Kelowna-based digital insurance brokerage Summit has raised $3.5 million CAD in seed funding to build out its technology infrastructure and revenue teams.
Gilbert told BetaKit that Summit is exploring a potential secondary capital round due to oversubscription and other VC interest.
The all-equity seed round was led by New York-based venture capital (VC) firm IA Capital Group with a follow-on investment from Calgary-based Harvest Ventures.
IA Capital vice president Ravi Shah will join Summit co-founders Josh Pillsbury and Davis Gilbert on the company’s board as a result of the round.
“We are thrilled to be partnering with Josh, Davis and the entire Summit team in the next stage of their growth serving the commercial insurance needs of businesses in Canada,” Shah said in a statement. “We’ve been incredibly impressed by the traction to date in one of Canada’s fastest-growing retail brokerages.”
The round closed in February and brought Summit’s total funding up to $4.8 million CAD, Gilbert told BetaKit.
Founded in 2022, Summit calls itself a national insurance brokerage and risk management firm with technology-driven solutions. It offers various types of insurance across many different businesses, including construction, nonprofits, and even other FinTech businesses.
Gilbert told BetaKit that Summit closely resembles a B2B SaaS company with a digitally delivered insurance and risk management product. He added that rapid consolidation has stifled innovation and starved the traditional brokerage model of top talent by limiting options for potential employees and customers.
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“Our primary reason for raising venture funding was to scale our revenue team and enhance our technology infrastructure internally and for customers,” Gilbert said. “Technologies which are unique to Summit focus around the digital delivery of policy and risk management data not previously available to commercial customers in traditional models.”
He added that Summit plans to launch new insurance programs for large enterprises focused on using technology for compliance, risk, and contractor management.
Summit’s Canadian backer, Harvest Ventures, launched as an extension of SkipTheDishes co-founder Chris Simair’s venture studio, Harvest Builders, with a mandate to financially back Western Canadian tech startups. Harvest Builders had a win out of the gate when it took in the now-giant Canadian FinTech startup Neo Financial as its first venture.
Summit is exploring a potential secondary capital round, Gilbert told BetaKit, as the startup is oversubscribed and has other VC interest.
Feature image courtesy Summit.
