Amazon now sells auto insurance in India

Comment

Amazon’s India business said on Thursday it has begun offering auto insurance to cover two and four-wheelers in the country, marking the American giant’s first foray into this financial services category globally.

The e-commerce giant said it had inked a deal with Mumbai-headquartered Acko General Insurance to offer customers car and motor-bike insurance. Amazon is also an investor in Acko.

Mahendra Nerurkar, chief executive and director of Amazon Pay in India, said on Wednesday evening at a fintech conference that the company was planning to expand its insurance service to offer coverage on health, flight and cabs.

The auto insurance is available to customers through Amazon Pay on the e-commerce giant’s website and app. The company said buying insurance will take less than two minutes and requires no paperwork.

“This coupled with services like hassle-free claims with zero paperwork, one-hour pick-up, 3-day assured claim servicing and 1 year repair warranty – in select cities, as well as an option for instant cash settlements for low value claims, making it beneficial for customers,” it added.

Customers who have subscribed to Amazon Prime, the company’s loyalty program that costs about $13 a year in India, will be able to access additional benefits and discounts, Amazon said without identifying those benefits.

India’s insurance market is the latest financial services sector that has attracted the attention of local and international tech giants. Paytm, India’s most valued startup, and its chief executive Vijay Shekhar Sharma, acquired insurance firm Raheja QBE for a sum of $76 million earlier this month.

In India, only a fraction of the nation’s 1.3 billion people currently have access to insurance, and some analysts say that digital firms could prove crucial in bringing these services to the masses.

According to rating agency ICRA, insurance products had reached less than 3% of the population as of 2017. An average Indian makes about $2,100 a year, according to the World Bank. Of those Indians who had purchased an insurance product, they were spending less than $50 on it in 2017, ICRA estimated.

“Our vision is to make Amazon Pay the most trusted, convenient and rewarding way to pay for our customers. Delighted by this experience, there has been a growing demand for more services. In line with this need, we are excited to launch an auto insurance product that is affordable, convenient, and provides a seamless claims experience,” said Vikas Bansal, director and head of financial services at Amazon Pay in India, in a statement.

Though Amazon Pay is available in several markets, the payments service’s offering in India remains unmatched. The company has used the world’s second largest internet market, where it has invested more than $6.5 billion to date, as a testbed to explore various unique opportunities. The Amazon Pay app in India, for instance, also sells movie and flight tickets.

More TechCrunch

Get the industry’s biggest tech news

Every weekday and Sunday, you can get the best of TechCrunch’s coverage.

Startups are the core of TechCrunch, so get our best coverage delivered weekly.

The latest Fintech news and analysis, delivered every Tuesday.

TechCrunch Mobility is your destination for transportation news and insight.

By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Notice.

Tags

Rohlik rolls up $170M to expand in European grocery delivery and sell its tech to others

The salad days of fresh grocery delivery startups are over, but those that have stayed the course, and have built businesses that are seeing gains, are still here and are…

Robotics investments are gaining speed after post-pandemic slowdown

The first six months of the year have seen $4.2 billion invested in robotics, putting this year well on track to beat 2023’s 12-month total of $6.8 billion.

Hebbia raises nearly $100M Series B for AI-powered document search led by Andreessen Horowitz

Hebbia, a startup using generative AI to search large documents and return answers, has raised a nearly $100 million Series B led by Andreessen Horowitz, according to three people with…

Agility’s humanoid robots are going to handle your Spanx

Digit’s first job will be moving totes around a Connecticut Spanx factory — which is most definitely not a euphemism.

MagicSchool thinks AI in the classroom is inevitable, so it’s aiming to help teachers and students use it properly

These days, when you hear about students and generative AI, chances are that you’re getting a taste of the debate over the adoption of tools like ChatGPT. Are they a…

Zuckerberg disses closed-source AI competitors as trying to ‘create God’

In the conversation, Zuckerberg said there needs to be a lot of different AIs that get created to reflect people’s different interests.

Andrew Ng plans to raise $120M for next AI Fund

AI big shot Andrew Ng’s AI Fund, a startup incubator that backs small teams of experts looking to solve key problems using AI, plans to raise upward of $120 million…

VW taps Rivian in $5B EV deal and the fight over Fisker’s assets

Welcome back to TechCrunch Mobility — your central hub for news and insights on the future of transportation. Sign up here for free — just click TechCrunch Mobility! Am I…

FCC rule would make carriers unlock all phones after 60 days

Specifically, according to the FCC, carriers would simply have to provide unlocking services 60 days after activation.

As battery startups fail, Sila snaps up $375M in new funding

Amid a fraught environment for battery startups, Sila has raised $375 million to finish construction of a U.S. factory that will scale its next-generation battery technology for customers like Mercedes-Benz…

Startups scramble to assess fallout from Evolve Bank data breach

Fintech-friendly Evolve Bank disclosed a data breach, saying it may have impacted customers and partners.

Meta starts testing user-created AI chatbots on Instagram

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced on Thursday that the company will begin to surface AI characters made by creators through Meta AI studio on Instagram. The tests will begin in…

Rondo Energy funding shows a new way across the climate startup ‘valley of death’

Climate tech startups especially those building hardware, face a particular challenge when trying to move beyond the prototype or pilot phase and start selling finished products to customers.

Amazon consolidates Amazon Clinic into the One Medical brand

Amazon is folding its Amazon Clinic telehealth service into its primary care business One Medical, the company announced on Thursday.  The company explained in today’s blog post that, to simplify…

Just in time for the debates, Meta fixes bug impacting users’ political content settings on Instagram and Threads

Meta has fixed the bug that caused people to believe the company had adjusted their selections in a political content settings tool without their consent. The issue had impacted users…

YouTube Premium upgrade adds smart downloads and picture-in-picture mode for Shorts

YouTube is adding several new features for Premium users, including smart downloads and support for picture-in-picture mode for Shorts, as well as a wider rollout of its “Jump Ahead” feature…

TechCrunch Disrupt joins forces with Google Cloud for Startup Battlefield 200

TechCrunch is joining forces with Google Cloud as its lead partner for Startup Battlefield 200. This event will highlight and support the most promising startups from around the globe at…

Character.AI now allows users to talk with AI avatars over calls

a16z-backed Character.AI said today that it is now allowing users to talk to AI characters over calls. The feature currently supports multiple languages, including English, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Korean, Japanese…

TikTok to challenge Amazon Prime Day with its own sales event in July

TikTok is gearing up to challenge Amazon’s Prime Day event in July. The social network announced on Thursday that TikTok Shop is holding a “Deals For You Days” sales event…

Reliance Jio, Airtel kick off Indian telecom price hike

Reliance Jio and Airtel, the two largest telecom operators in India, have initiated what analysts expect to be an industrywide increase in tariffs in the world’s second largest wireless market,…

SoftBank forms AI healthcare JV in Japan with Tempus

SoftBank Group founder Masayoshi Son announced on Thursday that the Japanese tech giant has set up a joint venture in the country with Chicago-based health tech company Tempus. Together, the…

As Spain gets its latest VC fund, Southern Europe appears to be on a roll

While startup valuations have plummeted since the bull run of 2021-2022, a factor that’s hit the European startup ecosystem particularly hard, there’s one region of Europe where the correction has…

Illumex is using GenAI to ease pain of getting good data into LLMs

By now we know how crucial it is to have quality data for use by large language models (LLMs), but getting data ready for the models has been an early…

Directo turns a TikTok travel hack into a deal-finding Chrome extension

A travel hack that went viral on TikTok teaches users how to save money on hotels and Airbnbs by booking directly with the properties themselves. Now, a new startup, Directo,…

Axelera lands new funds as the AI chip market heats up

Axelera designs AI-running chips and systems for applications like security, retail, automotive and robotics.

ChatGPT: Everything you need to know about the AI-powered chatbot

ChatGPT, OpenAI’s text-generating AI chatbot, has taken the world by storm since its launch in November 2022. What started as a tool to hyper-charge productivity through writing essays and code…

Orby is building AI agents for the enterprise

Orby AI, is building a generative AI platform that attempts to automate a range of different business workflows, including workflows that involve data entry, documents processing and forms validation.

PortSwigger, the company behind the Burp Suite of security testing tools, swallows $112M

Sometimes the most successful startup ideas come from people building tools to solve their own needs. Such was the case with Dafydd Stuttard, a security expert who goes by Daf. …

Amazon hit with fresh class action-style suit in UK — $3.4B in competition damages sought for 200,000+ sellers

Amazon is facing another competition lawsuit in the U.K. The latest claim, which was filed Thursday, is seeking more than £2.7 billion in damages — or around $3.4 billion at…

Odaseva raises $54M to secure Salesforce users

Securing cloud services remains a challenge for enterprises. That’s why several companies have been working on security solutions that specifically address that need. In the latest example of that, Odaseva…

About

Legal

Trending Tech Topics

Powered by WordPress VIP