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Laka has bolstered its leadership team with Kelly Barnes and Simon Hiscox.
Barnes joins Laka as VP for marketing and currently sits on the Board of Directors at British Surfing. Prior to this, Barnes worked across over 100 territories as the global head of business development at Wiggle and Chain Reaction Cycles and has over 11 years of experience in sports marketing, and was previously head of marketing at Yellow Jersey.
Hiscox joins as Laka’s growth director and will be responsible for driving Laka’s customer-growth across Europe. Hiscox previously held the same position at Seedrs and was also head of marketing at direct-to-consumer brand PactCoffee.
“2020 has become a hugely exciting year for Laka,” said Tobias Taupitz, Laka’s CEO and co-founder. “We successfully secured funding from stellar investors LocalGlobe and Creandum, former Zurich EMEA CEO Amanda Blanc joined our board in January, and the growth of our community has been strong – we’ve been blown away by the loyalty and support of our community in this difficult time of COVID-19.
“Kelly and Simon’s expertise will help launch Laka in Europe this year, extend our product range and allow more cyclists to enjoy fair, transparent, and community-driven insurance products.”
In January, Laka announced a $4.7 million Series A funding round, led by LocalGlobe and Creandum, with participation in the round coming from Rapha chairman Nick Evans and the former CEO of Fitness First Oren Peleg. This follows the news that Amanda Blanc joined Laka’s board of directors earlier in the year.
