Recorded at the 2026 National Insurance Brokers Association (NIBA) Convention on the Gold Coast, this Insurance Business interview features Matt O’Sullivan, chief underwriting officer at Zurich Australia and New Zealand. With the market widely described as soft and reinsurance pricing adding pressure, O’Sullivan argues that brokers need a sustainable, long-term approach to their clients rather than chasing short-term price incentives, especially as many in the market have not worked through this kind of cycle before. He explains why Zurich weighs claims payment, capital strength, longevity and relationships alongside price, and how it works with brokers early in the process. He also outlines how Zurich is using AI to ingest more data, streamline underwriting and build natural peril models faster than before.
Matt O’Sullivan 00:00:00 We’re obviously in a market at the moment that is, you know, often talked about as being a really soft market. We are a data-driven business, so it’s really good for us to be able to draw down from external data sources, use AI.
Daniel Wood 00:00:14 Hello and welcome to Insurance Business TV. We’re at the NEBA Convention on the Gold Coast, and I’m joined by Matt O’Sullivan. He’s Chief Underwriting Officer with Zurich Australia and New Zealand. We’re going to talk about some of the challenges facing insurance brokers. Matt, really nice to talk with you.
Matt O’Sullivan 00:00:32 Great to be here, Danny. Thanks.
Daniel Wood 00:00:33 Yeah, good to have you. From your perspective as an underwriter, what do you see as some of the big challenges facing brokers right now?
Matt O’Sullivan 00:00:40 Yeah, I’ve been— we’ve been hearing about it today at the convention. There’s been a lot of challenges that the market is facing, particularly the brokers with the geopolitical situation, the new technologies that are coming into the market. But one of the areas that we’re really concentrating on at the moment is where we are in the market cycle. We’re obviously in a market at the moment that is, you know, often talked about as being a really soft market, which means there’s a lot of pressure from the reinsurance point of view around pricing and things like this. So from our point of view, one of the biggest challenges we see from the broking side of things is how do they ensure that they have a long-term sustainable approach to the customer? They make sure that the customer gets the right level of service over the whole cycle rather than just looking for short-term incentives around price. And there’s a lot of people in the market that haven’t been through this type of cycle before. And it’s about understanding that this is not a real short-term process. You have to look over the medium to longer term and make sure that you’re providing the customer with the sustainable solution that we should be providing.
Daniel Wood 00:01:40 You’ve mentioned some of the challenges there, the soft market being an obvious one, but how specifically are you helping the brokers to deal with these challenges?
Matt O’Sullivan 00:01:48 I mean, it’s really interesting. We try often to take price as not the most important factor when we’re talking about the way in which we’re trying to manage a customer’s risk. We look at other things like claims payment, capital strength, and longevity and relationship. Obviously price has a factor to play, we’ve got to be realistic about that, but we’re trying to make sure that the consumer, the ultimate consumer of the insurance product, is getting a longer-term view of risk mitigation rather than just looking at short-term gains and things like this. And that’s the way we work with the brokers. We get in early with the brokers, we work them through the whole process, make them see that this is not just about price, it’s about a whole other range of factors as well.
Daniel Wood 00:02:31 It’s hard to have a conversation in the insurance space and not mention AI. So as an underwriter yourself, I mean, what are you seeing in terms of tech innovation that you’re using in your work that’s helpful?
Matt O’Sullivan 00:02:44 Yeah, I mean, AI is obviously a whole new world for us as a business. It’s a whole new world for the community at large. So we are obviously a key component part of that community. So we are looking at it from a risk point of view, but also from how we can make our— the whole process of underwriting more streamlined and more beneficial, more time— less time-consuming for the ultimate consumer. So there’s a lot of work we’re doing around data ingestion, around streamlining of the underwriting process. But equally, there’s a lot of work we can do about access to more data. Now, we are a data-driven business, so it’s really good for us to be able to draw down from external data sources, use AI. We had an example today what we’re using at Zurich to develop models around particular natural perils. We can do that much more quickly now because we can ingest so much more data using AI than we could do before. And all of these advancements are only getting more and more quick as time goes on. So it’ll allow us to give a better solution to our customers through the brokers. And I think that’s where AI is only going to be good for the industry.
Daniel Wood 00:03:46 Matt O’Sullivan, thanks for your time.
Matt O’Sullivan 00:03:48 Danny, thanks. Good to be here.
Daniel Wood 00:03:49 Great.
Matt O’Sullivan 00:03:50 Thank you.
