Kalepa raises $75 million Series B at a $470 million valuation for AI insurance underwriting

Kalepa, a New York company that builds AI software for commercial insurers, said on November 5 that it has raised $75 million in a Series B round led by Updata Partners, a growth equity firm based in Washington, DC. The deal values the startup at $470 million, according to the company's announcement distributed via Business Wire.

The round and the backers

IA Ventures and Inspired Capital, which led Kalepa's $14 million Series A in 2021, also participated. Tech Funding News reports that individual backers include former US Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker and Carta chief executive Henry Ward. The company puts its total funding at $91 million and says the new money will go toward a broader AI product suite, entry into new markets and doubling its headcount in 2027.

Kalepa was co-founded by chief executive Paul Monasterio and Daniel Hillman, who both previously worked at the analytics firm Applied Predictive Technologies and at Mastercard. Tech Funding News says the company operates in more than ten countries.

What the software does

Kalepa sells to insurers, managing general agents, reinsurers and program administrators. Its platform coordinates work across underwriting, pricing, portfolio management and operations, using AI agents for multi-step tasks while routing decisions to staff when their judgment or approval is required. The company stresses that results are verifiable and auditable. Monasterio framed the split simply: "Sometimes that's AI and sometimes it's a person."

Named customers include W.R. Berkley, Bowhead Specialty and AmRisc. The company says revenue and the number of customers tripled over the past year, that it has been cash-flow positive for more than two years, and that clients have improved their combined ratio by 960 basis points. These figures come from Kalepa and have not been independently verified.

A crowded field

AI underwriting has drawn heavy investment. Tech Funding News points to Federato, which raised a $100 million Series D in November 2025, Sixfold, which raised a $30 million Series B in January 2026, and London-based Artificial Labs. Kalepa's pitch is that the degree of automation should depend on the risk and complexity of each task, with human oversight built in. Whether carriers will keep paying for that model as rivals push more autonomous agents remains an open question.