US-based life insurance provider Northwestern Mutual has formed a $50m corporate venturing subsidiary called Northwestern Mutual Future Ventures to invest in companies developing products that can help promote financial security.
Northwestern Mutual Future Ventures will provide between $500,000 and $3m in each deal, and has a brief to back digital technology that can help customers achieve financial security, particularly with regard to decision making and back-end efficiencies.
The unit will seek to prioritise four areas: the evolving preferences of consumers, new ways of enhancing the client experience, digital approaches to health, and transformational analytics and technologies.
Rebecca Porter, chair of Northwestern Mutual Future Ventures’ investment committee, said: “We want to make it easier for Americans to know what financial security is and how to achieve it.
“We are bringing together the strength and scale of a 160-year-old Fortune 100 company with leading-edge innovations of startups to transform financial planning through our trusted advisors and relevant digital tools.”
Another Northwestern Mutual subsidiary, Northwestern Mutual Capital, acquired financial planning platform LearnVest for $250m in 2015, the year after leading its $28m series D round.
The company is also an investor in robo advisor service Betterment, having contributed to its $32m series C round in 2014 and a $60m round the following year.