need to have the services plus you need to have the relationship to the insured person otherwise you can’t really be hundred percentso I was looking for the opportunity and then when we went in my consultancy you know add the advantage of you know using some of my of my Consultants on the side to prepare this projectand we build up an idea that was pretty close to what I do know is today and then we saw that there was,on the other side of the ocean all scarring their red brick success and.
[14:59] With knowing that you know then while I work for another startup trying to get financing for them some of the big investors in Germany were asking me no you can’t we do something like Oscar and Germany and I said well yes as a matter of fact,I do have a plan here in my pocket and I’m preparing this plan and so it was a very lucky coincidence for me and.I do think that without having Oscar on the other side of the ocean it would have been much more difficult to start autumn over if not impossible,so I’m very grateful to Oscar for being there and for being a success story that investors could see that there is a value in creating a health insurance.
[15:43] I see and what was what was the moment you actually decided okay now it is time and.I’m wondering how long it actually,to cure from like doing the first step okay now I’m going to launch this company until you had the final license of the bar — meaning the German oversight body for allthinks Financial they obviously the banks as well as the insurance companies and if you want to provide insurance you have to be licensedbuy them the beginning of 2015 while now largest investor hosting Venture Costa boomcame into my office with an idea that he wanted to check and I told him it’s never going to fly andhe was kind of frustrating said but Healthcare so big you know but there must be something.And I said to him you know if you have balls you’re going to start a real your own health insurance and then you can actually push all these levers.From that moment on he was set on fire and we are talking we were talking all through the year 2015 about this idea and pushing it further and building it.
[16:56] And in the summer of 2015 we were basically looking for a management team and I was interviewing some people you know what.Come back from some other Rock Adventures where basically you know not firm and health insurance and health care,and at the end of the summer I told to Crystal I said you know I think it’s still a great idea but the management that we’re seeing here is not going to be the management that you need you need somebody who understands Insurance you understands Healthcare.Hasn’t entrepreneurs mindset you know and that’s to have all these.
[17:36] To have all these points and one person was really difficult to find.As I have a very big ego or relatively big ego I said you’re not the only person I know worldwide ticks all the boxes.Actually me you know and.So basically it’s a female cat probably it will have to let my consultancy run by itself and and leave the company to do that.And so in the fall of 2015 I was looking for two co-founders as my investor said well you know.
[18:12] It’s cool you know if you’re 52 I think I think it was 52 at the time.Value 52 and that’s not the typical startup age really you know and I said well you know that’s why I’m ticking all the boxes you know because I have all that experience.And this is what we still need a great City oh you know who’s worked at Rocket and we need.
[18:32] Great guy for design and for the product and I said you know what what what’s you know where when you think this person should come from and I said well you knowwhen the list was just so you know maybe if you can get the design of Windows that would be great and I said okay so rocket Wunderlist get itso we went out there with my Consulting team and talk to talk to Great candidates in the market and I went to Berlin and met them andthey all saw this letter so right away what a great opportunity this was and so Frank wrestler from rocket and Sebastian Sienna from Wunderlist.Basically said you know they’re going to participate they were becoming my co-founders,and in December of 2015 so the end of the year beginning of the year the idea started in the end of the year we started the company and.I think the other financing round the final first financing round with consoling Ventures that final.
[19:34] Startup was basically a 23rd of December at midnight.So I really wanted to get home for Christmas and so we got the last points cleared out of the way and so started the company officially it always said you know the company was started in 2015.But operations really started in January of 2016 a person then I likeconsultancy made my best consultants and made them see a con CEOs of the companyand let them run and later on a couple of years later so the consultancy to larger consultancy which made sense because basically.I was not there anymore too.
[20:20] You were the sales you know and then they were looking critical mass in some ways and so we saw in the end I sold off the consultancy but a couple of years later and.
[20:34] So we started the company and 2006 2016 in the January and we wouldn’t have started it if I hadn’t had hadn’t talked to barf in the regulatory agency in Germanyat the end of 2015 and emailsaid you know is there a chance that you will let me through and they said well yes we actually would welcome a new entrant into the marketwe can’t let too many companies in because obviously if you are a private health insurance in Germany you live forever because they don’t want you to go broke.And because you have the savings more or less of you insured persons because they pay more when they’re young and we use that money,pay their bills when they’re oldbut we need Innovation from time to time so every you know 20 years roughly or 17 years in our case they will let a new entry into the market in order to get some competition assetscertainly time now because digitization is coming you know we have to do something about that andso they let us enter the market also asked us todo I have a structure where we could also sell some of our services to other health insurers and which we have is like a.You to be like of the business and.
[21:55] From start you know from starting in 2017 and 2016 and generate it took us one and a half years until 21st of June of 2017 when we could launch a companywe never knew you know whether when we would get the license you know because they always say you know when when everything is perfect you know we will give you the license but we still need a b c and d,so over time we build up our system we build up the company and you have to imagine it it’s a little bit like if you have an ocean liner sitting in the harbor of Franco,Hamburg and they will give you the license to get patients to get to deliver to deliver peasant as images across the ocean.But they will check your oceanliner they will enter the restaurant and where they will try to taste the menu and they will see how the machines are working and when all of this is working they will allow you now the predicate screws ifif they’re tied yes I know I know that’s that’s how they work and it is understandable because they are protecting the customers and the.
[23:02] And but it does mean that you have to front a lot of money we had to front 40 million euro basically.For you have to get 40 million euros from the from our investors before we were able to launch the company you know then we needed some money afterwards.Currently the boffin is getting even stricter they say we’ve seen that you know.Even when we you know see the first business plan that you know later on the startups always find out that they will need more money.
[23:35] After all I think you know every startup config knows this feeling you knowyes this we could use a little bit more money here and little bit more money there may be one or two employees here in sales and marketing and the kind of adds up over time Masters do know that and they you know professional investors in there so that you have consecutive rounds and everythingthe Bison is more than mindset of you know we want to have it financed through so,it’s actually even harder now to start an insurance or ensure Tech in Germany that it was at the time I restarted so we were lucky in that respect.When I was looking at your profile on crunchbase I saw that you currently unserious D and raise the total approximately 85 million euros and you hinted well it’s not.Mostly up to date but it’s approximately right there we think in the meantime we have raised a little bit more we don’t always report all the financing rounds right away so we you know.
[24:40] Basically it’s not the most important thing for us to report Elena we’ve done another financing roundso we reported from time to time and so usually if you look at crunchbase we I think it’s correct to say that we usually have raised a little bit more money than you can see it crunch place.But over time it will correct yeah.
[25:03] Over time it will correct that’s great and now we talked through how you start it up where you at right now approximately three to four years,after you start off with ottonova what of your assumption of running this business turned out to be true and what turned out to be wrong.Yeah we I think.Let me start off with what assumption turned out to be Elliot well I think there’s like one Assumption of turned out to be true one that turned out to be wrong and another one that what we learned about it.So what turn the volume to be true was the assumption that.
[25:45] People you know in our case between the age of 30 and 35 will making this lifetime decision for health insurance.They want an experience like they have an Amazon and about this is something they want.With Alzheimer’s of the current health insurers and M.
[26:07] We may add for our audience here that usually your intrude by what we call,exactly she can’t confess this you’re wrong it’s the legal insurance company so they’re their insurance companies out there that justhave to take you if you have an income or no income and you will and you pass a certain threshold or when you’re an entrepreneur or when you work independently freelancing stuff like this there are certain rules when you can getprivate insurance but usually if you’re working somewhere you have to pass over a certain amount of certain threshold certain time in order to use to qualify for Private health insurance,that’s why you’re talking about 30 to 35 rep the reason why I’m this is the you know the age bracket in which we are getting our new lives.
[26:58] And which we are addressing and.And we were right about this and we were right about this at a digital product where we can get a lot of support and real-time information to the insured person will create that great customer experience,and I can tell you now that we have enough perform in that performance NPS net performance score net promoter score of.17 while the industry average is 14 so we are like far above the crowd and really on par with apple and Amazon so that that is something that turned out to be true.And we were right about that we made an initial mistake that we could correct over time.But initial mistake there’s an old saying an industry that in the insurance industry that says insurance is sold my fault.
[27:54] And we basically meaning that nobody wakes up in the morning and says he now today I’m going to buy health insurance,and that this is a reason why there is a very good business for brokers who make a lot of money and you know visiting you at your home and basically telling you where to sign which kind of paper and.
[28:15] Actually if I would have not been working during my national service in the medical field as an EMT I would have never,thought about health insurance I think that that’s the topic you’re talking about because I had a new job I was passing the threshold and I was looking at Private health insurance andactually it’s I do believe it’s not that frequently that somebody really realizes oh I could do thatwell let’s work out the details let’s look for the best best health insurance company out there absolutely that’s why we are.In this lie Dia was we will start and only sell and the direct Channel and we will not going to have any commissions into the in the terror.And because of that we will not be listed at comparison websites like check 24 and Germany and but we don’t care because we have the best tariff and people will find out about it it will love it.And the good news is that even the great company lemonade from the u.s. made the same mistake when launching in Germany.Did the same thing and they didn’t sell too much we didn’t sell too much.Because of German would go typical German blue go and check 24 comparison website and we’ll see whether the terror of that you’re trying to sell him actually how it compares to others.
[29:36] And 224 will only let you down there if you are if you pay them a commission and if they can sell your product.And so as I would be learned is we’re not strong enough or grand is not strong enough in the beginning just because we have the superior product,we also have to have Superior sales.And that’s why we edit commission’s into our tariffs we listed on the comparison websites we added Cuisine that is group as an investor and kept media for Equity package there so that we could,increase the strength of our brand via TV advertisements and.
[30:15] With that we actually started growing very strongly so that was the mistake that we made was just purely focused on the directional,we still have a very good business on the directional especially in the full health insurance.In the supplemental health insurance we sell a lot about that look to partner website.And the latest development on that in that area was that we also,started now with what I was talking about at the beginning about with white label corporations where we havePartners sales Partners who are basically selling the Tariff under their own name they’re very happy that you know they have a great tariff with great customer experience with the best net promoter score in the more in the market,and we’re basically sharing the income from from this from this chair.And that way we have many more.Avenues to the market and many more the sales channels and that is bringing us a strong growth in the market,this table is still in the directional we’re still very transparent and we’re still using that but we have to have we have to have we have to adapt to the German Market.Specifically is and that is that this actually worked very well for us.
[31:37] I also want to add that with you referring to Terracesactually Americans would refer to it as insurance plans and I think just a few American listeners just said oh yeahso so we have to bridge the we have to project he actually can compare us to the service Market,the strange thing in Germany’s are the different thing is that once you make a choice for a health plan.
[32:06] Usually stay there for life it makes sense the first few years can still switch if you’re not happy with the with your customer experience.But after after a certain period of time I would say roughly seven years it’s just economically not not a good idea to switch because you build Reserves at your health plan and you lose them when you switch.That’s a specific thing in Germany that’s why have you have a very big customer lifetime value and when I was still a consultant I also work for a company Who Sold risk life insurance,you know which is not a big product is a good product additional product to have but not a good product itself and they’s Vaught there they bought the the traffic very nearly and then they had a very small customer lifetime value that didn’t make any sense.
[32:53] But for us we have a very high customer lifetime value and even with a relatively High customer acquisition costs are,hello racial you know of lifetime value to the customer acquisition cost is much better than hell and all the other businesses that I know.So health insurance is a business that lends itself much better to actually to direct selling nevertheless,he has you need the trust factor in the market you need to build up your brand and you need to have,sales Partnerships with other partners in the market who can actually get the trust across you know and that’s why this even working together with broker groups.Because they can actually tell the.The person that that is interested in our tariff now Health Plan yes or the no where is this good company you will be happy with them and that is important for us that’s what we learned.
[33:52] Even though you’re insured by your office outside your insurance everything is regulated by baffling people still need this branding aspect I was,I was curious what are your two questionsfirst you said he got a media deal from Posey times a times their private TV station based in Munich down there they run some of the privately-owned TV stations here in Germany the big one some of the bigger ones and personally I experienced that Imuch less and less and less,linnie on TV as it is called since I do have the user streaming apps on my TV so one question would behow do you also see not like in terms of numbers but like in did you also see a decline of the importanceoff TV as a marketing channel here in Germany,so that was the surprising thing for myself because at the beginning of the ottonova voyage I was even quoted as saying you know we’re not going to do TV commercials you know we are going to be on Facebook Google whatever.The ad says what we’ve learned is you need to do both.So simply spoken and the power of TV is still much bigger than we all think.
[35:16] So especially by the way doing Corbett times everybody was watching TV linear TV.
[35:24] I know personally I was I’m like you I would say you know well I have.Netflix and Amazon Prime and Disney at home so I’m not going to watch I’m not going to watch free TV.
[35:36] I did watch free TV yesterday night obviously for the Euro Cup UEFA cup but.So so this is the thing we say you know I’m not going to watch vtb but then I do frost-free to be down there and and,yep and they’re still especially the young people it’s fascinating to me also there are some specific and you know you can obviously.
[35:58] You don’t go for every kind of show but there are some shows that still have a very good viewership and 30 to 35 years record and also good people with good buying power andsoit is so we all thinking of the future of a saying in our content years that what it’s going to look television anymore but as of today people still are and it’s a great branding instrument and it still works much better than most ofus that we have kind of living in the future still believe that was one of my learnings you know and obviously you have to couple that you know it’s like it’s not enough to be on TV and.You have to be on Instagram as well but the mix basically you have to be on different and different channels and you have to mix it and.So my surprise was how good TV is actually working with Italy I’ve seen some ads for ottonovajust digital like talk about Facebook Google ads and stuff like this but you’ve never reached the on TV personallyYouTube is a good channel for us you know so so like one you know there you could see the same ad on television or you know A variation of the ad on YouTube.
[37:12] And so we so do you mix that’s the I think that’s that’s the real Secret.But I was surprised myself I would I came in with the same mentality of you know television is over and why do why do we do this at all.But it makes a lot of sense for us and it doing covert times it was it was spectacular talking about covid-19 the questions I meant to ask you with how did Coronaimpacted you I assume you in all digital health insurance company have you been prepared to work.Or remote and that you also see a change.In the behavior of your let’s say potential customers and customers.
[37:58] So there’s like different parts of covid that the change does and one thing was we were up to two weeks we were all remote that was easy for us.It’s easy when you start a new company and and you doing video conferences anyway and you will have zoom installed and everybody has a laptop I mean so it was much easier for us than for the incumbent companies obviously.
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[38:23] But I think that’s probably true for all the startups and the other thing is.What does it do to the business so for the business it wasn’t one hand it was actually good for us,because you know digitization was getting into it was basicallyaccelerated across all the different areas and it was much more normal to buy something online even health insurance,and it was before and our competition couldn’t even go and come and visit people in their homes.Does a little effect for the first few months when basically.
[39:06] And the financing dried up when everybody was afraid you know and that was kind of bad for us we didn’t like that.But then after a couple of months everybody saw okay this is going to be over in some time and also that we are actually profiting in some ways from it I don’t I wouldn’t want to say that really in profit but.But it was helpful for us and people for one,people saw the importance of health insurance what what you learned in your in your job is in the ERdepartment and people saw that that was important people realized I could do anything,the mobile phone you know and digitally and people.We’re willing interested in some some things that we had pioneered in Germany like like Telehealth you know.
[40:05] But as it everything in life there’s always a balance and I told you before we need this.Trust is very important for us and when people are worried about the future,the trust factor is a little bit of a problem so we saw Whenever there was a strict lockdown that.Business was a bit slower than usual but the moment that the lockdown was then released business was even better than before.I’m so sorry was in general you know they are complicated answer in general it was helpful for us.And it helped us all positioning as well.It’s trick blocked on itself you know those weeks of the strict knockdown wear something where a sales numbers wouldn’t go up as much as in the rest of the year.
[40:55] I’m wheel running already a little bit longer than the usual interview as we said before butnonetheless I found this interview fascinating and they just one more question on my usual repertoire that I have to ask are you guys open to talk to potential investors.
[41:13] Sorry are we Guys open to talk to potential new investors yes I think.
[41:21] Yeah short answer is yes which started as not we’re moving now from The Venture Capital Area to the growth Equity area and.Towards the end of the year we will start some new talks for us.Raising you know we have the ability to deploy large amounts of capital because we basically by the customers up front you know and monetize them over a long period of time,and there’s some ways it’s a very safe cash flow that we’re done writing and it will is,the possibility to deploy large capital and large amounts of capital but it’s not necessary so we are actually a very good juncture right now as we’re talking todifferent groups will be talking at the end of the year two different groups,and I think we will probably be able to get to the next level of growth through that.
[42:24] So yes we will we are open to talking to a new investors especially from the growth Equity seen well.Only thing left for me to say right now would be.Best of luck for you new adventures and hopefully we catch up let’s say in four years again,absolutely Joe I hope I can tell you many interesting things in those four years again looking forward to it thank you very much.Thank you very much.
[42:58] If you are a professional looking at the European startup scene Germany is a place you cannot miss fortunately for you.
[43:06] Music.
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