Digisafe aims to close the gap between urban and rural areas for curated insurance products by offering aggressive insurance. It was founded on a decade of extensive research and analysis by its founding team, who completed their observational analysis in a localized survey under the Flagship Agri Insurance Scheme, PMFB.
In order to get more insights about the functioning of Digisafe, Krishi Jagran interacted with Anupam Shrey, Founder & Director of DigiSafe, who is responsible for the facilitation of tech integrations with insurance companies, creating POSP network across 7 states, curation of customized insurance products which are relevant to rural setup and supervising all the activities of the company.
Tell us about your company and what does it do?
DigiSafe – India’s Local Broker for Rural Insurance is focused on contributing to securing rural India by reducing uncertain risks and enabling Phygital solutions through a variety of insurance products. DigiSafe has been conceptualized in our decade-long extensive research and analysis.
We started operations in September 2021, and have successfully launched DigiOne, a partnership programme in association with our channel partners that identify, train, and develop a team of certified point-of-sale persons (PoSPs) for insurance distribution through a combination of physical and digital modes, this model will assist clients with pre-sales, post-sales, and claim services. We are working towards extending this service to Tier 2 and Tier 3 semi-urban markets very soon.
We are a one-of-a-kind insurtech firm that not only creates insurance solutions with insurance companies but also makes them easily accessible to buyers.
Every insurance policy that we sell gets a commission from the insurance companies. We connect all the dots of the ecosystem where customers can choose the right insurance products as per their requirements, from different companies through our PoSPs. We provide our products and services through a hybrid model of physical and digital modes for the comfort of its patrons.
We have a unique insurance program in DigiOne Gram insurance, which will aid our clients with various services like pre-sales, post-sales, and claim services. It will bring all the people in a village under one insurance umbrella to provide efficient insurance cover to each member. We also offer 1 gram insurance through a phygital model which aligns simultaneously with government schemes like Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) and will bring further reform in the market.
The Mera Assistant application will serve as a decision support system by aiding the users to make informed decisions by gathering information from the field, community, and agricultural data. It will provide predictive analysis and an insurance dashboard to keep the users updated with the weather, crop advisory, and government initiatives. This will help not only in mitigating risks but also in promoting the focus on revenue generation. We ensure high-speed claim assistance and end-to-end solutions at each doorstep.
All the members of our founding team (Mallikharjun Kukunari, Suman RoyChoudhury, Anupam Shrey, Rajat Dhar and Ashwin Arora) have explored the crop insurance segment across several states in India. We concluded our observational analysis in a localized survey under the Flagship Agriculture Insurance Scheme, PMFBY.
What were the challenges of setting up and scaling? How did you overcome them?
We managed to overcome various hurdles, a few of which were creating simple and affordable products per the rural population's requirements and identifying DigiOne while spreading awareness to make our customers resonate with the concept.
Rural markets have a huge scope for growth which entails cover for crops that remain uncovered under schemes like Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, small businesses started by groups of women, catastrophe bonds, etc. We believe that the key to penetration in rural areas lies in the simplicity, easy administration, and affordability of the products. Product customization will further pay dividends in building trust as agricultural vocations are dependent on various factors including weather, innovation in policies, or natural disasters, and having our policies align with these unforeseen contingencies is a must.
What are the key features that stand you apart from the companies operating in the Agritech space?
We are a one-of-a-kind insurtech firm that not only creates insurance solutions with insurance companies but also makes them easily accessible to buyers.
Every insurance policy that we sell gets a commission from the insurance companies. We connect all the dots of the ecosystem where customers can choose the right insurance products as per their requirements, from different companies through our PoSPs. We provide our products and services through a hybrid model of physical and digital modes for the comfort of its patrons.
How is it a one-stop platform for all the farmers?
Our practices are very much in line with the Honourable Prime Minister's vision of Vocal for Local and we hope to create a measurable impact across all pin codes of India in the next two years by on-boarding 10,000 PoSPs and serving over 10 million farmers. The rural economy majorly depends on crops. Their major source of income is through crops but only a few major crops are covered under PMFBY so farmers have no insurance operations apart from PMFBY notified crops.
We understand how farmers need small ticket-sized products with low-margin premiums. We are bringing simplified and affordable products that span the Motor, Health, Livestock, Crop, and Life Insurance for people living in the rural areas at their doorsteps. Such features will penetrate deeper into the rural markets and a pull structure will help farmers reduce risks and get increased revenue.
We also want to slowly eliminate the financial uncertainty that looms over the rural people, especially the farmer communities. Our goal is to provide them with a sense of trust and confidence when it comes to making informed decisions, employment opportunities as well as revenue generation. By contributing to society and bridging the gap between urban and rural, we intend to climb the ladder to success together with mutual cooperation and growth.
What are your growth priorities for 2022?
We have been able to insure 500 plus people in 14 states since the start of our operations in September 2021. We plan on capitalizing on the existing number of agents we have from 100 to 10,000 in the next 2 years and spread our services to all suburban and rural areas across India. We aim to eliminate the financial uncertainty that looms over rural people, by providing them with a sense of confidence when it comes to making informed decisions, employment opportunities as well as revenue generation.
What are your expectations with Krishi Jagran?
To continue to bring out stories of the farmers and the rural sector, the adversaries they face, and how owing to the technology and innovations a lot of companies like ours are providing real-time solutions to those in need.
(Author- Shivam Dwivedi)
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