Digital Platforms

In a tough operating environment, the title insurance industry persevered with improvements in many major financial and operational categories in 2011, including composite ratio, and in a new special report, A.M. Best expects these successes to be surpassed in 2012.

Great American Insurance Group, nominated for a Practice award, wanted to create a competitive advantage and excellent customer experience by offering customer mobile applications to deliver self-service functionality.

Gallagher looks to Unison’s industry relationships to complement its employee benefits brokerage operation.

Provider of risk financing and loss prevention services for Texas municipalities calls on software provider in attempt to become more proactive with claims.

WellPoint Inc., the second-biggest U.S. health insurer, will reorganize into four business units in the first major move undertaken by interim Chief Executive Officer John Cannon.

As demand for mobile, big data, cloud and virtualization initiatives continues to grow, so does the demand for (and salaries of) qualified IT professionals.

Sentry Insight is designed to help companies and brokers manage, track and analyze claims.

Novarica Research Council Impact Award Nominee of the Day: Leveraging a project and portfolio management application, Erie Insurance took on a transformation initiative to track all costs across 13 discreet portfolios.

Insurers that have invested in analytics tools in the past year are just beginning to recognize their ability to manage producers and improve their performance with the technology.

Data and analytics at the top; staff development becoming more important, according to Novarica research reported at this week’s PCI Information Technology Conference.

Data and analytics at the top; staff development becoming more important, according to Novarica research reported at this week’s PCI Information Technology Conference.

While online resources continue to gain influence over consumers, agents and brokers remain the top resource overall.

Willis report finds weak economy, low underwriting losses and abundant capacity create mix of rates for commercial P&C carriers.

Strong third quarter earnings from P&C insurers is expected by Keefe, Bruyette & Woods.

Insurer looks to e-Discovery software suite to advance its legal, IT infrastructure.

Allianz survey finds those ages 55 to 65 most concerned about rising healthcare costs and Social Security, regardless of political affiliations.

Newly formed Global Federation of Insurance Associations will comment on issues affecting the global insurance industry and its regulation.

Digital signatures brought to the cloud in support of E.U. eSignature laws.

Over the past five years, commercial auto insurance has experienced the most consistent underwriting results compared to other commercial lines and has generated better results than personal auto, despite the difference in the sizes of the markets, according to a new report from Fitch Ratings. Allstate Corp., Erie Insurance Group and Progressive have the strongest commercial auto underwriting margin over the last five years.

UnitedHealth Group Inc., the biggest U.S. health insurance company, agreed to pay about $4.9 billion to buy 90 percent of Amil Participacoes SA, a Brazil-based insurer and hospital chain that gives the American company a stake in the world’s second-biggest emerging economy.

Insurance software solutions provider Dovetail Insurance has won the Palmetto Pillar Award for cloud computing, which is sponsored by the Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce in conjunction with the Columbia Information Technology Council. The award is intended to honor the Midlands' technology leaders, innovators and IT executives.

Insurer deploys the Toughbook mobile computers in all 50 states, enabling appraisers to write estimates on site and upload reports.

Potential voluntary federal guidelines foretell a future that may require keeping a close eye on the balance between collaboration and control.

The U.S. property and casualty sector’s profits got a boost in the first half of 2012, largely as a result of underwriting improvements resulting from a quiet catastrophe year to date. According to ISO, a Verisk Analytics company, and the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America (PCI), private U.S. property/casualty insurers’ net income after taxes jumped to $16.4 billion in first-half 2012 from $4.8 billion in first-half 2011. Measuring insurers’ overall profitability as an annualized rate of return, policyholders’ surplus on average climbed to 5.9 from 1.7 percent.

Forecasted savings reached by 90 percent that adopt cloud technology.

More than half of U.S. insurers surveyed expect rise in personal property, workers' compensation and auto insurance fraud losses.

The global financial crisis and subsequent economic developments have brought to light critical weaknesses in existing hedge programs.

Based on a review of 35 major health plan websites, most issuers are still struggling to provide the Summary of Benefits and Coverage (SBC), even while the SBC provision of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) law took effect last week, according to Tyrula LLC. The law requires insurers to provide a paper SBC document within seven days of application, renewal, or the first day of coverage.

Program to provide review of building characteristics, factors that affect a building's wind resistance.

According to one Gartner analyst, precision, personalization and collaboration will motivate a new wave of business analytics.

The Federal Reserve sets January 5 as deadline for insurer to show it can handle severe economic stress.

Subscription service to track and review web resources for 16 providers of defined contribution plans, including ING, New York Life and Principal.

Two-thirds of life/annuity insurers plan to increase spending on analytics in the next two years as they seek to enhance the customer experience.

Surplus lines see spike in direct premiums written, experience turnaround as standard market insurers express the need to increase rates.

A new report from Forrester outlines potential mobile-enabled innovations and market transformations that could transform the insurance marketplace by 2020.

Spending is expected to nearly triple from current levels by 2016.

Insurer hopes e-signature capabilities will improve mobile distribution strategies, enable straight-through mobile processing.

Erie Insurance and IIHS study finds the teen driving death rate triple that of adult drivers.

ARCLand title specialists expect continuing growth and record premium levels for Q3 2012.

Stephen Halfpenny, formerly of Allstate and Munich Re, joins firm to lead Canadian business development.

By charting processes and performance as though it were a game, P&C and life insurers may have a cheap, engaging way to instill behavioral change within an organization.

J.D. Power 2012 Homeowner survey finds multi-policy owners most satisfied, but all add-on policies are not created equal in the retention equation.

Claims processing remained the top compliance issue for P&C insurers, followed by rating factors and the cancelation of policies. In terms of life and health insurers, problems with claims processing stole the top spot away from compliant policy forms, which was reported last year as the biggest compliance issue. Failure to pay claims properly in accordance with policy provisions was only fifth on that list for life and health insurers.

Mobility—rising from its humble beginnings—is on a roll, driven by ever-higher-performing smartphones, tablets, and other devices enabled by 3G and 4G networks, as well as an explosion of innovative applications. Indeed, we believe that enterprise IT is on the brink of a revolution that promises to boost productivity by expanding office functionality beyond the brick-and-mortar location. There are opportunities galore, but cost, governance and security challenges must also be reckoned with.

IRC study considers catastrophe- and noncatastrophe-related events over a 15-year period.

A new research brief from Strategy Meets Action outlines how ambitious insurer's investments are, why they're making those investments and what helps foster innovation.

The majority of insurance executives participating in a recent survey agree that effective networking requires ongoing practice and development.

With 2015 deadlines approaching, the NAIC recently conducted a pilot program with 13 insurers and shared some guidelines and best practices.

Given a $3 million-to-$5 million bump in budget, almost one-third of insurer CIOs would put the money toward analytics, despite already investing heavily in that area, according to “If I Had $5 Million… Where Insurer CIOs Would Spend Money They Don’t Have and Why,” a survey from Novarica.

The rate increase would be the third consecutive annual increase, according to the Insurance Information Institute.

Strategy Meets Action presents its Innovation in Action Awards, recognizing solutions that enable insurers to move beyond modernizing and optimizing to innovation and transformation.

Thunderhead's NOW solution looks to provide a single platform for the insurer's enterprise communication.