Nettle raises $6.8m for AI insurance risk inspections

Nettle has raised $6.8 million in total funding for its AI insurance risk assessment platform. The oversubscribed $4.8 million seed round, led by MTech Capital, follows a $2 million pre-seed investment. The company will use the capital to expand operations across the US and Europe.

The funding addresses a critical industry bottleneck. Commercial insurers face backlogs of up to six months for risk assessments, compounded by an estimated 40% retirement rate for risk engineers by 2030. Nettle's platform aims to accelerate underwriting decisions by automating the inspection of physical risks.

Platform capabilities and market expansion

Nettle's AI workspace automates insurance inspections through remote risk identification, guided inspections, mobile evidence analysis, and instant report generation. The platform processes images, video, audio, documents, and third-party data. It completes risk assessments up to five times faster than traditional methods.

Initially targeting Commercial Property lines, the platform has expanded to cover Liability, Construction, and Workers' Compensation. It supports both cloud and on-premises deployment with regional data residency and enterprise-grade security. Nettle currently serves insurers across Europe, the US, and Asia from offices in New York and London.

Client validation and strategic adoption

Early pilot programmes have demonstrated significant efficiency gains. Client Allianz Türkiye saw up to a threefold improvement in the speed of risk engineers completing property inspections using Nettle's system.

Investors highlight the platform's ease of integration for large enterprises. Kevin McLoughlin, founder and managing partner at MTech, stated, Using generative AI, top global insurers are adopting the Nettle platform, which requires minimal integration effort to transform physical data collection and analyses for large commercial risks.

Founding team and strategic vision

Nettle is an Irish-founded insurtech startup launched in 2024 by co-founders Jack Miller and Katya Kinane. The pair met while working at McKinsey's AI arm, QuantumBlack. Kinane is a computer science graduate from Trinity College Dublin.

The founding team's vision is to turn loss control into a strategic advantage. Jack Miller said, "Our AI workspace gives insurers the tools to bring more of the portfolio into view, either through risk engineers, agents, or even policyholders."

The seed round included participation from Project A Ventures, which invested with a super pro rata, alongside Sure Valley Ventures, Portfolio Ventures, Ventures Together, and several angel investors. The new capital will fuel the expansion of Nettle's engineering and go-to-market teams to scale operations.