It’s hard to believe that 12 months have gone by since our last end-of-year review. 2021 has certainly been a memorable one at Sprout.ai, and while we’ve all been facing continuing challenges in the wider world, we’re delighted to say the business has gone from strength to strength. The team has grown in size by 400 percent and we’re honoured to have been nominated for several awards.
12 months ago, the festive celebrations were, by necessity, a somewhat muted affair. It was great to make up for it to a certain extent this year, when several members of the team were able to meet up in person for our Christmas party to celebrate all that we’ve achieved – and to hand out a few extra awards of our own!
Our Growing Team
Before we get on to that, there are some new team members to introduce since our last update earlier this year.
- Aris Koliopoulos is our new Head of Engineering. He’s spent the past five years building DriveTribe by Clarkson, Hammond and May from the ground up. We’re certain that his considerable experience will bring massive benefits to the insurance sector.
- Justin Galerne joined in October as a Senior Data Scientist. Before coming to Sprout.ai, he spent three years developing his skills at respected French insurtech Shift Technologies.
- Jeremie Charlet will already be familiar to many, having worked with us as a contractor for the past year. He became an official member of the team in November, also as a Senior Data Scientist. Jeremie has worked for the UK government and several corporates and startups in various data science roles.
- Soi Luong joined in December as Lead Frontend Engineer, and like Aris, he comes direct from DriveTribe by Clarkson, Hammond and May, where he was building frontend apps.
- Last but not least, Thanh Nhan Nguyen is the latest addition to our team of Data Scientists. Thanh joins us from Cinnamon AI in Hanoi, where he enjoyed success as a Machine Learning Engineer.
Please join us in welcoming all our new team members aboard! We will hear more about how they are settling in in a future update.
Industry awards
We always say that success brings its own rewards, but it’s nevertheless special to have our achievements recognised by our industry peers. We’ll try not to blush too much in telling you this has happened several times over the past few months.
Most recently, Sprout.ai was announced as a finalist at this year’s Insurance Times awards for Excellence in Technology – Claims. It’s a great piece of news on which to end the year, and is a testament to everyone’s dedication over the past 12 months.
We’re also pleased to report that Sprout.ai won Claims Collaboration of the Year at the Insurance Post Claims & Fraud Awards for our work with Zurich, and we were finalists for several other awards, including the Tech and Innovation awards, Insurance Business Rising Stars and COVER awards.
We must also mention the TechRound 100. This is the flagship event of the year, highlighting the hard work and success of UK startups, businesses and entrepreneurs. With more than 3,000 applications this year, we are extremely proud to announce that we’ve achieved a top 10 position!
Finally, we’re deeply honoured to be recognised as one of the top 18 insurtech startups to watch by some of the most respected VCs in an article published by Sifted. We couldn’t be more proud.
Special awards for special people
Of course, none of this would be possible without such an amazing team. But a fact that often goes unnoticed is that their skills and talents go way beyond insurtech and data science. Our recent Christmas party was the perfect opportunity to recognise those unique qualities with a few awards of our own at the inaugural Sprouties ceremony.
There were 15 prestigious awards presented, including Stand Up Comedian Award (Niclas Stoltenberg), Most Likely to Survive a Zombie Apocalypse (Aris Koliopoulos) and Most Likely to Run for Prime Minister Award (who else but Niels Thone). Congratulations to all our worthy winners!
It only remains for us to wish you all a happy and peaceful holiday season with your loved ones. Here’s to still greater success and growth in 2022!