It’s hard to summarise four years of product development in a few paragraphs—and even harder to represent it visually. I started in a product team of three (including a founder) within a business of just 24 people. By the time I left, we were a team of six in a company of around 55, with revenues that had grown many times over. There were no corners to hide in.
Laka rose to the top of the InsurTech world through its tech-enabled reinvention of the insurance model. Gone were the opaque, traditional long-term contracts based on predicted historical risk. In their place was Laka’s transparent collective model—where users were only charged for claims that were actually paid out at the end of each month. Laka’s USP was its model, and its model was its product.
Though simple in essence, the model was full of hidden traps—and as we scaled, those traps only grew in complexity. During my time at Laka, I helped the company evolve from offering a single-tier D2C product in the UK to supporting three major distribution networks (D2C, B2B, and B2B2C) across Europe, in five+ languages, and with three tiers of cover.
I did that by wearing a lot of hats—enabled by the experience I’d built in my career and a mindset that let me adapt quickly. It wasn’t uncommon for me to work well beyond the boundaries of a typical design role, across areas like pricing, policy wording, policy documents, resource management, technical infrastructure, product specs, customer communications, product architecture, product branding, product safeguards, revenue protection, third-party requirements, insurance law, tax law, and actuarial input.
Customer. Investor. Employee. In that order. That’s my Laka story.
I was approached by Laka—an insurance startup pioneering a peer-to-peer cooperative model that’s earned them the Insurance Choice Award for Best Cycling Insurance Provider seven years running—to join the team as their foundation designer. I was tasked with leading the evolution of their digital product, but in a small, high-paced environment, my role quickly expanded—as I’d hoped it always would. I put my skills to use across the brand, evolving both the visual identity and messaging, while also getting deep into the mechanics of insurance. I took regular dives into pricing, helped shape the creative direction of copy and marketing materials, and built internal tools and documentation to support good, efficient design practices across the business.
I helped steer Laka’s transition from a single-country D2C proposition into a multi-channel business operating across much of Europe, including D2C, group, B2B2C, and B2B models. I designed integrations with some of the world’s leading bike brands and financial institutions. I also led the restructure of our insurance product—from a single-tier cycle cover into a three-tier offering—re-architecting how it was presented and sold to maximise both user satisfaction and conversion.