Has insurance become too reliant on technology?

The industry seems to finally have warmed to tech – but has it truly reached a tipping point yet?

Has insurance become too reliant on technology?

Opinion

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The industry seems to finally have warmed to tech – but has it truly reached a tipping point yet?


Pascal Millaire - CEO - CyberCube Analytics
“Not only are insurers not too reliant on technology, they are insufficiently reliant on technology.  

According to Deloitte’s 2016–2017 Global CIO survey, insurers spend 3.6% of revenues on technology versus 7.2% for other financial services segments. This manifest itself in cumbersome human interactions for customers, highly manual processes for insurance staff and inflated expense ratios.  

But the future looks bright. Not only will new technology tools enable insurance professionals to focus on higher-value and more interesting work, over time, internet-connected technologies are creating a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for carriers to insure society against new technology risk pools.” 

 

Laird Rixford - CEO - Insurance Technologies Corporation 
“I would say the industry is not reliant enough on technology. There are parts of the industry that are making good use of technology. And then there are parts that are still relying on old, legacy processes that have a lot of room for improvement – for example, requiring a signature to bind a policy rather than using e-signature technology.  

Technology is a necessity of the modern business world, especially in insurance. The efficiencies, cost savings, data and business insight that technology can provide will make us better as an industry and help us all to grow.” 

 

Armand Ferranti - Accelerate partner - AXA XL  
“Not at all. Contrary to all the innovation and insurtech news we read today, many insurers continue to operate in the traditional environment. But we’re certainly in a transitional period. Technology is starting to heavily assist insurance businesses, empowering underwriters to make wiser, data-driven decisions; enabling a closer interaction with clients; providing ways to understand risks better; and more.  

Legacy systems and manual processes are still very much at the core of operations. The trend certainly indicates that tech can improve expense ratios and efficiency. It’s only a matter of time before more companies adopt these solutions.” 

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