Evry Health
Winter 2018AcquiredBetter health insurance for mid-size companies
Pressure-test this opportunity
Turn this teardown into a decision-ready prompt for ChatGPT, Claude, or your agent.
Better health insurance for mid-size companies
Turn this teardown into a decision-ready prompt for ChatGPT, Claude, or your agent.
If you only have a few minutes to spare, here’s what investors, operators, and founders should know about Evry Health (W18).
Evry Health built a full-stack health insurer for mid-sized Texas employers. Founded in 2017 by Chris Gay, Jay Startz, and Mark Jamilkowski, it combined zero-dollar in-network visits, care teams, member rewards, direct provider contracts, and software-assisted insurance operations. The company joined YC in Winter 2018 but did not launch plans until late 2021.[1][2]
The four-year build created a real insurer and also defined its ceiling. Each new market required licenses, provider contracts, brokers, actuarial capital, and local operations. Evry could automate claims and care work, but it could not use software to skip insurance regulation or balance-sheet risk.
Globe Life agreed to acquire Evry in October 2023. Its SEC filing called the purchase price immaterial and gave no dollar figure. Evry kept operating, expanded its product, and remained led by Gay. The sale ended the independent venture phase while preserving the company under an insurer with more capital and distribution.[3]
Chris Gay came to health insurance through software, finance, and personal loss. After the University of Texas at Austin, he joined Goldman Sachs as a financial analyst, moved into its technology team, and later earned an MBA at Georgetown. In 2006 he founded MileMeter, which priced auto insurance by the mile. That company taught him how underwriting, policy administration, regulation, and code fit together.[4]
The motivation for Evry was less abstract. Gay told Authority Magazine, “I lost a good friend to a $200 decision.” His friend had type 1 diabetes, skipped a doctor visit to preserve money for tuition and books, and later died. Gay's wife and co-founders had their own stories of avoidable loss.[5]
Gay joined with Jay Startz and Mark Jamilkowski. Startz became chief operating officer. Jamilkowski brought more than three decades in healthcare and served as chief actuary and finance leader. Public sources do not explain how the three met, a gap that matters because their roles spanned the distinct crafts required to form an insurer: technology, operations, and actuarial control.
They incorporated Evry in 2017 and joined YC's Winter 2018 batch. The initial promise was aggressive: insurance for mid-sized employers with premiums 20% below traditional plans and more useful care. Yet the company stayed out of public view for almost four years. Insurance cannot launch as an unlicensed beta. Evry had to build a regulated carrier, configure benefits, contract providers, assemble a broker channel, and prepare claims and care operations before it could enroll members.
That slow preparation shaped the business. Gay later described the company as “a software company that owns an insurance company.”[6] Evry's differentiation came from owning the policy and medical-risk decisions, not from selling an app alongside an incumbent plan.
Evry sold fully insured employer health plans, not a navigation benefit layered on another carrier. For its primary in-network plan, a member paid no deductible and no copay for doctor visits, telehealth, mental-health visits, or covered prescriptions. A care team of clinicians and coordinators helped members choose providers and follow personal care plans. Rewards of up to $1,000 per plan year encouraged preventive care and participation.[5]
Read the complete post-mortem, the rebuild playbook, and the exact reasons Evry Health is still worth studying now.