Edelweiss Tokio Life ties up with MobiKwik to offer insurance solutions

Edelweiss Tokio Life Insurance, a private life insurer, has tied up with MobiKwik, a leading fintech platform, to offer mobile-based group insurance solutions for the latter’s customers.

Through this partnership, Edelweiss Tokio Life will offer life insurance in the variants of ₹1 lakh, ₹3 lakh and ₹5 lakh through MobiKwik’s wallet app and website.

“Our whole effort is to get youngsters interested in the idea of life insurance and grow with them to get better covers for them. Catch them young, get them to understand insurance, and make them long term customers with us”, Sumit Rai, Managing Director & CEO, Edelweiss Tokio Life Insurance, told BusinessLine.

The policies can be availed for an annual premium of ₹148, ₹443, and ₹738, respectively.

Commenting on the tie-up, Upasana Taku, Co-Founder, MobiKwik, said: “Today’s underbanked customers are looking for sachet-size mobile insurance solutions, which are affordable, simple-to-understand, and easy-to-buy from a handheld device without paperwork. Keeping this in mind, we have rolled out small ticket size group insurance policies in association with Edelweiss Tokio Life, to enable Middle India to be able to afford the same. Our endeavours/ partnerships echo financial inclusion in all aspects for a brighter and secure Bharat.”

She highlighted that insurance penetration in India is close to 3.7 per cent of the GDP and that there is a huge potential ready to be tapped, more so with the exponential increase in the adoption of smartphones and penetration of the internet. This presents a vast opportunity for digital Insurance to the mass market, which has been ignored by banks, distributors, and even online companies owing to high distribution cost, according to Taku.

Rai also said that today’s youngsters want a lot more flexibility. They want to change insurance providers and have the option to increase or decrease cover as they want.

“We are trying to reach out to such customers. It will also enable us to reach out to some of them who want s permanent long term solution. We might even customise offering in future. We could also offer larger individual covers in days to come,” said Rai.

The strategic intent is to reach out to customers (in 18-45 age group), who are today more active on mobile app, more digitally savvy, and not do work on routes traditionally used such as agents or banca for selling insurance.

Stating that digital channel will play a significant role in coming days, Rai said that the life insurer eyes 10 per cent of its overall sales to be coming from online channel in the next three years. Currently, online sales account for just 3-4 per cent.