Meet Chisel: Top at the Zurich Innovation World Championship

Company’s natural language, AI processing tool for insurance leaves the judges impressed

Meet Chisel: Top at the Zurich Innovation World Championship

Technology

By Bethan Moorcraft

Zurich Insurance Group recently announced the winners of its first ever Zurich Innovation World Championship. Toronto-based start-up Chisel AI took the top spot for its artificial intelligence (AI) solution that aims to improve the processing of unstructured data sources in insurance policy submissions. The silver award went to Zesty.ai for its AI-powered property analytics solution, and startups LifeNome and Soldier.ly came joint-third.

The Zurich Innovation World Championship attracted more than 450 startups from around the globe. They battled it out over a period of five months, competing in five categories: smart homes and buildings, digital health, financial planning, mobility, and a wildcard option. After a number of local and regional rounds, eight global round finalists were selected to pitch their ideas to Zurich’s executive committee, who together decided on the four winners.

Zurich group chief executive officer Mario Greco said: “The Zurich Innovation World Championship underlines our quest to attract and retain the best and most innovative talent across the globe. We received applications from Argentina to Australia, demonstrating the breadth of talent, ideas and people who recognise the opportunity to work with and learn from Zurich. We’re very excited to be working with our winners to develop new products, ideas and innovations that will help us better meet the evolving needs of our customers globally.”

Gold winner Chisel has developed a natural language, AI processing tool that allows commercial insurers and brokers to extract, identify and classify unstructured data sources, such as insurance documents, 400 times faster and much more accurately than a human, the company claims. The winning solution, called Policy Check, can trace its roots back to a pioneering machine learning student tool, called Note, which was developed by Chisel CEO and founder Ron Glozman (pictured above), when he was studying computer science and business at the University of Waterloo in Canada. 

“Five and a half years ago, I asked myself: ‘What’s the most complicated part of being a student?’ The answer to that is, of course, studying for exams,” said Glozman. “So, I decided to teach a computer how to read and analyse a text book, so that 1,000 pages could be broken down into 10 pages or less. When I put that software into the market, it went viral within two-weeks. It was in 33+ countries, over 40 of the world’s top universities … and eventually Google called it one of the best 50 apps for students of all time.”

Note’s success was recognised far beyond the education sector. It wasn’t long before a senior vice president at a major insurance firm in Canada contacted Glozman to suggest he tweak his natural language, AI processing tool towards the verbose, complex and often quite pedantic world of insurance documentation. Glozman and his team took on the challenge and ended up creating Policy Check, which is essentially an errors & omissions mitigation solution for insurance professionals.

Zurich Insurance Group recently announced the winners of its first ever Zurich Innovation World Championship. Toronto-based start-up Chisel AI took the top spot for its artificial intelligence (AI) solution that aims to improve the processing of unstructured data sources in insurance policy submissions. The silver award went to Zesty.ai for its AI-powered property analytics solution, and startups LifeNome and Soldier.ly came joint-third.

The Zurich Innovation World Championship attracted more than 450 startups from around the globe. They battled it out over a period of five months, competing in five categories: smart homes and buildings, digital health, financial planning, mobility, and a wildcard option. After a number of local and regional rounds, eight global round finalists were selected to pitch their ideas to Zurich’s executive committee, who together decided on the four winners.

Zurich group chief executive officer Mario Greco said: “The Zurich Innovation World Championship underlines our quest to attract and retain the best and most innovative talent across the globe. We received applications from Argentina to Australia, demonstrating the breadth of talent, ideas and people who recognise the opportunity to work with and learn from Zurich. We’re very excited to be working with our winners to develop new products, ideas and innovations that will help us better meet the evolving needs of our customers globally.”

Gold winner Chisel has developed a natural language, AI processing tool that allows commercial insurers and brokers to extract, identify and classify unstructured data sources, such as insurance documents, 400 times faster and much more accurately than a human, the company claims. The winning solution, called Policy Check, can trace its roots back to a pioneering machine learning student tool, called Note, which was developed by Chisel CEO and founder Ron Glozman (pictured above), when he was studying computer science and business at the University of Waterloo in Canada. 

“Five and a half years ago, I asked myself: ‘What’s the most complicated part of being a student?’ The answer to that is, of course, studying for exams,” said Glozman. “So, I decided to teach a computer how to read and analyse a text book, so that 1,000 pages could be broken down into 10 pages or less. When I put that software into the market, it went viral within two-weeks. It was in 33+ countries, over 40 of the world’s top universities … and eventually Google called it one of the best 50 apps for students of all time.”

Note’s success was recognised far beyond the education sector. It wasn’t long before a senior vice president at a major insurance firm in Canada contacted Glozman to suggest he tweak his natural language, AI processing tool towards the verbose, complex and often quite pedantic world of insurance documentation. Glozman and his team took on the challenge and ended up creating Policy Check, which is essentially an errors & omissions mitigation solution for insurance professionals.

 

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