InsurX was founded in 2021 to build technology that enables brokers and insurers to trade risk without friction, with an early ambition to make smart follow automation a scalable alternative to the traditionally manual syndication of complex commercial risk. After joining Cohort 8 of the Lloyd’s Lab in 2022, the company gained deep exposure to real London Market underwriting workflows, building direct relationships with regulatory and oversight teams and engaging senior Lloyd’s stakeholders, which helped streamline its approval to become a Lloyd’s Coverholder. The programme also delivered early commercial validation, with Lab mentors Miller and Greenlight Re becoming InsurX’s first customers through the launch of an algorithmic facility for the contingency market.
Ultimately we built the core execution layer for smart follow strategies: a rules-based, data-driven matching engine that:
As a result, companies such as Beazley, Greenlight Re, and Axis deployed multiple smart follow strategies across multiple brokers in parallel, rather than a single, blunt approach on one book
What followed after the Lloyd’s Lab springboard was a rapid scale-up, supported by a series of commercial launches and strategic partnerships.
Key Milestones & Market Launches since leaving Lloyd’s Lab:
The Future of Smart follow
Across the specialty market, brokers and underwriters face a growing mismatch between the risks they want to service and what traditional processes allow.
For open market underwriters, portfolio underwriting and softening rates are squeezing orders, while service demands continue to rise. Smart follow strategies allow underwriters to retain control, protect standards and focus attention on the risks that matter most.
For brokers, declining rates and margin pressure make it harder to hit targets using legacy placement models. Smart follow strategies enable tailored, exclusive products that balance fee generation, insurer services and scalable execution.
Put simply, smart follow is becoming a core strategy for securing distribution, protecting margins and navigating the underwriting cycle. The team at InsurX remains deeply grateful to the Lloyd’s Lab for the opportunity, collaboration and challenge of Cohort 8. The Lab provided far more than workspace and mentorship - it offered the opportunity to test an ambitious idea directly with market practitioners who understand the realities of trading complex risk.
For entrepreneurs developing solutions with genuine potential to improve the way insurance operates, there are few environments more valuable. The Lab accelerates learning, sharpens ideas and gives teams the access they need to turn concepts into market-ready innovation.
Rosie Denée, Director, Lloyd’s Innovation & Commercial Education, Lloyd’s: “InsurX exemplifies exactly what the Lloyd’s Lab was designed to achieve -a promising idea brought into the market, tested rigorously with live risks, and developed into an innovation that delivers material value for brokers, carriers and clients. Their progress since graduating demonstrates how innovation can gain real traction when it is shaped in partnership with the market rather than apart from it.”
Gilbert Harrap, CEO & Co-Founder, InsurX: “The Lloyd’s Lab gave us something incredibly rare: direct access to the people who understand the market’s challenges best, and the insight needed to validate and refine our solution in a real commercial environment. It accelerated our development, sharpened our thinking, and helped us turn a concept into a scalable smart follow solution. Everything we’ve achieved since - from growth in smart-follow adoption to partnerships with leading carriers - traces back to the momentum the Lab helped create.
