MMI Holdings’ Exponential Ventures, Anthemis Group to invest in financial wellness startups

This is interesting. MMI Holdings (MMI), together with advisory firm Anthemis Group (Anthemis), on Thursday announced a partnership that will see it pump millions of Euros into financial wellness startups around the globe.

MMI has provided the initial €30-million (± R520-million) commitment while leaving room for other likeminded firms to join the initiative.

The investment partnership will operate on the principle that by supporting companies that improve the financial wellness of individuals and SME’s, investors can achieve ‘profit with purpose’ and help to create a prosperous and inclusive global growth economy. To that end, the partnership’s investment will primarily consider new business models and companies in the fintech, insurtech and healthtech categories in Europe, the US and Asia. MMI’s deep industry operating expertise in wellness complements Anthemis’ investment experience in financial services.

“At MMI, we have a clear and resolute goal that drives us: to improve the financial wellness of individuals, households, communities and businesses,” MMI CEO Nicolaas Kruger. “The investment partnership with Anthemis is the next step in our commitment to achieve that goal. We are excited to be collaborating with Anthemis and are open to working with other visionary industry partners in the financial wellness space.”

This is not MMI’s first foray into the startup space. Earlier this year, the company launched Exponential Ventures with the goal of identifying potentially disruptive innovation opportunities around financial wellness. Soon after, it invested in South African fintech company TaxTim.

“Our partnership with Anthemis forms part of Exponentials Venture Developer capabilities where we want to Identify and develop brand new and disruptive ventures that reach new markets, meet new needs and leverage new business models,” Jaco Oosthuizen, CEO of Exponential Ventures says. “We are looking for businesses that have the potential to fundamentally disrupt the financial wellness market space as we know it.”

Since 2010, Anthemis has been at the forefront of catalysing and accelerating positive, disruptive change across the financial services industry. In addition to advising large institutions on fintech strategy, Anthemis has made 39 investments in early stage companies across many financial services subsectors.

Nadeem Shaikh, Founder and CEO of Anthemis, said: “We are very excited to work with Exponential Ventures and MMI, a firm with a fantastic track record in the insurance space, on this investment partnership. Anthemis looks forward to building a long-term relationship with MMI through the partnership, which we believe will achieve both strategic and financial objectives for our respective firms.”