LA wildfires thrust insurance startup into spotlight as property owners scramble for protection
Summary
Midway through December, tech entrepreneur Dan Preston debuted insurance startup Stands first product focused on protecting property in wildfire zones. Three weeks after Stands launch, wildfires ravaged parts of Los Angeles, killing more than two-dozen people, scorching about 41,000 acres due to extreme winds and destroying at least 12,300 structures. In a post on X on Jan. 8, Clerico wrote that four keys to dealing with wildfires are forest and fuel management, rapid detection using cameras and satellites, "hardening" of homes and communities, and reducing fires caused by utilities. He then spent over three years as a managing director for the bank in the Bay Area, Clerico lives in San Francisco and has a cabin in Anderson Valley, about 115 miles north of the city. But making a meaningful contribution to the bigger problem will require significant behavioral and structural changes in neighborhoods that, like Pacific Palisades in LA, are suddenly at risk of almost disappearing overnight.