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CHICAGO, Jan 12, 2004 -- Fort Dearborn Life Insurance Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Health Care Service Corporation (operating as Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Mexico), a Mutual Legal Reserve Company, has acquired Omaha Life Insurance Company from Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Nebraska. Fort Dearborn Life is part of the Preferred Financial Group which is comprised of Medical Life Insurance Company (Ohio), Colorado Bankers Life Insurance Company (Colorado) and Fort Dearborn Life Insurance Company (Illinois).

Conshohocken, PA- eMoney Advisor, a leading provider of wealth planning solutions, today announced that First Commonwealth Financial Corporation has selected eMoney's AdvisorPlatform as the basis for its wealth management and planning services offered through First Commonwealth Financial Advisors, First Commonwealth Trust Company and First Commonwealth Insurance Agency. The eMoney system will be used by advisors throughout these affiliates to provide more comprehensive services to their clients.

Prudential Financial, Inc. announced that Barbara G. Koster has been named Chief Information Officer (CIO), succeeding William D. Friel, who will be leaving Prudential and retiring after sixteen years with the company. In this position, Koster will be responsible for overseeing the use of information technology companywide.

DxCG Inc., an independent provider of predictive modeling software for health care organizations, today announced that Tufts Health Plan has signed a multi-year contract to license DxCG's RiskSmart, its Web-based suite of predictive modeling tools. Waltham, Mass.-based Tufts Health Plan joins other leading Massachusetts health plans, providers and payers using DxCG's predictive modeling tools to improve the financial forecasting of its health care operations.

SAN FRANCISCO--Identity Theft 911, a leading provider of identity theft education, defense, and resolution services, and AIG Affinity Group Services, a division of AIG, the world's leading international insurance and financial services organization, are working together to help individual consumers, enterprise customers, and financial institutions to deal with the growing problem of identity theft.

Member companies of both the National Association of Independent Insurers (NAII) and the Alliance of American Insurers on January 7 voted overwhelmingly to merge and form a new trade association known as the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America (PCI). The new organization, which will officially begin operations today, represents more than 1,000 member companies that write 37 percent of the property and casualty insurance sold in the United States .

Combined Agents of America, LLC (CAA) today announced Safeco has signed a master contract with all 28 CAA member agencies. According to the contract, all CAA members gain access to this major company market while also profiting from combined premium benefits. CAA is a managing general agency (MGA) committed to strengthening the independent insurance agency system through profitable growth, quality and service for its member agencies.

First Notice Systems Inc., the leader in claim reporting solutions for the insurance industry, and Guidewire Software Inc., a leading provider of claims solutions to property and casualty and workers' compensation insurers, today announced the formation of a strategic alliance that gives insurance carriers an end-to-end claims reporting and management solution. Customers of both companies can now easily leverage First Notice's expertise and value-added services at first notice of loss and Guidewire's downstream claims processing system to enhance claims handling procedures and improve customer service.

ePolicy Solutions, Inc., a leader in providing Web-based policy administration solutions that can reduce expenses and improve customer service, today announced a marketing agreement with ODEN(R) Insurance Services, Inc., a provider of regulatory research and compliance products. ePolicy Solutions also announced it has integrated ODEN's Policy Terminator(R) into ePolicy Solutions' RightRisk(TM) for a top property and casualty insurer.

Fallon Community Health Plan (FCHP) will join Insurix's www.BenefitCentral.com on-line quoting and E-Marketplace web site. This will enhance FCHP's quoting and proposal generation capabilities allowing Brokers 24X7 access to FCHP's information. The web site will allow Employee Benefits and Health Insurance Brokers to quickly and easily review FCHP's product options, obtain quotes for Massachusetts' employers with 10 - 50 eligible employees, and review FCHP's provider network.

LONDON-- Lloyd's of London announced today that the market will have the capacity to underwrite 14.9 billion pounds Sterling (pounds) of business in 2004, or $26.7 billion. This figure maintains 2003's capacity level of 14.9 billion pounds, or $23.2 billion.

Duck Creek Technologies Inc., a provider of product management software and services to the insurance industry, today announced that Irving, Texas-based program administrator, Innovative Risk Management, Inc. (IRM) has selected Duck Creek's EXAMPLE Platform. IRM will implement the entire Duck Creek product suite including: EXAMPLE Express(TM), EXAMPLE Author(TM), EXAMPLE Server(TM), ManuScript Templates(TM), and Example TransACTTM.

HARTFORD, Conn.--Travelers Life & Annuity today announced the availability of its Annuity Funded Life and Muni Max products on pTeraDac Corporation's WebStory, a customized Web-based presentation system that links directly from Travelers WinFlex and Travelers Life Illustration Systems. WebStory Advanced Marketing Presentation System provides text, schematics and graphics to help the producer develop and present sales strategies in a format that facilitates the client's ease of understanding.

HARTFORD, Conn.--The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. today announced it has completed the purchase of CNA Financial Corporation's group life and accident, and short-term and long-term disability businesses for approximately $500 million in cash. The transaction closed on December 31, 2003.

Last October, when Allstate Insurance Co. developed a plan to best assess damage and settle claims in the wake of the Southern California wildfires, the Northbrook, Ill.-based company reasoned it would be counterproductive to set up operations in brick-and-mortar offices located in the vicinity of the fire's epicenter.With the fire spreading and local residents scurrying to find shelter, Allstate established a unique operational presence to conduct business amid the blazing inferno, dispatching some of its local claims adjusters and a 270-person national catastrophe team to operate out of six mobile response units (MRU) scattered around the area.

Barring another terrorist attack on U.S. soil, or some other catastrophic event, U.S. insurance companies are cautiously optimistic about the economy in 2004. As a result, IT budgets in the industry on average are increasing slightly this year.Research from Celent, Datamonitor, Forrester and TowerGroup suggests insurers will add as much as 10% to their IT budgets this year, with an average increase between 2.5% and 6.7%.

Although storage area network (SAN) technology has been around for several years, it's been mainly limited to big-budget IT operations, due to cost and complexity.However, the economics of SANs have been changing, thanks to more robust management tools, as well as the fact that SANs can now be deployed without expensive fibre channel technology.

In the largest-ever civil insurance fraud case filed in the state of New York, Allstate Insurance Co., Encompass Insurance and Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. last month filed a RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act) lawsuit in the Supreme Court of New York.After 21 months of investigation, Allstate filed the complaint against 74 individuals whom the Northbrook, Ill.-based carrier alleges were either principals or employees of-or otherwise involved with-a group of companies established for the sole purpose of generating hundreds of millions of dollars in fraudulent insurance claims.

Alexandria, Va.-based Agents Council for Technology (ACT) is trying to sell independent agents on a new concept: using technology to enhance the sales and marketing aspects of their businesses.In phase one of a multi-part report designed to help agents and brokers build a disciplined, sales-driven agency culture, ACT, an affiliation of the Independent Insurance Agents & Brokers of America (IIABA), revealed in November that "as the independent agency system inevitably becomes more efficient, greater efficiency should improve productivity by enhancing the manufacturing and sales processes.

Insurers are turning introspective. They lived a charmed life when healthy investment returns covered for a lack of efficiency within their operations. Now, they have shifted their focus from asset management back to insurance basics.A new survey performed by the global insurance services practice of New York City-based Deloitte notes that insurers have shifted their focus after a protracted period of low interest rates and volatility in the equity markets.