Jack Ma is selling cancer coverage for pennies a month

Ping An Insurance (Group) Co. employed about 1.4 million people to peddle policies last year. Yet it’s Jack Ma’s newest online disruptor that is stealing the show – with 50 workers and visions of serving 300 million customers.

Ma’s Ant Financial conglomerate launched healthcare-coverage product Xiang Hu Bao in October and already has about 65 million clients. They pay small monthly fees that are pooled to help cover treatment costs for members stricken by diseases such as cancer, Alzheimer’s and even Ebola.

“No insurance company would service a customer base of this size,’’ Yin Ming, a vice president for Ant Financial who oversees Xiang Hu Bao, said in an interview. “They wouldn’t attempt it.’’

Call it crowdfunding for health care – an emerging industry in China that itself is becoming crowded. Ant Financial is one of at least 50 companies, including ride hailing giant Didi Chuxing and a startup backed by Tencent Holdings Ltd., upending the conventional health-
insurance business by creating what essentially are online collectives.

It’s a unique business model that probably only can be pulled off in China. The country’s leapfrog into the smartphone age means more than 700 million people can sign up, make monthly payments and even upload medical documents and bills with just a few clicks.

The pervasive use of apps in China also means people are more accustomed to giving internet juggernauts – with their emporiums of gaming, shopping and banking services – access to the most private aspects of their lives.

The companies generate revenue by keeping a percentage of every payout. Typically, that’s 8%.

Technology-enabled insurance, which includes everything from policies sold online to wearable device-linked insurance coverage, could generate premiums of $174 billion by 2020, according to a report by research consultant Oliver Wyman on what it calls “Insuretech.’’

“In China, an underdeveloped insurance market enjoying double-digit growth, the disruptions triggered by Insuretech are causing an insurance industry revolution,’’ the report said.

China’s conventional insurance industry is a fledgling one. The country only started rebuilding the sector in the 1970s, initially through state insurer People’s Insurance Co. (Group) of China Ltd., according to a report by Swiss Re. Thanks to rising incomes and a growing awareness of health care, China is set to become the world’s largest insurance market by the mid 2030s, Swiss Re estimates.

Yang Jinzhu, who owns a beauty spa in Chengdu, needed just four taps on her smartphone to join Xiang Hu Bao.

“It’s not too expensive and it was so easy to sign up, so I thought: Why not?’’ said Yang, 40, who also spends about 1,000 yuan a month on commercial insurance. She then persuaded eight other people – including family members — to do the same.

What gives the upstarts an advantage is their relatively low dependence on human beings. State- backed insurers such as China Life Insurance Co. and PICC rely heavily on employees to sell policies, examine claims and disburse payments.

By comparison, Ant Financial only has about 50 people working on Xiang Hu Bao, which means “mutual protection.’’ In addition to its ubiquitous payments app, Ant Financial’s artificial-intelligence software is getting better at recognizing claims and medical records after going through tens of millions of receipts. It can also automatically verify chops from more than 10,000 hospitals in China.

“When we realized that we might service hundreds of thousands, if not millions of users, we knew it couldn’t all be done manually, and we needed to rely on technology,’’ Yin said.

Ant Financial envisions having 300 million members within two years – the equivalent of one in every five people in China. The demand for health care should be strong as the population ages, the rates of critical illnesses soar and people earning higher incomes seek better quality treatments.Bloomberg