Startups from Silicon Valley with Russian-speaking founders. Jacob Diener and Igor Katsman - the founders of Driveway Software

(Video from the Silicon Valley Open Doors conference, the content of the text interview in the article is much wider than the video - not decoding the video)

SiliconNews.Ru correspondents talk with Driveway Software founders Igor Katzman and Jacob Diener, the founders of a company that helps insurance companies improve driver risk detection. > 1 million dollars invested in a startup, incl. from Russian investors (Igor Matsanyuk, Igor Ryabenky).

Guys, tell me what you do, and why is this a “hot topic”?

Jacob: Our application helps car insurance companies to better determine the degree of riskiness of driving a potential client by using additional information. For example, what distances does he travel on average or at what time of the day, and most importantly, how aggressive he is. Insurance companies have the opportunity to be more careful in the prices of policies and attract more customers at the same time risking profits. Today, when automobile insurance is a “commodity” (data from a widely used commodity, editor's note) data on the quality of driving a car is the last frontier, overcoming of which will help the insurer in attracting scrupulous customers.
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Igor: And a little bit about our platform: this is “big data cloud analytics system” and “insurer-branded smartphone app”. The insurer sends the link to its drivers, the driver makes several trips, the system evaluates his driving style, writes estimates to the cloud, and thus determines the driver's risk. The insurance company, through the protected area of ​​the application, looks at the data, and on the basis of this assessment, decides what additional discount the driver will give, usually between 10 and 35 percent, but only a discount, no extra charge.

And how will insurance companies force drivers to put such software in their car? This is contrary to the interests of the drivers themselves!

Jacob: I answer in order. Our solution is a white label for insurance, that is, a product with their logo and is distributed by the insurance itself through its own channels. As an incentive, drivers are offered a significant discount, up to 35% in some companies, in return for consent and installation of the application on a smartphone. And accordingly, the driver understands what it does, and what kind of information is collected.

The basic principle: "always on". The driver does not need to press any buttons or limit himself to use the phone. Our program will automatically understand that the car is driving. It sounds simple, but how to do it without killing the battery in 2-3 hours ... This is exactly where the application is the most unique and unique on the market.

Igor: We are doing a B2B2C service. The B2B component is that this is a service for insurance companies, which insurers, in turn, will offer their policy holders, and this is B2C. The idea is that no one will force or deceive anyone. This is a system of triple benefits:

First: Drivers get the opportunity to show insurance that they are good drivers and get a big additional discount, up to $ 400 a year.

Secondly: With our technology, insurance companies will be able to attract the best drivers who will not get into accidents. And thereby increase their income and profits.

In three: Driveway will sell its product, service or technology to insurance companies, for drivers it's all free, and in the end everyone gets value (benefit - ed.)!

Why is your solution better than the existing analogues on the market and which analogs are there at all?

Igor: There are two types of competitors. The first: "Iron" - boxes that do the same thing, but worse and are very expensive, and their solution is not scalable. There are similar applications that are trying to clone our development, but very, very far from a complete and high-quality solution due to the lack of IP and experience in real-world development that we have acquired over the past 4 years and have rolled over five hundred million miles.

I estimate that competitors will need a few more years to reach our level. And we do not plan to stand still!

How is the functionality implemented technically? What are the difficulties for a technical team in this implementation?

Igor: Yes, there are more than enough difficulties - the technology is very advanced and is based on 20 years of experience in developing smart mobile systems in the military and medical sectors of the economy. This includes hundreds of algorithms and tech know-how in the field of signal processing, artificial intelligence, sensor fusion, machine learning, advanced mobile and cloud systems, etc.
Yes, there are a lot of difficulties in creating mobile applications. I will list a few: the use of telephone sensors such as an accelerometer, a gyroscope, and so on. Next is the need for very low battery usage, one hundred percent autonomy of the application, protection against fraud and control of the movement of the phone in space. The combination of all these conditions creates a solution that is acceptable for both insurance companies and drivers.

How did the idea come about?

Jacob: The idea of ​​using the phone as a device to determine the quality of driving came while living in Israel - in a country where more people die from road accidents than from wars. We tried to save the drivers from themselves. By the way, the first target audience of the product were teenagers and their parents, but for many reasons we decided to put it off until later and concentrate on insurers.

What is the dynamics now? How many years did the development of such a platform take? As far as I know, you started about 3 years ago. Why so long?

Jacob: Our application is being tested by many companies, although we admit that we can have a sales cycle from one to two years. And we started working on it 5-6 years ago, a long time ago - a very long time ago. Why it took so long to enter the market is not a simple question. I am sure this is a combination of many factors. Among them, in my opinion, there are two main ones: the complexity of sharpening the technology and the readiness of the market for the product.

For what money did the company exist before raising the round?

Yakov: The company existed on our personal funds, Igor and I were excellent specialists in their industries, they earned good money and, accordingly, saved money to live and bring this business to mind.

And how did you manage to raise money?

Jacob: How did you manage to raise? They say that this is a question for 100 million, a combination of hard work, perseverance, faith in oneself and in a team, as well as luck.

What events or conferences were helpful in this business?

Yakov: Conferences, of course, help, so that people, and not only investors, know about us. Here is SVOD, this summer was very useful. Also TEC events held by the same organizers.

Where is your office located? Where are the developers sitting?

Jacob: We already have two offices - the developers are sitting in Haifa, Israel, where Igor rules this. And the headquarters, sales, marketing, technical support are located in Silicon Valley - Redwood City.

Igor: I would like to mention the guys from our team, who for several years are pulling the strap of hard work on a par with us. Lena Grushevskaya is a UX specialist for design and iPhone developer, Dima Neroba is an Android master.

Who are your investors and who came to whom and how?

Jacob: About investors. Israeli angels Gigi Levi and Robi Khilkovets were the first to believe in us and put in, then Igor’s communications from Kellogg University certainly helped. Then a year later when the first signs of business traction appeared, local (from the valley) Kernel, IMI and Altair could have heard Igor Ryabenky and Igor Matsanyuk? SVOD really helped to get the necessary connections and contacts.

By the way, about your previous experience, what were you doing before? Have any of you worked in the industry?

Jacob: I worked at a startup in Dell and Belkin was a product manager. Gained real experience, how to turn technology into a product, and moreover, to earn a lot of money. Igor worked on sophisticated mobile medical devices and from there came experience in 3D signal processing, which in fact is the basis of our technology.

And the last. Tell us about any difficult situation in the business from which you have got out with dignity. Plus, give advice to entrepreneurs based on personal experience.

Jacob: There are a lot of difficult situations, for example, we bootstrap for a very long time, because we could not find the money. We programmed ourselves, we did everything to show the dynamics of user growth, so that at least one of the investors would believe in us and invest. I even had to make a pivot, otherwise they didn't give me any money. Then they gave a little bit, but in a new direction, which both I and Igor considered to be secondary, but investors, of course, know better. What to do - we can not deceive, had to adapt. Another thing is pleasant - both Igor and I were right, and the investors themselves asked to return to the direction where we initially went.
And I can only give advice to the most trivial - if you believe in something, you should not be afraid of being in the minority ... Good luck, guys!

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