Launching Nirvana!

Rushil Goel,

Co-founder & CEO

February 23, 2022

Today, we’re publicly launching Nirvana Insurance, where we are revolutionizing the commercial fleet insurance industry. We’re taking it from a frustratingly analog world to one where we deliver a fast, modern experience and use data to not only help our customers save money, but make our roads safer for everyone.

Now, I know that sounds unsexy and you might think: How does that affect me? Because this is so vital right now, while the world is in the midst of a very serious supply-chain crisis.

Everything that reaches you and your family, from toilet paper to medicines, is transported on trucks, and the trucking industry is seriously imperiled. More than 90 percent of the fleets nationwide have fewer than 50 trucks, and these small businesses operate on razor-thin margins. These little guys are being forced out of business, and oftentimes insurance is the straw that’s breaking the proverbial camel’s back. No wonder the guaranteed next-day arrivals are no longer so guaranteed!

Here’s the thing: Since 2017 the federal government has required trucks to install telematics devices called ELDs (Electronic Logging Devices), which include sensors to track everything from speed to hard braking. That key information has so far been largely ignored by the big legacy fleet insurers, who tend to increase rates across the board rather than reward the safer fleets.

Nirvana is using those billions of telematics data points, like location, speed, video, erratic driving, weather, traffic, along with our bespoke machine-learning models, to understand risk better than anyone else.

We provide instantaneous quotes rather than it taking months with phone calls, faxes, and tons of paperwork. And we give regular recommendations to our clients, including specific coaching for drivers and routes to avoid. All this means safer fleets get up to a 20-percent discount upfront. And when you’re a little guy, that can make a huge difference when every truck in the fleet can cost more than $15,000 a year to insure.

Before Nirvana, I was the VP of Product at Samsara, one of the fastest growing IoT, or Internet of Things, players in the world, where I helped them scale to more than $400 million ARR. During that time, we worked with more than 20,000 fleets, and I traveled from Bakersfield, California, to Ft. Smith, Arkansas, to Mt. Sterling, Illinois, meeting with fleet operators.

These are great people. And their stories are largely the same. There was one thing I heard every time: “We just want our drivers to get home safely to their families at the end of each day.” But they are also business owners. They didn't want to simply survive; they wanted to thrive. Most saw their insurance rates go up even though they were doing everything right.

We believe they deserve better. We’re not an insurance provider who charges you a lot and you can’t even get a hold of when something goes wrong. We’re changing the paradigm by building a modern, data-driven platform for a new kind of insurance company — one where quotes are delivered almost instantaneously, and getting hold of us is seamless.

We started Nirvana in early 2021, and saw tremendous demand from customers and agency partners like USI, HUB, Truck Writers, Transtar, leading to us being more than 5x oversubscribed at launch. We have a big year ahead of us, and are excited to share that we’ve raised more than $25 million, including a recently closed $22 million Series A, from marquee investors like Lightspeed, General Catalyst, Elad Gil (early investor in Stripe, Brex, Flexport, Gusto), Fidji Simo (CEO, Instacart), Spike Lipkin (CEO, Newfront), Sam Hodges (CEO, Vouch) and more to fuel this next phase of growth.

With my co-founders Abhay and Alex, and the rest of our amazing team around the globe, we have the perfect mix of technology and insurance expertise to go after this $300B+ opportunity. And it’s a testament to their hard work that has made us one of the fastest insurtechs EVER to launch! What’s more, we’re just getting started.

When you think about the world of operations, things like transportation, warehouses, factories, that drive our economy, more and more of them are getting connected as IoT penetration increases, and our vision is to use that data to help build safer and more efficient businesses everywhere. We’re growing across the board, so come join us in this exciting journey ahead!