£2.3m seed backs vendor-agnostic middleware to harmonise catastrophe models for insurers
This article covers Maximum Information, an insurtech startup, which has closed a £2.3m seed round to accelerate development of MagniPhi, a vendor-agnostic middleware for catastrophe modelling. The funding is intended to expand the product and build an ecosystem for multi-sector catastrophe and disaster risk management to support insurers, brokers and financial institutions in comparing, stress testing and harmonising outputs from multiple model providers.
Maximum Information, an insurtech startup, has closed a £2.3m seed round to accelerate development of MagniPhi, a vendor-agnostic middleware for catastrophe modelling. The funding will be used to expand the product and push toward the company’s stated goal of building an ecosystem for multi-sector catastrophe and disaster risk management — a response to growing demand for tools that let insurers and other risk holders compare, stress test and unify outputs from multiple model providers.
Why it matters
Natural catastrophes remain a major economic and social problem. In 2024, they caused an estimated $417bn in economic losses, of which under 40 percent were insured, leaving a global protection gap of roughly $263bn. At the same time, the number of modelling providers, regional models and remit-specific tools has multiplied, increasing complexity for risk carriers, brokers and financial institutions that need consistent analysis to underwrite, price and transfer risk.
Maximum Information’s approach is to provide a neutral orchestration layer that sits above existing models. That matters because, without an agnostic translation and comparison tool, decisions are slower, model adoption stalls and users struggle to reconcile differing outputs when making capital and resilience choices.
Inside the product
MagniPhi is presented as middleware that integrates with catastrophe modelling workflows rather than replacing individual models. Its stated capabilities include:
- ingesting outputs from multiple model vendors and peril regions
- enabling side-by-side comparisons and scenario stress tests
- exposing model assumptions and components so users can “look under the hood”
- producing harmonised outputs intended for underwriting, risk transfer and reporting.
Maximum Information positions MagniPhi for re/insurers, brokers and financial institutions that require transparent, vendor-agnostic analysis to support mission-critical catastrophe and climate-related decisions. The company says it intends to broaden the platform into a multi-sector ecosystem for disaster risk management over time.
Who are the investors?
Maximum Information closed a £2.3m seed round led by Insurtech Gateway, with participation from Liberty Mutual Strategic Ventures, Convex and Portfolio Ventures.
In the announcement, Dom Nolan, Investment Manager at Insurtech Gateway, said:
Maximum Information solves a critical problem at the centre of emerging cat modelling trends. (Re)insurers and brokers are facing increasing pressure to better understand risk, and vendors are continuously updating / building new models across global peril-regions. Insurtech Gateway is delighted to partner with Tom and his exceptionally equipped team in building a vendor-agnostic platform of B2B SaaS tools that help risk carriers understand, quantify, and manage catastrophe and climate-related risks.
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Founder perspective
Founded in 2020, Maximum Information says its mission is to increase global resilience to natural disasters by making model outputs more useful and accessible. Tom Philp, Chief Executive Officer at Maximum Information, framed the product as infrastructure for a more complex modelling ecosystem.
In the announcement, Tom Philp, Chief Executive Officer at Maximum Information, said:
As the modelling landscape expands the industry needs reliable infrastructure, not more noise. Our goal is to provide the analytical foundation that allows organisations to lean into catastrophe risk decision-making with consistency and confidence.
The bigger picture
The raise highlights two intersecting trends in the UK and Europe: growing investor appetite for insurtech infrastructure that addresses climate-related and catastrophe risk, and a shift from single-vendor modelling to interoperable tooling that supports complex risk transfer needs. For insurers and financial institutions, harmonising model outputs is becoming as important as improving any single model’s accuracy.
Regulators and policymakers in the UK and EU have increased focus on climate resilience and reporting, which will likely drive more demand for tools that produce auditable, comparable risk analytics. For startups building in this space, the challenge will be converting research-grade model outputs into operational tools that integrate with underwriting, pricing and capital models.
This deal is another signal that early-stage capital is available for companies tackling the protection gap and the technical complexity of modern catastrophe modelling, and that investors are willing to back neutral infrastructure rather than new single-source models.
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