Insurtech GCC Zinnia, who recently opened its ninth India office in Bengaluru, says over 50 percent of its employees are based in the country. Of the 3,000 employees globally, almost 1,700 sit out of India, said Josh Everett, CEO of Zinnia India.
“We’ve been in India since 2014 but used third-party entity data to help us get started. In 2019, we started with two locations in Gurgaon and Pune, with about 400 associates. From 2019 to 2021, we grew from 400 to about 600. Earlier this year, we bought five products from Ebix, focused on the life and annuity market. We grew from about 650 people to about 1,200 people as of April this year. From then to now, we added a few more, so we have less than 1,700 people here,” he said.
Across the country, the company has offices in nine locations - Gurgaon, Noida, Chennai, Coimbatore, Nagpur, Pune, Hyderabad, and Mumbai. In October, it opened its first office in Bengaluru .
While Zinnia currently has 25 team members in Bengaluru, it wants to scale quickly and double the headcount in the city. The company has three new go-to-market capabilities which continue to be built out of India, specifically Bengaluru, he stated.
“The type of talent we’re after includes UI/UX, blockchain technology, and system of record technology,” Everett said. “The top talent in technology in the world sits here. We came to Bengaluru to get specific skills, one being blockchain. We’re building a new system of record on blockchain technology, leveraging smart contract capabilities. We’ve looked all over India and the world for these blockchain technologists. While there are some in the US, more are here. The leading edge sits right here in Bangalore.”
The company has its product managers and product team, marketing team, global operations, and technology talent in the country. It has around 1,100 technologists in India and about 350 in the US.
In India, Zinnia got five clients from the Ebix acquisition, including ICICI Bank. It acquired a portion of the company that was focused on life and annuities. However, 95 per cent of Zinnia’s clients are in North America, across Canada, and the United States.
“We want to prove our capability in the US because we know that market well. Then, we will expand globally over the next several years. How quickly that happens depends on how quickly these go-to-market capabilities prove their work, which is already starting to come to fruition. Before we expand, we want to get the North American market and put a stake in the ground to be known as the go-to technology provider for life and annuities,” the India CEO said, adding the company will prove the business case in North America, and expand globally.