General Magic, a Toronto-based startup building artificial intelligence agents for the insurance industry, said on Tuesday it had raised $7.2 million in an oversubscribed seed round to expand a platform designed to cut insurance quote times and reduce manual coordination work.
The round was led by Radical Ventures, with participation from a16z Speedrun and new investment from Figma Vice President of Product Brendan O’Driscoll and Larry James Erwin from OpenAI. The company said it has raised $8.4 million to date from investors including Radical Ventures, a16z Speedrun and Comma Capital, along with operators such as Cohere Chief Executive Aidan Gomez and executives from Braze.
General Magic builds AI agents that handle routine customer interactions across the insurance lifecycle, including answering pre-quote questions, collecting documents after a quote is issued and coordinating claims follow-ups. The software integrates with broker management systems, quoting and rating platforms and customer relationship management tools.
Early deployments suggest significant efficiency gains. Working with one of the world’s largest general insurers, General Magic said it reduced time-to-quote from roughly 30 minutes to under three minutes using an SMS-based agent that automates clarification questions and follow-ups.
“Too much of insurance still relies on manual follow through across calls, inboxes, and scattered systems,” said Jai Mansukhani, Co Founder and President of General Magic. “We focus on keeping customers engaged at every stage of the lifecycle, not just at quote or claim. Our agents handle the routine work that slows teams down, while giving insurance leaders real visibility into what customers are asking, where they are getting stuck, and how they are feeling. When that engagement and data flow directly into core systems, teams move faster and customers feel genuinely supported.”
The company’s core product, called Cell, connects directly to existing insurance systems and can be deployed across SMS, iMessage and RCS messaging. Customers can text questions directly to the agent, which responds using live system data, requests missing information and updates records automatically as workflows progress.
General Magic said early rollouts with large personal lines insurers reduced inbound call volumes by about 30% and saved teams more than 250 hours per month by automating routine coordination across auto and life insurance workflows.
The startup is also building agents designed to align with insurance licensing and regulatory frameworks such as RIBO and OTL exams, aiming to ensure conversations reflect how licensed professionals are trained to explain coverage.
The company was founded by Anthony Azrak and Mansukhani, who previously sold AI products into legacy industries. They turned to insurance after experiencing delays and coordination breakdowns during a personal claims process.
Industry analysts say insurance remains heavily dependent on manual processes and fragmented legacy systems, even as digital distribution accelerates. Retention rates lag behind other sectors, and customer acquisition costs have risen as consumers increasingly shop for better rates at renewal.
Still, the use of AI in regulated financial sectors carries risks. Insurers must ensure automated communications remain compliant with local licensing rules, consumer protection laws and data privacy requirements. Integrating AI agents into core systems may also raise concerns about accuracy, auditability and liability if errors occur in quoting or claims coordination.
Sanjana Basu, partner at Radical Ventures, said the company’s approach avoids replacing legacy infrastructure.
“Most of the world’s financial and insurance data is locked inside rigid, legacy systems that were never designed for the AI era. General Magic isn’t trying to convince enterprises to throw away that infrastructure. Instead, they are giving them a way to finally talk to it. By building a reasoning layer that sits on top of existing systems of record, the General Magic team are unlocking a massive amount of trapped value. This is how the Fortune 500 becomes AI-native. Not by rebuilding from scratch, but by bridging the gap between old data and new intelligence.”
Troy Kirwin, investment partner at a16z Speedrun, said: “We’ve watched Anthony and Jai grow exponentially both during their speedrun cohort and in the months after. They are building a truly compelling product that we believe will revolutionize workflows across insurance carriers and brokerages globally. I have a personal thesis that outsiders will disrupt legacy industries, and General Magic has helped buttress this thesis with the immense progress they’ve made. We are excited to deepen our partnership through supporting their seed round.”
Pete Tessier, President at managing general agent Taycon Risk, said adoption across the sector will depend on execution.
“What I have seen with General Magic and their approach to AI was a willingness to adapt to the insurance industry’s needs. This is significant because of the varied nuances of the insurance industry and how its products are distributed and why internal and external customer journeys are different. The challenge will be making it scale across all channels of insurance product distribution. This might be the first true ‘game changer’ for the industry and deliver on customer experience and expectations”
While investors are betting that AI agents can unlock productivity gains in one of the world’s most paperwork-intensive industries, the broader test will be whether insurers trust automated systems to handle customer interactions at scale without increasing regulatory risk.