VIDEO | Tint CEO: Insurance Should Be a Feature, Not a Product

(US and Canada) Matheus Riolfi, Co-founder and CEO of Property and Casualty (P&C) insurance producer Tint, speaks with Marc Johnson, Founder, Team Central, in a video interview about how the company helps companies make embedded protection and insurance products, and turn risks into opportunities.

Riolfi mentions working with companies from different industries, especially in the vacation rental and shipping marketplace industries, creating products that assist companies in developing and improving customer experience.

He states that the customers of the companies Tint works with are generally innovators in their own space. Riolfi speaks about pushing boundaries and creating new products that may bring new challenges. He shares that all the customers of Tint users are tech-savvy and are working to accelerate their core business and improve their customer experience.

When asked about his background, Riolfi shares that he moved to the US to pursue an MBA from Harvard Business School and join Silicon Valley, seeking out an opportunity to build a global business. While working at startup Touro, Riolfi and his Co-founder had the idea to create Tint, inspired by the difficulties they faced while creating an insurance product.

Further, he is driven to make insurance a feature, and not a product. Riolfi adds that embedded insurance is a better way, where the insurance product is part of something bigger, like AirBnB, where even if something goes wrong, users will be protected. He asserts that the standalone insurance model is outdated and needs improvement.

Shedding light on marketplaces and platforms, Riolfi says that his team creates shipping protection for shipping marketplaces that transport items such as cars, couches, and motorcycles. He maintains that through assessments, the team provides a playbook of best practices for integration and seamless integration of an API. Additionally, monthly check-ins evaluate the performance of the program, making the process streamlined and tech-focused.

According to him, the customers of Tint are typically marketplaces because they had to previously go and speak with both brokers and insurers. This process was challenging because the parties did not understand each other. However, Tint allows both parties to speak the same language and bridge the gap, promoting customer satisfaction.

Responding to queries about the nature of the product, Riolfi explains that Tint has an underlying infrastructure with APIs that conduct prices and transactions in the insurance world. On top of that, the company has an app available for customers to log in to view how the program is doing, review more details about their protection, adjust settings, and make claims.

Emphasizing the hurdles to success, Riolfi states that the insurance ecosystem is complex, which makes it hard to accelerate. Further, he states that in a regulated industry like insurance, organizations need a plan to accelerate. To implement it, the company adjusted its product cycles, getting customer input while also "building their vision" and understanding they will not be able to test everything, he says.

Highlighting the competitor landscape, Riolfi notes that competition is fierce between innovative players and traditional ones. The traditional players have billions or even trillions of dollars to invest each year, giving them an advantage. But even so, he believes everyone is in the same boat, competing against the more established players.

Sharing his secret behind winning, Riolfi states that Tint provides tech-enabled solutions, offering their customers an infrastructure and software they can use to create the shipping protection product that they own. Unlike traditional players, Tint empowers customers to become the primary creators of the product, with access to data, insights, and customer connections. He reckons that this shift in the mindset has led to a more fundamental product that operates very differently.

Then, commenting on the company's growth, Riolfi states that as his company develops, they are seeing and putting into practice necessary processes, planning, and budgeting that happen at that scale. He mentions that having more people, voices, and resources has allowed them to have a much bigger impact than when it was just four people. However, he does miss the feeling of taking the company from zero to one rather than getting to ten or a hundred.

Furthermore, Riolfi recalls a moment at the end of 2020 when he realized it was better to provide an end-to-end solution than just individual components. He compares this to giving customers a car, complete with a powerful engine, rather than just the engine itself. This allowed him to pitch a complete end-to-end embedded insurance platform with more success. He mentions that the goal is to build everything into the product so it can eventually scale.

When asked about the product roadmap and decision-making process, Riolfi opines that he strives to create a balance between short and long-term goals. He believes that most of the power of the experience can be achieved when customers use the entire platform. He mentions that the team is working on ways to streamline this process and make some things optional.

In conclusion, Riolfi believes that having grit and being curious are the two qualities a person needs for success. He assures that insurance will become a feature, and when that happens, it will make buying things like cars and homes much easier, as they will include insurance. Ultimately, he predicts that this will change how the industry works.

CDO Magazine appreciates Matheus Riolfi for sharing his insights and success stories with our global community.