French insurer Apicil in December 2018 launched an EUR 10 million insurtech fund along with private equity firm Odysseus Alternative Ventures (OAV). The fund will invest in European startups “seeking to develop new technologies, new business models and new forms of delivery for the insurance sector”.

APICIL Group is France’s 4th largest provider of occupational health, life, and retirement plans. OAV is the private equity and venture capital arm of Reech Corporations Group.

Dubbed Insurtech Capital I, the fund is targeting early stage start-ups (Seed and Series A).

OAV brings a semi-automated deal sourcing platform to “identify and filter promising candidates for investment”. APICIL is looking for investment exposure to “a fast growing subset of the insurance industry”, as well as access to “sources of innovation which will drive future growth and profitability” for itself.

Going forward, Insurtech Capital Fund hopes to include other European insurance companies from Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands and the UK.

For APICIL, the moves comes soon after the acquisition of Luxembourg-based individual life insurer OneLife. Internationalization and innovation / digitization are two key components of the “DEFIS 2020” strategic plan.