Introduction
Most insurers say they want to be innovative. Fewer have a systematic way to know what's worth pursuing, who's building it, and whether they should partner, invest, or simply wait. Matt Connolly has spent ten years building the answer to that problem.
Connolly is the founder of Sønr, a global market intelligence platform that tracks over five million companies and helps insurers, reinsurers, and brokers make better decisions about innovation and technology. Working with fifty-plus tier-one carriers—from Travelers and Liberty Mutual to Munich Re, Allianz, and Tokio Marine—as well as brokers like Guy Carpenter and WTW, Sønr sits at the intersection of the startups changing the industry and the incumbents that need to understand them.
In this conversation, Josh Hollander and Connolly dig into where innovation intent breaks down inside large carriers, the four points where value leaks out of a corporate innovation process, why POC purgatory is a symptom not the disease, and how Sønr 2.0 is bringing market intelligence to operators who've been tasked to innovate but not given the tools to do it.
Guest Bio
Matt Connolly is the Founder and CEO of Sønr, a global insurtech market intelligence platform used by fifty-plus tier-one insurers, reinsurers, and brokers worldwide. Founded ten years ago, Sønr tracks over five million companies and has built a proprietary data set on insurance innovation unavailable to general AI platforms. He also hosts his own podcast interviewing innovation leaders from major global carriers. Sønr now generates half its revenue from North America and recently made its first US hire.
Key Topics
• Where innovation intent breaks down — At the CEO level. Without clear sponsorship and direction from leadership, innovation functions become disconnected from real business priorities. Ten years of data backs this up.
• The four value leaks — Not understanding trends, poor scouting discipline, year-long POCs that should be three weeks, and failing to move from POC to pilot to scale. Each is a distinct failure mode with a distinct fix.
• POC purgatory — Mature innovation programs are running more POCs than ever but scaling fewer. The root cause is almost always people: wrong sponsors, wrong internal champions, or wrong startup for the actual need. Sønr's fix: a one-day workshop to build a mini business case before a three-week POC begins, with KPIs and go/no-go criteria agreed upfront.
• The decentralization of innovation — Carriers that once had centralized innovation functions have spread that mandate across underwriting, claims, and distribution—but capability hasn't followed. Operators have been tasked to innovate with no networks, no tooling, and no experience. This is the gap Sønr 2.0 addresses.
• Sønr 2.0 and the Emerging Trends Academy — A simple front-end into ten years of proprietary insurance innovation data, priced for operators not just innovation teams. The Emerging Trends Academy goes deeper: cross-industry groups going deep on specific trends with startups, carriers, consultants, and academics in the same room.
• The data moat — Ten years of tracking every company, trend signal, and client engagement within insurance innovation. Data that Connolly notes even Anthropic or OpenAI simply can't access. That compounded intelligence sits behind both the platform and the research offering.
Notable Quotes
"Don't go with the startup that is the best salesperson. Do the scouting properly—where are they based, what's their culture, who are their people, does the technology align to your needs?"
"POC purgatory. We're seeing mature innovation businesses doing more POCs than ever but not moving beyond them. The answer is often the people."
"The data we sit on is not available to anybody else. It's compounded intelligence from ten years. Anthropic or OpenAI simply can't get to it."
"If you don't get your direction right from the top, the value leak is going to be huge later on. Just start in the right place."
Resources
Guest:
• Sønr: https://www.sonr.io
• Matt Connolly on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wearematt/
Host & Organization:
• Joshua R. Hollander on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuarhollander/
• Horton International (USA): https://www.horton-usa.com/
• Insurtech Leadership Podcast (LinkedIn Showcase): https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/insurtech-leadership-show
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