Under Fire and Still Showing Up: Kobi Bendelak on Israeli InsurTech Resilience
There are conference stories, and then there is this one.
When all direct flights from Israel to London were cancelled ahead of InsurTech Insights London, Kobi Bendelak did not cancel the trip. He organized a delegation of 20 startups and roughly 40 people, drove five hours through the desert to the Red Sea, crossed the border into Egypt, drove another hour to a small airport near Taba, flew to Athens, overnighted, and arrived in London roughly 40 hours after departing — for what should have been a five-hour flight.
He did this during an active war. He left his family behind. Several members of the delegation faced the same journey home.
That story is not just an anecdote. It is the thesis of InsurTech Israel.
In Episode 151 of InsurTechTalk, Kobi and I covered the state of the Israeli InsurTech ecosystem, how the relationship between startups and insurance companies has changed over nine years, the B2C distribution reckoning, and a bold prediction about the future of core systems.
About Kobi Bendelak
Kobi Bendelak has been leading InsurTech Israel since 2017 — nearly nine years at the time of this recording. InsurTech Israel is the leading organization for the Israeli InsurTech ecosystem, supporting over 250 InsurTech startups across four pillars: investment, business development, global delegations and road shows, and an accelerator program that was named the best InsurTech accelerator in the world in 2024 and 2025. In 2025 alone, 72 new InsurTech startups joined the ecosystem. InsurTech Israel has also expanded globally, with hubs in Central America and Budapest, and a global accelerator program that has run in Israel, the US, Munich, and London.
Why the London Trip Matters
The 40-hour journey through Egypt and Greece to reach InsurTech Insights London was not a stunt. Kobi's explanation was straightforward: insurance is built on trust. If your clients and partners cannot count on you to show up — especially under difficult conditions — that undermines the foundation of every business relationship you have.
What the Journey Demonstrated
Israeli startups are operating in a war environment and still delivering on commitments to global partners
The delegation left families behind, with no certainty about return flights, to honor obligations to the ecosystem
Several members of the delegation faced the same reverse journey home — through Egypt, not on direct flights
The message to the global insurance industry: you can trust us, regardless of what is happening at home
Nine Years of InsurTech Israel: How the Industry Has Matured
Kobi has had a front-row seat to the full arc of InsurTech — from the early days of curiosity and conferences to the current era of focused procurement. His summary of how the relationship between startups and incumbents has changed over nine years is one of the clearest descriptions of market maturation I have heard.
From Tech Tourism to Real Business
In the early years, C-suite executives from insurance companies attended InsurTech events enthusiastically — but primarily out of curiosity, not with serious buying intent
Startups arrived expecting business; incumbents arrived for conversations and education
Kobi's term for it — echoing a phrase used often in this space — is tech tourism: browse, engage, window shop, commit to nothing
Today, the dynamic has shifted significantly: insurance companies now arrive at events with a focused agenda and specific problems they are trying to solve
If your product fits their current priority, you get a serious conversation; if it does not, you may not get a meeting at all
The upside: when you do get in the room, it is a real buying conversation, not an exploratory chat
The B2C Distribution Reckoning
One of the defining storylines of the past several years in InsurTech — not just in Israel but globally — has been the collapse of the direct-to-consumer distribution thesis.
What Happened to B2C InsurTech
A wave of B2C InsurTech startups launched on the belief that they could sell insurance products directly to consumers, bypassing brokers and agents entirely
The logic was reasonable on paper: if your product is good enough and your digital experience is strong enough, why share margin with an intermediary?
Two to three years in, most of them hit the same wall: broker and agent relationships are deeply embedded in how consumers actually buy insurance, and you cannot outcompete that network from scratch
The conclusion most of them reached: if you cannot beat the broker, join them
The majority of B2C InsurTech companies that survived have pivoted to multi-channel distribution strategies that include brokers and agents as primary partners
The Israeli InsurTech Ecosystem in 2025
InsurTech Israel added 72 new startups to its ecosystem in 2025 — a number that reflects both the breadth of the opportunity and the unique position of Israeli technology culture in the global InsurTech market.
What Keeps the Ecosystem Growing
Insurance is a wide industry with many verticals — life, health, cyber, P&C, specialty — each offering distinct entry points for new startups
Parametric and embedded insurance continue to generate genuinely new product categories, not just incremental improvements
Technology originally built for other industries — space technology, cybersecurity, health tech — is increasingly finding direct application in insurance
Competition within the ecosystem is healthy: multiple startups working on adjacent problems raises the quality of the whole
Israeli technology culture, shaped by mandatory military service and a history of operating under constraint, produces founders with a particular tolerance for ambiguity and a drive to execute
A Bold Prediction: Core Systems May Not Exist in a Few Years
This was the most provocative moment in the conversation — and Kobi said it clearly and on the record.
The Argument
AI tools are advancing fast enough that the underlying functions of a core system — policy administration, claims management, billing, underwriting workflow — may be executable by AI agents without a dedicated system of record in the traditional sense
Insurance companies may not need core systems to operate within a few years
They will instead have AI tools that handle the full workflow from end to end
InsurTech Israel itself built a custom CRM and operations platform on Base44 in under five hours — replacing HubSpot for their own internal operations
The implication: the barrier to building functional, tailored operational software is collapsing, and with it the rationale for long-term investment in legacy or even modern core systems
Upcoming Road Shows and Events
InsurTech Israel's 2025 agenda includes:
A first-ever road show in Mexico, co-organized with the Mexican InsurTech association, bringing Israeli startups alongside companies from Guatemala, Chile, Argentina, and Colombia
A US road show in June bringing 12 startups to Ohio and Nebraska
Continued global accelerator programming, with the 2025 edition running in London in April
Key Takeaways
Resilience is not a talking point for Israeli InsurTech — it is a demonstrated operating principle, as the London delegation proved
The InsurTech market has matured from tech tourism to focused procurement; startups need to arrive with a specific solution to a specific problem the buyer is actively working on
B2C direct distribution in insurance is largely a failed thesis; broker and agent partnerships are essential for most product companies
72 new startups in a single ecosystem in a single year reflects both the breadth of insurance as a problem space and the continued vitality of Israeli tech culture
The boldest prediction of the episode: core systems as a category may be disrupted or displaced by AI within a few years
🏷️ Categories
Startup, AI and ML, MGA, Insurtech, Distribution, Accelerator
🔖 Tags
Kobi Bendelak, InsurTech Israel, Israeli InsurTech, Accelerator, B2C Distribution, Core Systems, AI in Insurance, InsurTech Ecosystem, Road Show, Parametric Insurance, Embedded Insurance, Tech Tourism, Global InsurTech