American Financial Group has announced that it has bought machine learning company Verikai.
The latter, which has reportedly developed a machine learning tool to help assess insurance risk, will continue to be led by Jeff Chen, its current president and CEO.
Carl H. Lindner III, co-CEO of American Financial Group, said that the company was thrilled to welcome Verikai to AFG.
He added: “We believe that artificial intelligence and machine learning will continue to have a significant impact on the insurance industry and see Verikai as a thoughtful and effective leader in the use of these technologies.”
Verikai was founded in 2018 and is based in San Francisco. It received $6m in Series A Funding in August 2020. Its website claims that it has a database containing more than 5,000 behaviour attributes for more than 250m people in the United States. This, it says, provides deep insight into these individuals’ true health risks.
Meanwhile, the Cincinnati-based American Financial Group has been going from strength to strength. In May last year, it reported that it had moved from a net loss in Q1 2020 of $301m to a net income of $419m in Q1 2021. That followed reporting in February 2021 that its Q4 2020 earnings were $692m, up from $211m in Q4 2019.
The deal between the two companies is said to be $120m in cash.
