RISE Resilience Innovations announced five winners in the RISE Flood Insurance of the Future Challenge, a competition designed to source innovative solutions that reduce flood-related insurance premiums and payouts by 50%.

Winners will receive up to $300,000 to test and advance their products in the Hampton Roads region through the end of 2023, and get access to a customized business accelerator through 757 Collab, co-working office and testing space, real-world pilot sites, and introductions to regional municipalities and stakeholders.

The five winners are:

National Flood Experts specializes in flood risk analyses and cost-saving solutions. With RISE’s help, National Flood Experts will pilot a scalable platform that will allow municipalities’ floodplain managers and residents to more easily assess costs under FEMA’s new Risk Rating 2.0 flood insurance premium pricing methodology and better prioritize mitigation strategies.

Plover Parametrics helps carriers and brokers bring new parametric insurance products and endorsements to market faster and cheaper through software. Plover will structure event-driven insurance products that benefit residents, businesses and municipalities.

reThought Insurance is an insurance innovator that has developed a proprietary Flood underwriting methodology and risk assessment technology which will significantly increase the uptake in flood insurance. With RISE’s help, reThought will further advance its flood risk assessment and pricing capabilities for properties in the U.S, helping to bring flood coverage to more property owners and to close the flood protection gap.

Ric offers micro parametric insurance solutions, builds resiliency and gives underserved communities access to catastrophic rainfall flood insurance at scale. Ric will implement a community-based parametric insurance model of its $14/month, zero-deductible policy, which offers a $10,000 payout within 48 hours based on a triggering event.

True Flood Risk uses its online software risk management platform to instantly estimate building structural height, and provide flood risk reports and cost-benefit mitigation strategies to accelerate climate resilience for over 250M properties worldwide. True Flood Risk will extend its platform capabilities to produce current and future damage estimates and support insurance applications.

The newest projects will join more than 30 RISE-funded pilots from seven previous Challenges, including sensors that gather essential stormwater system capacity data, applications to re-route drivers in real time using Waze to avoid flooded roads, and the nation’s first home raising academy.

After recently extending our successful model to the rural Middle Peninsula region to source solutions to problems distinct from those encountered by coastal cities, RISE will soon launch a Challenge addressing the needs of riverine and mountain communities in western Virginia. Be sure to visit their website to learn more.