Scale up or shut up. Yes, it’s that time again, where we invite you to join us in our mission to #ScaleUpGreece – at our 2nd Scale-up Greece event which is taking place on Wednesday, June 26.

Scale-up Greece: save the date for the 2nd event @Insurance Market

Whether you’re a startupper, investor or aspiring entrepreneur (or even just a curious wanderer) we extend an open invitation to you to take part. The time and place? At 7 pm at Insurance Market’s offices (Evripidou 31-33, Athens 10554, 4th floor). We’ll be serving up a whole load of insights, stories and advice. Oh yes, and also pizza and beers too. Register here!

Scale-up Greece: an introduction

For the uninitiated, #ScaleUpGreece is our tribute to Greece’s ongoing status as one of Europe’s growing startup and scale-up hubs. It’s also a community for anyone who is interested in entrepreneurship.

Following the success of our inaugural event in January, where key members of the Epignosis team relayed their own scale-up success story, this time round we will welcome the team from Insurance Market, a startup that trades in the FinTech arena.

Through these events our aim is to dispel a few common misconceptions. For example, such as that the number of start-ups or the number of small to medium businesses have something to do with the state of the economy. Or that venture capital funding is an absolute prerequisite for entrepreneurial success in our era.

The above are simply myths. Epignosis’ story, which we heard about last time, is living proof that you can scale up your business easily on a budget. What you do need is a sound business model.

Who are Insurance Market?

So, this time around we’ll be hearing from our hosts Insurance Market. You may or may not know the company, so here’s a little potted history. The company was founded in 2016, after essentially starting out in 2010 as LiveInsurance.gr.

Two years later in 2012, they revamped and relaunched their platform and managed to conquer the Greek insurance market. The financial crisis in Greece was an opportunity for the business to disrupt the existing insurance (policy selling) business model. During this period customers initially turned to online platforms for their car insurance contracts instead of local insurance agents in a way to save money.

Insurance Market with a kind of “brutal penetration” in the Greek market, managed to gradually become the #1 choice for direct policy selling. Among other insurance aggregators they managed to make the difference in auto, health, house and yacht insurance.

Today Insurance Market has been established as a pioneer in the digitalization of insurance services as their Insurance & Energy comparison and brokerage website gets over 95% market share among online aggregators.

But this is only scratching the surface of their successful story. During our 2nd  #ScaleUpGreece event you will get the chance to learn all about their tremendous success from the inside.

What you can expect

Expect learnings aplenty to be transferred! As well as getting a run through the company’s track record, the challenges and the obstacles they’ve overcome, there will also be an open discussion with team members to learn all about the various aspects of their success. As you’d expect, cooperation and teamwork are key themes which have helped to make things happen.

Their transition from startup to scale-up, and on to number one insurance-aggregator is an inspiring story. The team will give us the lowdown also on where they want to go from here.

See you there!

Once again, this #ScaleUpGreece meetup aims above all to bring together the whole Greek startup community. And, in fact, anyone who is keen on sustainable and scalable entrepreneurship. Companies as case studies offer their valuable learnings and knowledge in a best way possible – all in order to push the whole Greek startup ecosystem towards growth. So, don’t miss it!

When: Wednesday, June 26, 2019 @ 7:00pm to 9:00pm
Where: @ Evripidou 31-33, Athens 10554, 4th floor

Graham Wood Graham Wood

The Starttech Ventures Storyteller. Studied Journalism with Business at the University of Central Lancashire. Has worked in various product marketing management positions for the likes of Nokia, Samsung and Vodafone, as well as in several journalism and media roles since 2000.