Manulife has launched a proprietary enterprise AI platform, marking a shift from building individual AI tools to running AI as a shared capability across its global operations.
The platform gives teams a common environment to build, deploy and manage AI applications. Tools already reviewed for security, risk and governance can be reused in other markets without repeating the full approval process.
Manulife said that will shorten development times while still allowing for different business and regulatory requirements in each jurisdiction.
“The platform positions us to move beyond individual solutions to a shared enterprise capability that encourages and enables teams around the world to innovate, collaborate, and scale AI responsibly,” said Phil Witherington, president and CEO.
Manulife expects AI to generate $1 billion in cumulative enterprise value by 2027, and says it had achieved $300 million by the end of 2025. Its measure includes run-rate expense reductions, revenue uplift from AI-powered workflows, fraud reduction and “growth absorption,” meaning handling business growth without a matching increase in costs.
Earlier this year, the insurer described the same target as “more than $1 billion.” The latest release drops the “more than.” Manulife has not said whether that reflects any change in its expectations.
Manulife highlighted three tools being integrated onto the platform. In Singapore, a sales assistant helps staff find information quickly and prepare for client conversations. A shared intelligent document processing service reads documents and extracts key data, cutting manual data entry for teams across the company. In the US, Quick Quote automates parts of the preliminary life insurance assessment, giving advisors and customers faster access to early underwriting information.
Jodie Wallis, Manulife’s global chief AI officer, said the platform would let the company take proven ideas and scale them across its business, removing friction for customers, advisors and colleagues.
The launch follows a five-year agreement with Microsoft announced in July. Under that deal, Microsoft became a foundational partner in the platform, then in pilot, and Manulife expanded Microsoft 365 Copilot to more than 30,000 employees.
In June, Manulife was ranked the top life insurer for AI maturity for the second year running in the Evident AI Index for Insurance. The index assesses 30 major insurers in North America and Europe, and Manulife placed third overall. Evident said Manulife had disclosed more AI use cases in production than any other insurer in the index.
The most relevant tool is Quick Quote, which so far runs only in the US, with faster preliminary underwriting and less paperwork on new business.
The governance model also matters. Approving a tool once and reusing it is efficient, but regulators are paying closer attention to how financial institutions manage model risk.
