MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Stonestep Developing Tele-health, COVID-19 Insurance in Partnership with DigiPay Mobile Money, Swiss Capacity Building Facility, TDO Nepal

The Swiss Capacity Building Facility (SCBF), a Switzerland-based public-private partnership, recently announced its funding of the Nepalese unit of Switzerland-based insurance technology (insurtech) company Stonestep to build a product merging COVID-19 insurance and tele-health consultations. Customers of the service will be able to access digital health resources such as online health data as well as physician consultations via phone from healthcare service company Top Doctors Online (TDO) Nepal. While the Stonestep service will also include “risk protection” related to COVID-19, details on this element have not been released.

Stonestep will market the product to first-time insurance buyers through Nepal-based DigiPay Mobile Money. DigiPay will advertise the product to its customers via in-app notifications and SMS (text) messages. The service will be available near the city of Kathmandu initially and then is slated for expansion into rural areas of the country. The goal is to reach 5,000 clients by May 2021. These will be among the 50,000 clients of DigiPay and TDO Nepal, but Stonestep intends to add more distribution partners over time.

Stonestep is active in Africa, the Americas and Asia, specializing in marketing and distributing income and property coverage to first-time insurance buyers through a digital platform. Founded in 2012, Stonestep received USD 4 million in Series A funding from insurtech venture capital fund XL Innovate in 2016. Additional financial information on the firm is unavailable.

Founded in 2011, SCBF supports financial institutions in developing countries with funding for technical assistance relating to expanding delivery channels for services such as insurance, loans and savings, including digital financial services. Supported by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, SCBF has funded 130 projects in 43 countries, reaching a total of 2.1 million clients since its founding in 2011. As of December 2018, SCBF reported total assets of CHF 11.9 million (USD 13.1 million).

By Kate Finster, Research Associate

Sources and Additional Resources

SCBF press release
https://scbf.ch/new-scbf-project-first-of-its-kind-digital-tele-medicine-and-covid-19-insurance-product-in-nepal/

Stonestep homepage
https://www.stonestep.ch/

DigiPay Mobile Money homepage
https://digipay.cash/

TDO Nepal homepage
http://www.tdonepal.com/

SCBF 2018 annual report
https://scbf.ch/annual-report-2018/

XL Innovate press release on PR Newswire
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/stonestep-raises-4m-from-xl-innovate-to-deliver-microinsurance-as-a-service-300379023.html

XL Innovate homepage
https://xlinnovate.com/

Did you know that MicroCapital publishes the MicroCapital Monitor newspaper each month? Find out more at http://www.microcapital.org/products-page.