Inspiration often strikes when least expected. A chance meeting, a turn down the wrong path or a routine activity on a mundane day can all lead to unforeseen opportunities. For Jihan Abass, the eureka moment came during a casual conversation with a café waiter in her home city of Mombasa. During this informal exchange in 2016, the waiter mentioned he did not have health insurance. His remark stuck with Jihan, and she began to probe into the Kenyan insurance market. Her inquisitive nature, coupled with her undergraduate degree in finance from Bayes Business School, had primed Jihan to spot opportunities with the potential to make a difference.
Forging a New Path
With about 50 insurance companies operating in Kenya, it was difficult for Jihan to understand why less than three percent of the population was insured. After researching more on the issue, she realized that it boiled down to an absence of technological infrastructure. The process of filing insurance claims was manual, long and tedious, discouraging people from reaping its benefits. Not to mention the poor reputation that most insurance firms have for trying to undercut clients from getting their dues. Jihan sought to revolutionize the industry and make the process as transparent and seamless as possible. But first, she needed to pivot her career. At the time, she was working as a commodities trader at sugar trading company in London and felt unfulfilled with her job. The season of change was imminent, so Jihan resigned and relocated back to Kenya to charter a new path for herself.
To get a foot into this sector, Jihan set up Griffin Motor Insurance in October 2016. Griffin is Kenya’s first digital-only motor insurance provider. Every step of the insurance process takes place on the Griffin app, with the added benefit of letting customers pay for services in instalments. The app even lets users pause their coverage if they travel abroad. It takes less than ten minutes to sign up and only ten days for claims to be processed, a much shorter time span than the standard thirty days in the insurance industry.
Revolutionizing the Game
The launch of the app was met with excitement and uncertainty in equal measure. Rapid turnaround times were unheard of in the insurance field, and many had a difficult time conceiving of this new reality. Slowly but steadily, Griffin gained traction because of the flexibility of use and affordability of the platform. Already, Jihan was leaving her mark in this space.
After one and a half years of successfully running Griffin, Jihan was ready to expand beyond motor insurance. The technology behind Griffin was the heart and soul of her company. She wanted to use it to help other insurance companies in their service delivery. In 2018, she launched this technology as Lami Insurance Technology, a platform that digitises the entire insurance process and allows users to create and distribute digital insurance products in record time.
Expanding Horizons
Since its establishment, Lami Insurance has grown to create new product lines, all with the aim of increasing insurance coverage in Africa by streamlining the process. In 2020, against the backdrop of the pandemic, Lami raised 1.8 million dollars of seed funding. In August 2022, the company raised a further 3.7 million dollars. This speaks to the confidence that investors have in the product and its ability to positively disrupt the industry. With these funds, Lami plans to upscale its technology development and expand to other countries, including Egypt, Nigeria, and Uganda.
Jihan’s capabilities continue to awe and inspire many, particularly those struggling with insurance administration. There is still a long way to go as her companies seek to make insurance more accessible and inclusive. But we cheer her on in her journey to scaling greater heights.
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