Insurtech partnership to assist SMEs

In an exciting new partnership for the insurtech space, Prudential Corporation Asia is teaming up with HælthTech in a move that the insurer said will enable straight-through processing of transactions and the automation of core processes.

Spotlight

Badger Mutual Insurance Company

Since 1887, Badger Mutual Insurance has been committed to protecting our policyholders and what means most to them - their families and their future. Our unique IT Department and cutting-edge technology provide efficient service and reduce waste, our innovative and comprehensive products allow us to remain competitive in the ever-changing insurance industry, and our exciting, engaging company culture fosters the success of our employees.

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Automobile Insurance, Insurance Technology

Emergency Prevention: 3 Ways Insurtech is Leading the Way

Article | December 19, 2022

The COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated the pressures on emergency medical services and healthcare professionals as well as insurance platforms. Insurtech has proved to be a robust area of technology that needs further investments to ensure that we are able to leverage it even in times when there’s little global turmoil. The Efma-Accenture Innovations in Insurance award winners have validated the exponential expansion of insurtech. Here are three insurtech innovations driving emergency prevention in healthcare. 1 bAIby – Interpreting Baby Cries bAIby is a next-gen baby monitoring device powered by AI. Labelled as a “cry translator,” the BabyT device uses AI to interpret what a baby’s cries mean. The bAIby solution is based on the understanding that the first six months of a baby’s cries universally communicate the following: sleepiness hunger discomfort stomach issues The developer of the BabyT AI, Zoundream, collaborated with insurance company Generali to enroll young parents and test BabyT. This allowed Zoundream to collect the massive amounts of data sets required to train the AI. The AI is able to detect pathologies like hyperthyroidism, autism and even hearing impairment. Furthermore, it will enable Generali to provide new parents with assistance, prevention, and insurance services, thus providing the peace of mind that insurance services should provide. This innovation won the gold in the Efma-Accenture Innovations in Insurance award. 2 Air Doctor – Finding a Doctor Overseas Silver winner Air Doctor is a cutting edge solution to help individuals find general practitioners in unfamiliar places. The solution is aimed at travellers and expatriates whose first instinct when sick overseas may be to visit a hospital, leading to high medical costs and burdening the local healthcare system. The Air Doctor platform provides access to a network of physicians in six continents and 70 countries. The information includes the doctor’s location, specialization, as well as online appointment booking and virtual care options. Insurance providers can integrate with the platform to connect with their customers by offering a digital link for quick verification and approval. The platform has made managing basic medical attention easier for both consumers and insurance providers. 3 bolttech – Boosting Insurance Penetration Bronze winner bolttech was recognized for its smart insurance exchange ecosystem that enables non-insurers to integrate insurance solutions into their purchase journey. For instance, smartphone vendors can use bolttech to provide insurance as an option during the purchase of a new phone, leveraging the most effective purchase touchpoints to provide coverage. This is especially crucial in markets that have a low penetration of insurance. bolttech’s platform has medical plans with self-declared underwriting, delivering instant cover and reducing the onboarding time to just 90 seconds. 4 The Way Forward Digitalization of insurance is the future of the industry. The above solutions have proven use cases that enable both consumers and providers to leverage digital network to create secure and stress-free access to insurance.

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Insurance Technology

The Age of Sustainable Fixed-Income Investing Has Arrived

Article | July 14, 2022

Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) considerations have increasingly entered the mainstream of investment discussions, both through routine incorporation into traditional investment processes and through distinct sustainable or impact investing styles. Recent and current global conditions, such as extreme weather events, the inequitable effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, rising distrust of government institutions, and geopolitical challenges to a rules-based world order, have accelerated this trend, emphasizing the direct relevance of ESG and sustainability to understanding long-term market risks and opportunities. Until recently, equity investors were more concerned with ESG and sustainability than their fixed-income counterparts. That is, however, beginning to change, and at a rapid pace. ESG and sustainability have gained significant traction among bond investors, particularly since the implementation of COVID-19, and are now widely regarded as essential components of fixed income investing. For example, global sustainable debt issuance reached a new high of over US$1.6 trillion in 2021 and is expected to rise further in the coming years. Notably, we believe that ESG integration and sustainable fixed-income investing require a very deliberate, thoughtful approach — one that varies significantly from one fixed-income sector to the next. ESG and sustainability: At a high level, researchers believe that increased awareness of ESG and sustainability benefits global markets in two ways: 1. ESG integration allows market participants to think more holistically about the types of financially material risks and opportunities — such as physical, reputational, and (geo)political — that should ideally be reflected in asset valuations and taken into account during the routine portfolio construction and management process. 2. Furthermore, the conversation about sustainable investing is encouraging more market participants to look beyond narrow, issuer-specific investment thesis to consider how market participants' behaviors affect the broader systems and structures (e.g., climate stability, institutional strength) whose long-term viability is critical for the long-term health of economies and markets. We, like many others, believe that a stable global climate, clean air and water for all, adherence to the rule of law, strong institutions with broad public legitimacy, and broad-based access to economic opportunity are valuable public goods from which market participants would benefit collectively over time. As a result, a central goal of sustainable investing is to assist markets in evolving toward rewarding participants for exercising responsible stewardship of these public goods, which are critical to pursuing favorable long-term outcomes for the real people who are the ultimate beneficiaries of markets. This framing of sustainability highlights why fixed income is so important in moving global markets and economies in a more sustainable direction.

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Insurance Technology

Time to Overcome Barriers in Your Decision-Making with Data Analytics

Article | July 20, 2022

A quick Google Trends search on data reveals that data analytics, data and analytics, data analysis, and predictive analytics have steadily grown in popularity among businesses across industries. These terms peaked when business leaders searched for ways to increase ROI and reduce business costs and tech-based investments. The insurance industry is amongst the industries actively leveraging data analytics. The rising importance of analytics in insurance has made CMOS take note too. As agility became more important in the insurance industry, more than 85% of global businesses shifted to a data-driven model. The purpose of taking you back is to emphasize that, as a CMO, now you need to churn accurate data and turn it into relevant information. This is a necessary model to practice to make the right decisions or will improve the decision-making process. Without data analytics, you are deciding in a void, and that’s not considered good practice. Forrester reports that 41% of insurance companies faced challenges in extracting data and making decisions based on it in 2020. Take a look at how and what you can do with insurance analytics to cater to better insights into your decision-making process and, finally, ROI generation. Bring Data to These Key Levels of Departments Marketing Analytics in insurance raises the bar in terms of marketing. As you know, marketing results frequently fluctuate, making data insights challenging to capture. CMOS who base their decisions solely on outcomes usually loses sight of making sound decisions due to unstructured data. Therefore, it is essential to have an aligned platform for data analysis in insurance. To begin with, marketers must understand the various types of data analytics available. Most insurance marketers employ descriptive, predictive, and prescriptive analytics, among others. This will assist them in strategizing based on continuous data insights from various sources for any given initiative. Sales Sales leaders can also improve how they spend their time by using data analytics to create more accurate sales forecasts. However, the question is, how will they do it efficiently? CRM software is the answer and solution to them. The software performs best because of its analytical capabilities in combination with data visualization, particularly predictive functions. It generates enormous amounts of data on customer interactions, which can then be used to inform decisions. You can assemble relevant data and use it to make some decisions, such as: Acquisition and management of leads Lead segmentation Sales funnel optimization There is enormous value in optimizing productive data by focusing on prospects likely to become loyal customers. Operations Utilizing data analytics in insurance boosts insurance operations. Small changes help to align a wide range of core processes. You can access data obtained from operations, observe key aspects of the overall processes, and make appropriate decisions. A targeted, timely, and data-driven approach will help you make decisions about these key functions, which can lead to business growth in the long run. Bain's research in 2019 reports that seventy insurers were polled. They say data analytics will reach 58% in the marketing funnel and 45% in business operations. Begin with Overcoming Barriers to your Decision-Making Process Use Data to Identify Customer Patterns Information from data can identify patterns. As mentioned above in the sales section, CRM's predictive modelling and the popular Google Analytics' descriptive overview are the two best platforms for identifying customer patterns. What is the best way to get pertinent data? Data mining is the answer to it. Do you want to know about it? Then read data mining for pattern evaluation now! As a CMO, you're probably aware that behavioral patterns are highly predictable and can sometimes result in unsatisfactory outcomes. This occurs when you are unable to obtain relevant data. And you end up performing ineffective marketing activities. To assist you in overcoming it, an AI-enabled platform can reduce the level of effort and provide the necessary data to study your customers' patterns in real-time. This is how you will notice a significant increase in sales. According to research by McKinsey and Company, automation saves 43% of insurance employees’ time. Segmenting Sales Plans Following the establishment of your customers' patterns, segmenting the insurance sales plan is a necessary step. In this process, analytics provide detailed information about customers, allowing you to make decisions about sales functionalities. This will undoubtedly reduce the time, energy, and effort you previously spent. Accurate customer segmentation and sales forecasting can also help tailor marketing efforts, improve the sales funnel, and keep sales strategies in check. When Media 7 contacted Vishal Srivastava, Vice President (Model Validation) at Citi, here’s what he said about data segmentation through data analytics. CMOs must ensure that adequate data quality checks have been performed, The goal is to ensure a scientific approach to data segmentation, sampling methodology, and data outliers, which can significantly impact revenue forecasts.” Pricing & Savings Analytics in insurance marketing can help CMOs make cost-cutting decisions and become more cost-effective in marketing efforts. It can set price ranges based on historical, current, and predictive performance. Also, analytics will help you figure out how to price things in the future, which will be good for ROI. Keep Improving with Data to Stay Abreast with The Decision-Making Process Better data organization in your business boosts productivity." Warren Buffett, an American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. This phase is best suited to the current business environment. Implementing data analytics in insurance now will open up tremendous opportunities in the future. To make the most of them, you, as a CMO, must stick to a data-driven model for marketing actions. Aside from that, it appears that the data analytics you select for your business must be capable of informing and driving performance. Performances ranging from risk assessment to sales forecasting and a plethora of actionable insights assist businesses in thriving. Frequently Asked Question How are data analytics used in insurance companies? Data analytics empowers insurers to optimize each function and also assess risks. It also identifies trustworthy customers, which further boosts engagement. What does data analytics mean in insurance? Data analytics empowers insurance professionals by providing them with the business intelligence to understand their customers better, build better products and services, and thus, boost business growth. How are insurance companies using data? Insurers can use data to gain insights from customers’ profiles. They can review their history, behavioral pattern, and marketing needs to develop strategies and provide marketing services.

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Insurance Technology

Will your insurance IT investments pay off?

Article | April 12, 2021

Automated claims processing, price comparison platforms, mobile bill paying—these are just some of the digital services that insurance customers expect and insurers want to provide. As the demand for digital skyrockets, so does the need for insurers to invest in IT. In the past seven years, the share of IT in total operating costs of property-and-casualty (P&C) insurers increased 22 percent. The rise of digital means technology is no longer a cost center. Rather, it is an asset that, if managed well, can increase growth and profitability. But do these IT investments pay off? As the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbates already increasing cost pressures, insurers’ IT budgets are under scrutiny; they want to see the business impact of their IT investments. Insurers with targeted IT investments achieve better growth and performance Data from McKinsey’s Insurance 360° benchmarking survey provide strong evidence of the positive business impact of targeted IT investments. In fact, insurers that invest more in technology outpace competitors that don’t pursue targeted investments in business measures such as gross written premium (GWP) growth, return to shareholders, and expense and loss ratio (exhibit). As an example, in life insurance, companies that invested more in IT saw a greater reduction in expense ratios (by 2.0 percentage points) and higher returns on technical reserves2 (1.7 percentage points) when compared with insurers with lower IT investments. Insurers achieved these outcomes within three to five years of making their investments. For P&C insurers, those with high IT investments achieved approximately twice the top-line GWP growth of low IT investors. High IT investments also produced a greater reduction in combined ratios when compared with those with low IT investment. Four areas for targeted IT investment So what kinds of technology investments can help insurers achieve growth and improve productivity and performance? Investments in four areas are critical: Marketing and sales: Marketing technology solutions can increase sales and processing efficiency, improve the quality of core customer-facing processes such as policy inquiries and policy applications, and improve customers’ overall experiences. McKinsey’s Insurance 360° benchmarking data show that tech investments in this category can facilitate top-line growth for P&C insurers by up to 20–40 percent; for life insurers, that growth could be 10–25 percent over a three- to five-year period. Underwriting and pricing: Automated underwriting fraud detection can improve the likelihood that insurers correctly identify fraud and set accurate prices. A pricing tool kit that analyzes pricing across competitors and enables a flexible, more segmented market versus technical pricing further improves profit margins. Insurers that deploy these and other product, pricing, and underwriting technologies have seen improvements in their profit margins by 10–15 percent in P&C insurance and 3–5 percent in life insurance. Policy servicing: Workflow automation, artificial intelligence–based decision support, and user experience technologies in policy servicing and within IT can improve the customer self-service experience and automate back-office processes, thus reducing IT and operations expenses. And state-of-the-art self-servicing options will reduce processing times and even improve customer experience. An analysis of programs for large-scale insurance IT modernization finds that insurers that deploy these and other product, pricing, and underwriting technologies have seen improvements in their profit margins by 5–10 percent in P&C insurance and 10–15 percent in life insurance. Claims: P&C insurers can use automated case processing—machine-learning technology trained to process basic claims cases—to segment more complex cases and significantly improve claims accuracy. Combined with better partner integration and steering technologies embedded in a transformation of the claims operating model, such technologies can help P&C insurers improve profit margins by 25–40 percent, according to McKinsey analysis of large-scale IT modernization programs. To realize the full value of IT investments, insurers must strategically allocate their resources and view tech as an asset, not a tool.

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Spotlight

Badger Mutual Insurance Company

Since 1887, Badger Mutual Insurance has been committed to protecting our policyholders and what means most to them - their families and their future. Our unique IT Department and cutting-edge technology provide efficient service and reduce waste, our innovative and comprehensive products allow us to remain competitive in the ever-changing insurance industry, and our exciting, engaging company culture fosters the success of our employees.

Related News

Valued Policy Law and Total Loss

inredisputesblog | May 21, 2019

Typically, a fire insurance policy pays a policyholder for the actual cash value or the replacement value of the property destroyed. But in 20 states, if there is a total loss, the amount the insurer must pay is equal to the value of the property at the time the insurance policy was issued. What happens if the policy covers a multi-building complex and one of the buildings is destroyed? The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals recently addressed this issue. In Norwood-Redfield Apartments Limited Partnership v. American Family Mutual Ins. Co., No. 18-2618 (8th Cir. May 16, 2019)(Unpublished), the appeals court affirmed a judgment in favour of the insurance company denying the policyholder’s claim to recover the full value listed on the policy of an entire complex of buildings when only one of the buildings was destroyed. The policyholder sued its insurance carrier after a fire destroyed one of the buildings out of 32 in the complex. The insurance carrier paid nearly $3 million for the loss, but the policyholder wanted the policy limits of over $31 million.

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Valued Policy Law and Total Loss

inredisputesblog | May 21, 2019

Typically, a fire insurance policy pays a policyholder for the actual cash value or the replacement value of the property destroyed. But in 20 states, if there is a total loss, the amount the insurer must pay is equal to the value of the property at the time the insurance policy was issued. What happens if the policy covers a multi-building complex and one of the buildings is destroyed? The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals recently addressed this issue. In Norwood-Redfield Apartments Limited Partnership v. American Family Mutual Ins. Co., No. 18-2618 (8th Cir. May 16, 2019)(Unpublished), the appeals court affirmed a judgment in favour of the insurance company denying the policyholder’s claim to recover the full value listed on the policy of an entire complex of buildings when only one of the buildings was destroyed. The policyholder sued its insurance carrier after a fire destroyed one of the buildings out of 32 in the complex. The insurance carrier paid nearly $3 million for the loss, but the policyholder wanted the policy limits of over $31 million.

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