InsurTech startup Monitaur raised some crucial early-stage financing that will help expand hiring and its development of machine learning assurance technology.

The oversubscribed $2.6 million funding round included TechStars, MTech Capital, Hub Angels and “other prominent angel investors,” Boston, Mass.-based Monitaur said.

Hiring will focus on technical and market-facing teams for insurance, which Monitaur notes is “a first-mover industry” for machine learning assurance.

“Monitaur is focused on improving people’s lives by building trust and confidence in AI, and we’re already engaged with and delivering increased transparency and governance to major global corporations and partners,” Monitaur CEO and co-founder Anthony Habayeb said in prepared remarks. “As [machine learning] continues to be deployed to make consequential decisions, we’re ensuring risk, compliance and governance teams have the ability to manage risk comprehensively and continuously across all of their advanced models.”

Monitaur’s software platform is designed to help insurers and other companies identify when a model is operating under controls and internal policies and when it isn’t. It combines continuous recording, monitoring and independent validations to address issues like bias, drift and anomalies with software that streamlines human-driven audit and compliance processes. This approach creates a system of record that Monitaur said lets clients create controls, trust and confidence in machine learning systems.

Kevin McLoughlin, a partner and co-founder of MTech Capital, said in prepared remarks that “unforeseen biases in actuarial and marketing models that deploy machine learning present an emerging risk for insurance companies.”

He said Monitaur has had some early success in spotting biases in machine learning models and their sources.

In a related move, Monitaur added former Ohio Department of Insurance Director Jillian Froment to its advisory board. Her background in supporting industry innovation and consumer protections will help support Monitaur’s product development and approach, the company said.

Source: Monitaur