On Wednesday, Indianapolis startup myCOI announced it will invest nearly $1 million to more than double its footprint, creating up to 185 jobs by 2021. To help sweeten the deal, the Indiana Economic Development Corporation will grant myCOI up to $1.75 million in performance-based tax credits and up to $42,500 in workforce training grants.
In businesses required by regulations to track and adhere to compliance standards, whether internally or for its vendors and subcontractors—property management or construction firms, for example—there is something called a certificate of insurance, or COI.
The COI verifies the existence of an insurance policy and usually contains information on coverage limits and types, policy number, name of the insured, and the dates the policy is effective. It’s meant to protect a company from insurance claims, litigation, and the risk of failed audits. If a COI lapses and an accident happens, a company risks being liable—even if the accident does not involve the company itself, but rather its vendors or subcontractors.
In a large business, tracking and maintaining multiple COIs can be a cumbersome process and is usually done manually in-house, says Kristen Nunery, co-founder and CEO of myCOI.
“Lots of companies don’t catch when they’re out of compliance, or, if they do, they’re spending a lot of time resolving it,” she explains. “We provide an automated solution that finds overlooked COIs, because if an accident happens and there’s an insurance claim, our customer could end up in a situation costing thousands, or maybe even millions.”
MyCOI charges its customers based on the quantity of COIs they seek to manage as well as how much help they need to become compliant. The company’s customers can choose from three product tiers ranging from software only to a process fully managed by myCOI, she says.
Nunery says it’s a bit tricky to compute the value of the COI management market, but estimates it at $3.6 billion annually in the U.S. alone. With all that money at stake, myCOI intends to remained focused on further product innovation, she says, including a tool under development now that will allow the company’s software to uncover canceled insurance policies.
According to Nunery, what makes myCOI different from competitors is its ability to “deliver a tech-driven risk management program, making compliance the top priority instead of outsourcing the administrative process.”
Nunery says the 36-person company’s growth has been steady since it launched in 2009. Most of it has been sales-driven, she adds, but myCOI has also raised $2.4 million along the way from Elevate Ventures and angel investors. Its customers include JE Dunn, Hines, and Re/Max.
In March, myCOI completed relocation to its new 6,841-square-foot headquarters downtown, which she says was done in part to be closer to Indy’s pool of young, professional talent.
“Indianapolis is the fifth-fastest-growing tech community in the country, so we’re excited to be a part of it,” Nunery says. “We moved downtown because we wanted to be involved in the exciting things happening.”
