Exclusive Interview with Arun Balakrishnan, CEO, Xceedance

Arun Balakrishnan is the CEO and co-founder of Xceedance, an insurance-focused service provider that helps insurance organizations across the globe to effectively evaluate risk, understand customer behaviors, implement new process enhancements, and improve policyholder experiences. Below he shares his perspectives on the company he leads, its plans for growth, and his approach to leadership. Analytics Insight has engaged in an exclusive interview with Arun Balakrishnan to understand how Xceedance helps insurance companies cut through the clutter to deliver instant and personalized services.

1. Kindly brief us about the company, its specialization, and the services that your company offers.

Xceedance is a global provider of strategic operations support, technology, and data services to insurance organizations. Our team works with insurers, reinsurers, agents, brokers, and program administrators to boost operational efficiency. Since insurance is the only industry we work in, our team leverages vast insurance and technology expertise to facilitate, automate, and optimize insurance lifecycle functions, including exposure management, actuarial requirements, underwriting, policy management, claims to handle, and finance.

Headquartered in Worcester, Massachusetts, U.S.A., Xceedance has a presence across 9 global office locations, including four in India, and has annual staff growth of over 30%. With over 2,600 team members, 138 client partners, and 250+ ongoing insurance operations and technology engagements, Xceedance helps insurers launch products, implement intelligent technology, deploy advanced analytics, and achieve business process optimization.

 2. With what mission and objectives, the company was set up? In short, tell us about your journey since the inception of the company?

Before co-founding Xceedance, I served as CEO for Berkshire Hathaway India. When Berkshire Hathaway decided to exit their India operations, I saw an opportunity to float a new idea to the management team – to set up a company that could provide technology and consulting services to the multiple insurance and reinsurance companies within the Berkshire Hathaway group.

Manish Khetan, Vice President, Berkshire India, and Amit Tiwari, Vice President and Head of Technology, Berkshire India, joined me in founding this new venture, and Xceedance was launched in 2013. To this day our mission remains singularly focused on leveraging deep-rooted insurance domain knowledge to support all facets of the insurance lifecycle. Xceedance prides itself on having in-depth expertise in how the industry operates and having people who've faced challenges themselves 70% of our team comes to Xceedance with an insurance industry background.

3. Brief us about you and your contributions to the company and the industry.

I have 15 years of experience building startups, running companies as a CEO, and promoting startups as an investor. I have an entrepreneurial focus and have been involved with a series of early-stage startups, including building one of them, Xceedance, into a 100M USD ARR business in about 9 years, with no external funding. In my role as CEO at Xceedance, I manage a team of close to 2,600 professionals across multiple offices that caters to 138+ insurance industry clients across North America, Europe, and Australia.

4. Kindly mention some of the major challenges the company has faced till now.

As we've grown over the past nine years there have been many challenges, the pandemic being the most recent one. However, as a team, we've always viewed challenges from the lens of opportunities. As an example, I've never seen as much capital flowing into the insurance business as there is right now, especially at a startup stage. This presents some exciting opportunities for us, not just as a partner but also as an investor. The last two years have been high-growth years for Xceedance, and that wave is continuing. That's one area we are looking forward to from a market opportunity point of view.

The insurance sector, like many industries, faces a unique set of challenges. The team at Xceedance understands the insurance marketplace and works closely with clients within the market to adopt technology and be more data-driven in their strategies. The biggest hurdle for Xceedance is to ensure profitability without compromising on our growth rate. With that goal in mind, the company's leadership had the clarity and strength of purpose to rebuff suitors from private equity wishing to invest in Xceedance. Rather, we have grown on the expertise of our people and a track record of client satisfaction to build profitably and organically.

5. What is your biggest USP that differentiates the company from competitors?

We are different because we focus on a single industry – insurance. We know this industry our clients, and we look at the challenges and opportunities in this space through three distinct lenses – people, process, and technology. We want to enable technology, enhance processes, and allow people to do more and be more efficient and effective in their roles. This approach, combined with our industry specialty, truly sets us apart from our competitors.

6. What are your growth plans for the next 12 months?

Our growth plan for the next 4-5 years is to grow to 3 times our current size in terms of revenue. To date, we have experienced a healthy growth rate of 40% year-over-year, and are focused on growing that rate in the coming years. Xceedance has a significant presence in major insurance markets across the globe, from North America and Europe to Australia, and we are looking to expand our footprint in each of those markets.  

7. What does your technology and business roadmap look like for the rest of the year?

We are building an organization that will outlive all of us – one that will be operating 100-200 years from now. When you start thinking in those terms it doesn't matter quite as much what you are doing over the next 1-2 years or even the next 5 years. The insurance industry that we are part of was here 300 years ago, and it will be here 300 years from now. While the market has always evolved and grown, the foundation of insurance remains. Our role at Xceedance is to provide value and insights to insurance organizations no matter their specific role within the industry. As such, we'll need to continue to flex and adapt as the industry changes in the years to come."

8. What is your Leadership Mantra? 

My focus is on finding the right people, with the right approach and experience, to advance the organization. My ability to identify and attract the right talent and build a cohesive team has been one of my biggest assets, and a key to our success at Xceedance. The company's core team members possess significant insurance industry experience, and the staff retention rates here are the envy of our peers and competitors. That success has been replicated globally, and the emphasis on the team is evident in every office in the Xceedance group.