Etherisc

Etherisc’s journey began when two founders Christoph and Stephan met in July 2016 discussing insurance on the blockchain. From there was born in just a few months our first version of a blockchain insurance application – the Flight Delay Dapp in September 2016.

We also applied the same model of parametric insurance to crop insurance based on weather data. We learned parametric insurance works well here because it originates a pre-established payout based on a triggering event, rather than waiting to evaluate and compensate for a specific loss. Our approach proved that smart contracts can reduce operational costs to a level that enables new markets, potentially bringing the benefits of insurance to millions of farmers in developing countries.

In November the same year, we joined hack.ether.camp, a virtual hackathon, to develop a decentralized market for insurance and reinsurance. We developed a method of using tokens to transfer and trade risks easily, bringing the concept of insurance-linked securities to the blockchain. This is the kind of tokenization of risks we expect companies to create on the platform. We finished the hackathon as the most-funded project, receiving more than 500,000 Hackergold and about 3,000 Ether from early supporters. You can read more about that in our 2016 whitepaper.

At the same time, Etherisc was also awarded as winner in the Blockchain startup contest, sharing the main prize with Status.

In January 2017, we demonstrated a prototype for social insurance on the blockchain as our submission for the Blockchain Virtual GovHack in UAE.

In April 2017, Etherisc won the Blockchain Oscar for “Most Innovative Blockchain Startup”. We also started working with EY to explore the regulatory and legal aspects of setting up and operating an insurance company on blockchain.

In June 2017, Etherisc joined the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance and started the Insurance Working Group there, which Stephan and Christoph chair.

In September 2017, Etherisc won a jury award at ICO Summit in Zürich, Switzerland in the pre-ICO start-up category.

In the final quarter of 2017, we sold more than a hundred flight-delay policies to travelers to the Devcon3 meeting in Cancun, the Blockchain Summit in Zug and the Token Summit in San Francisco.

In December 2017 we founded the Decentralized Insurance Foundation in Zug, Switzerland.