- Verily, the life sciences unit owned by Alphabet, intends to sell its stop-loss insurance business.
- Verily had entered an agreement to sell the business, named Granular, to Elevance Health.
- Verily has been trying to cut back on projects and reorient its strategy around AI.
Verily, Alphabet’s life science group, entered an agreement to sell its insurance subsidiary to Elevance Health.
In an email to staff last month, Verily CEO Stephen Gillett announced that Granular had entered into an agreement to be acquired by the US health insurance giant.
“This is an exciting step for the Granular business, as it will benefit significantly in its next stage of growth from Elevance Health’s extensive capabilities,” Gillett wrote on January 16 in the email, which was reviewed by Business Insider.
Granular sells stop-loss insurance, which is sometimes taken out by employers who pay their workforce’s medical bills and want to limit their financial exposure. Granular specializes in using data science to help employers control their costs and reduce risk.
“Elevance Health is also excited and sees tremendous value in the Granular team, their processes, technology, and more diversified range of healthcare solutions for self-funded employers who are seeking effective ways to manage their healthcare costs,” Gillett wrote in the memo.
A Verily spokesperson confirmed this agreement and said that the terms of the deal are not disclosed.
“I can confirm Verily has entered into an agreement to sell its stop-loss insurance subsidiary, Granular Insurance Company, to Elevance Health,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “Granular was launched in 2020 and utilizes innovative, proprietary technology to deliver medical stop-loss, reinsurance, and fronting solutions for self-funded employers and captives.”
Verily has been on a mission to cut projects and reorient its strategy around AI, BI reported in December. The company, which was spun out of Google’s moonshot group in 2015 and continues to sit alongside the search giant, has primarily focused on using data analytics to improve healthcare. Along the way, it has explored a wide range of projects, including surgical robots, glucose-tracking contact lenses, and editing mosquito populations.
In 2020, Verily announced it would launch a new insurance business, then known as the Coefficient Insurance Company, which was backed by Swiss Re Group. In 2021, it was rebranded as Granular Insurance.
Current and former Verily employees have told BI that Granular became one of the company’s biggest revenue generators.
While Alphabet still owns it, Verily has been removing itself from Google’s technical infrastructure to eventually separate from the company entirely. As of January, many of its systems are independent. The company was also looking to raise another round of capital as of December, BI previously reported.
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