London-based insurtech startup and IoT water leak solution provider LeakBot to go public via a reverse takeover

Water leaks are a significant environmental problem. According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, leaky faucets are estimated to waste almost 1 trillion gallons of water per year in the United States, that’s equal to the annual household water use of more than 11 million homes.

In addition to running up water bills, leaks cause other problems including rot, mold, and other environmental impacts. An average household’s leaks can waste up to 10,000 gallons of water annually. The damage caused by these leaks accounts for around 30% of the underwriting cost of a typical home insurance policy in the US and UK.

It’s widely known that escape-of-water claims are a big problem for insurers with $16 billion a year spent on the escape-of-water losses in the US and UK alone. What’s less well known is that, over half of these claims are caused by mains water leaks and that the majority are small, hidden leaks that cause damage over a period of time. Escape of water seems like a great use case for IoT but so far nobody has really cracked the code on how to do it at scale… until now.

Enter LeakBot, a London, England-based insurtech startup and the world’s first end-to-end, IoT escape-of-water claims mitigation solution for home insurers. LeakBot provides an IoT-enabled leak prevention device reducing homeowners’ premiums and the environmental issue of wasted water. After 6 years of hard work, LeakBot now believes it’s time to float LeakBot on the London Stock Exchange via a reverse takeover.

Today, LeakBot announced it is planning to enter the public market under the name of Ondo Insurtech Plc pending a reverse takeover by Spinnaker Acquisitions Plc, pending a planned reverse takeover by Spinnaker Acquisitions Plc. Building on the success of LeakBot’s technology, the newly created entity will be a dedicated Insurtech solutions provider focussing on the home insurance sector.

The deal comes following the extensive success of LeakBot, which now has 9 live insurance partnerships with insurers such as Hiscox, TopDanmark, and Direct Line, across the UK, US, and Scandinavia. Invented, developed, and manufactured in Britain, LeakBot is a patented end-to-end solution to the huge global problem of domestic water leaks.

Founded in 2016 by Craig Foster, LeakBot is a patented system designed for insurers to reduce the risk of escape-of-water claims. LeakBot uses its patented Thermi-Q technology to detect water leaks in the home, without the need for professional installation. It connects to the home wireless network and, if it detects a leak, alerts the customer via the LeakBot mobile app, and provides access to a team of expert LeakBot engineers to ‘find and fix’ the problem.

The patented LeakBot technology can be provided free of charge to householders by home insurance providers and enjoys strong customer advocacy with a Trustpilot score of 4.8. By finding and fixing these leaks, LeakBot is helping reduce insurance costs as well as also saving water and preventing excessive waste of building materials caused by unforeseen water damage, contributing in a practical way to waste reduction and improving the sustainability credentials of UK homes.

Following the completion of the transaction, which will result in LeakBot being listed on the UK main market as Ondo Insurtech Plc, the new listed entity will endeavor to provide further cost-effective Insurtech solutions and deployments around the world.

In a statement, Andy Morrison, Chairman of Spinnaker Acquisitions Plc, said: “In a green economy space where hubristic plans and greenwashing are often seen, we are delighted to be working towards an acquisition that is neither of these. LeakBot is an established business and technology that taps into an existing insurance business model while making a practical contribution to avoiding waste. We were impressed from the start with the quality of management, and we look forward with confidence to completion and execution.”

Craig Foster, CEO of LeakBot added: “We have proven LeakBot’s efficacy following an extended period of product development and customer implementations in association with major UK, US, and Nordic home insurers and are now excited to be entering a new phase of our journey with SPAQ and the continuing support of HomeServe to finance the roll-out and adoption of LeakBot in our target markets where there are some 97 million addressable homes.”

Since its launch five years ago, LeakBot has partnered with a number of the UK’s major home insurers to supply LeakBot to their customers to help reduce the risk of claims caused by water damage, including Direct Line Group, Hiscox, Eaton Gate, and Covéa Insurance. In February 2020, Hiscox became the first UK insurer to offer a free LeakBot as standard to all new and existing home insurance customers. LeakBot is also available in Sweden with Länsförsäkringar, in Denmark via TopDanmark, and also recently launched into the United States with SageSure and Mapfre.

Below is a video overview of how LeakBot works.