In an industry experiencing fast-growing technology and at risk of outdated operations, carriers are tasked with the challenge of maintaining modern digital solutions, keeping up with evolving regulations and meeting the growing customer demand for tailored insurance experiences.
"We have a dynamic platform that has end-to-end capabilities that serves multiple stakeholders and processes within the insurance sector. It enables those insurers to make their business operations internally -- and their reactions to external market conditions -- almost instantaneous," said Robin Gilthorpe, CEO of Earnix, in an interview with Digital Insurance. "We act as a platform for them to innovate, to rapidly introduce new products and to tune those products once they're in market more rapidly. That becomes a real engine for them to compete, differentiate and grow in global markets that are, after all, highly regulated."
Their intelligent insurance operations solutions, which span across functions in both the insurance and finances industries, are AI-based and built for business lines including personal and commercial P&C, life and health. Some of their solutions include analytical pricing, behavioral-based product personalization and real-time engagement that uses machine learning (ML) capabilities to identify changes in customer insurance needs.
As more customers are opting for usage-based insurance options, Earnix also offers IoT and telematics technology that assesses customer's usage and driving behaviors.
"The product is designed so that our customers can bring their own models and their own data sources, so we're able to leverage and combine first-, second- and third-party data in the course of that business flow," Gilthorpe stated. "That gets particularly important and valuable when you're talking about some of these less conventional data sources, such as positional accelerometer data coming in either from apps that people have on their phone or from the vehicles themselves."
Gilthorpe explained that they are seeing an uptick in interest in less conventional data, whether the source is from IoT devices around the home or from connected vehicle data.
Since its inception, Earnix has delivered AI-based solutions, predominantly with machine learning capabilities. Their core AI, which is built and run for the highly regulated insurance industry, includes functions like full audit tracking and detailed decision-making capabilities.
Gilthorpe also noted that Earnix is focused on discussions around the ethical considerations related to AI, discussing best practices and applications.
"The amount of innovative capacity in this industry is remarkable... We've certainly seen markets around the world where capacity has been dramatically curtailed in the last cycle. It's important to push on that, but also to service customers where and how they want to be serviced," said Gilthorpe. "We think that the combination of AI, to be able to use these data sources, but also to be able to do this in a regulation-aware environment is critically important. We spend a lot of our time thinking about what the regulations are, how they might evolve in the future and how we can serve and support those."
In early March 2024, Earnix announced a partnership with Sollers Consulting, a software integrator and operational advisor, to deliver advanced analytics, machine learning and AI solutions to the P&C markets in the UK, US and throughout Europe. Earnix plans to continue expanding its multinational footprint, especially in the French and US markets. Earnix also sees an opportunity to help insurers navigate the challenges of pricing and underwriting moving forward.
"The industry cannot fail to notice the supercycle of price and availability hardening and softening in the insurance sector... We perceive a large opportunity to help insurers, whether it be carriers, agents, brokers or wherever they are in the ecosystem, to actually moderate and mitigate some of that cycle and to expand insurability and accessibility to risk mitigation on the part of customers," stated Gilthorpe. "Ultimately, to combine both more precise pricing with more accurate underwriting and do so in a way that those two things are working with each other rather than fighting each other."
