Now in its eighth year, the Vanguards in Insurance Practices awards honor the "best of the best." Celent, an independent business research and advisory service with a specialization in insurance technology, helped develop the survey and facilitated data collection and analysis, in partnership with INN.
The Awards
Insurance carriers in the United States and Canada ranked the top insurance technology providers across several categories, including Insurance Core Solutions, Customer Experience Solutions, Decision Support Solutions, Emerging Technologies, Back Office & Support Systems and Strategic Partners. As part of the program, Insurance Networking News also honors insurance carriers with VIP Best Practices Awards highlighting the year's best technology implementations.
Celent
Mike Fitzgerald, senior analytst for Celent, opens the ceremony with an explanation of the methodology and takeaways from the results. "The VIP program is a great way to recognize technology vendors that provide real, measurable value to their insurance customers, Fitzgerald said. Insurers tend to be very loyal to vendors that go above and beyond the norm in delivering good product and service, as seen in this year's list of preferred vendors. The survey results show customers value honesty, insurance expertise and focus on customer service."
The Awards - Decision Support
Accepting the first place award for IBM is Craig Bedell, Worldwide Industry Executive, Business Analytics Software Group, with Holli Gronset, publisher of INN. In the Decision Support Solutions category, Microsoft took second place and Microstrategy took third place. IBM also took third place in the Back Office Solutions category.
The Awards - Insurance Core Solutions
For the Insurance Core Solutions category, third place went to ISCS, second place to BenefitMall and top honors were awarded to Guidewire. From Left: Mike Fitzgerald Celent, Graham Gudmestad Guidewire Software, Holli Gronset INN. Guidewire also took second place in the Customer Experience Solutions and Back Office Solutions categories.
The Awards - Customer Experience Solutions
In the Customer Experience Solutions category, first place was awarded to BenefitMall. BenefitMall was nominated by technology partner SNL iPartners and Ericka Billue of SNL iPartners accepted the award on behalf of the company. From Left: Mike Fitzgerald, SNL, Ericka Billue SNL iPartners, Chris McMahon, senior editor of INN
The Awards - Customer Experience Solutions
In the Customer Experience Solutions category, there were two third-place award recipients, ISCS and Microsoft; Guidewire finished in second place. From left: Mike Fitzgerald Celent, Phil Iaccarino ISCS, Holli Gronset INN
The Awards - Best Practices
The first, second and third place winners of this years INN VIP Best Practices Awards were Citizens Property Insurance, National Life Group and The AssureStart Insurance Agency. Citizens was nominated by technology partner Bolt; Ernest Hursh of Bolt accepted the award on behalf of Citizens. From Left: Mike Fitzgerald Celent, SNL, Ernest Hursh BOLT Solutions, Inc., Chris McMahon INN
The Awards - Best Practices
From left: John McCormick INN, Tim Attia - BOLT Solutions, Inc., Ernest Hursh BOLT Solutions, Inc., Mike Fitzgerald Celent, Chris McMahon INN
Attendees
From Left: Graham Gudmestad Guidewire Software, Abhishek Peraka Saama Technologies, unknown, and Subodh Khare Saama Technologies
Attendees
From left: Kyle Bonestell - SNL iPartners, Jennifer King St.Nick Media Services, Phil Iaccarino ISCS, Ericka Billue SNL iPartners, Mark Roth Strategy Meets Action