Commentary/Opinion
Viewpoint: The New Era of Insurance Pricing Involves Precision, Speed, and Control
For decades, insurers have relied on spreadsheets and legacy systems to manage one of their most critical functions: pricing. But as market dynamics shift and pressures intensify, the old tools are no longer fit for this purpose. In today’s volatile and competitive P/C insurance landscape, the pricing function is a critical driver of growth, flexibility, and profitability, playing a key role in shaping strategy and improving outcomes.
The majority of insurers still rely heavily on Excel for pricing tasks. While familiar, Excel is a patchwork solution that lacks the speed, governance, and scalability needed in a digital-first, data-driven world. Under the status quo, updating rates can take months. Errors tend to creep in as the entire process is fragmented across multiple systems and teams. Compliance checks are time-consuming and inconsistent. And as customer expectations evolve and risks grow more complex, insurers can no longer afford to be held back by unstable solutions and fragmented processes.
Brian Moore leads North American operations for Sollers Consulting and brings over 20 years of experience in insurance technology and professional services leadership.
Dorota Gawron is a consultant at Sollers, focused on pricing transformation and digital innovation in the insurance sector.
News
US P&C insurers post record $89bn investment income in 2024: AM Best
The US property and casualty (P&C) insurance industry generated a record $89 billion in investment income in 2024, marking a 20% year-over-year increase, according to AM Best.
The firm reported that the growth was fueled by higher interest rates, stronger returns from bonds, and increased contributions from cash and short-term holdings.
AM Best noted that the Federal Reserve’s 425 basis point rate hikes between 2022 and 2024 reversed more than a decade of historically low interest rates.
While these moves drove bond prices below carried values, the impact was limited because most P&C insurers maintained shorter-duration and well-matched portfolios.
Reinvestment into higher-yielding securities significantly boosted returns, lifting the industry’s gross yield to 3.66% in 2024. Bond portfolios remained the largest component of assets and produced a yield of 4.1%, the strongest level in over ten years.
According to AM Best, shifts in portfolio allocations were also notable. Common and preferred stock holdings dropped by nearly four percentage points, largely due to a major divestment by National Indemnity Company, a Berkshire Hathaway subsidiary.
AI in Insurance
ZestyAI Secures Wisconsin Approval for First AI Model Tackling Non-Weather Water Risk
ZestyAI, the leading provider of AI-powered property and climate risk analytics, today announced that its non-weather water risk model, Z-WATER™, has received approval in Wisconsin for use in underwriting and writing.
Non-weather water is one of the costliest and fastest-growing perils in homeowners insurance, now ranking as the fourth costliest peril overall, with claim severity up 80% over the past decade—surpassing hurricanes. These losses stem from everyday risks like burst pipes, appliance failures, and plumbing leaks. With average claim costs now exceeding $13,000, their financial impact rivals catastrophe events.
Z-WATER is built, tested, and validated with real insurer loss data, ensuring accuracy and regulatory credibility. The model uses computer vision to analyze aerial imagery alongside tax assessor data, permit records, climatology science, and infrastructure insights to assess key property-level risk factors. By modeling how these variables interact, Z-WATER predicts both the frequency and severity of non-weather water claims with up to 18x greater accuracy than traditional models.
With this approval, insurers in Wisconsin can begin using Z-WATER to:
- Set more accurate, property-specific rates
- Align coverage with actual home vulnerabilities
- Optimize inspections and mitigation strategies, such as the adoption of water sensors
- Reduce cross-subsidization and improve portfolio performance
"Non-weather water is one of the most frequent and expensive sources of loss for insurers, and it behaves differently than other perils," said Bryan Rehor, Director of Regulatory Strategy at ZestyAI((. "Z-WATER captures the property-level features that truly drive risk—such as plumbing systems, home design, and even vegetation patterns**, giving insurers a much clearer picture of where losses are likely to occur. This approval demonstrates that regulators recognize the value of AI models that are explainable, data-driven, and validated against real claims."
Davies bolsters tech portfolio with AI Underwriting Workbench launch | Insurance Business Asia
Company continues to strengthen AI investments
Davies has launched its new AI Underwriting Workbench platform, aiming to support insurance clients in making faster, data-driven decisions.
The platform is designed to address common challenges in traditional underwriting systems, such as multi-carrier usage, inconsistencies in workflows, and disorganised collateral. According to Davies, the workbench is expected to help clients increase their hit ratio by 3–5%, reduce average internal costs by 25%, and eliminate 70–80% of manual processes.
The AI Underwriting Workbench provides a centralised dashboard for managing all underwriting tasks, tracking progress, and facilitating team communication. The platform’s AI-powered rules engine automates processes and tasks.
Davies said the solution was developed by its underwriting experts and is intended to help clients make more informed risk decisions. The workbench integrates with clients’ existing core systems and uses advanced AI to identify profitable risks.
Genpact Launches New Agentic Solution to Reinvent Insurance Buying
Genpact (NYSE: G), an agentic and advanced technology solutions company recognized for its deep industry knowledge, process intelligence, and last-mile expertise, today announced the launch of the Genpact Insurance Policy Suite for commercial and specialty business insurance.
Part of Genpact's Service-as-Agentic-Solutions™ portfolio, the new suite is designed to deliver autonomous, AI-powered workflows to help insurers eliminate repetitive administrative work, reduce cycle time, and gain data-driven insights. For more information, visit here.
"We designed the Genpact Insurance Policy Suite with underwriters in mind so they can focus on delivering faster quotes, building better broker relationships, and increasing submission-to-bind ratios," said Jinsook Han, Chief Strategy, Corporate Development & Global Agentic AI Officer at Genpact. "We understand how complex insurance processes and documentation can be, so we designed our solution with observability, audit trails, and role-based controls built in, giving carriers and underwriters better transparency and insights."
Purpose-Built for Insurance
Built for commercial and specialty insurance, and powered by Microsoft Azure AI Foundry Models and Azure Analytics Services, the Genpact Insurance Policy Suite orchestrates and executes underwriting support tasks, closing the gap between initial submission and the bind process.
The suite consists of four modules, each with a network of specialized AI agents that classifies, extracts, and summarizes data to enhance touchless processing, detect anomalies, and rank risk to speed up decision-making and quote generation.
Genpact projects that organizations adopting the suite can expect:
- Higher underwriting capacity with up to 90% touchless submission clearance
- Faster speed-to-market with up to 75% reduction from existing manual cycle times
- Improved working capital with up to 50% lower costs.
Research
AAA Data Shows New Car Ownership Costs Are Falling
New cars are getting more expensive, auto loan debt is at record highs, and even vehicle repossessions are sky-high. There is good news, though. The total cost of owning that car for the year will be less than it was last year, and the difference is significant. A new analysis says that the cost of owning a car this year is $719 lower than it was in 2024.
For the last 70 years, the AAA has been completing what it calls the Your Driving Costs analysis. 2025 definitely won't be the cheapest, but the decline is significant, and it should be enough for owners to notice.
Ownership Costs Down 6%
CCC Crash Course Report Highlights How Economic and Supply Chain Disruption Are Forging a New Auto Industry Reality
Tariffs, Consumer Financial Strain and Vehicle Technology Complexity Are Creating Interconnected Pressures Across OEMs, Suppliers, Repairers and Insurers
CCC Intelligent Solutions Inc. (CCC), a leading cloud platform provider powering the P&C insurance economy, today published its Crash Course Q3 2025 Report, providing an in-depth analysis of how tariffs, economic uncertainty and consumer behavior are reshaping the auto claims and repair ecosystem. The report details how supply chain disruption and inflationary pressures are converging with the growing complexity of modern vehicles, creating a “supply chain reaction” that is altering strategies for OEMs, suppliers, insurers and repairers.
Crash Course is based on information derived from 300 million claims-related transactions and millions of bodily injury and personal injury protection (PIP) /medical payments (MedPay) casualty claims processed by CCC customers using the company's solutions.
“Today’s auto industry is navigating unprecedented economic turbulence – from pricing pressures to sourcing challenges to household financial strain,” said Kyle Krumlauf, director of industry analytics at CCC and co-author of Crash Course. “These forces are converging in ways that represent not just cyclical pressures, but a structural shift. Our Q3 report provides context and clarity to help insurers, repairers and OEMs better understand these dynamics and adapt their strategies in a more complex and unpredictable environment.”
Climate/Resilience/Sustainability
Humberto becomes a hurricane and may soon be joined by Imelda, posing a US threat
Two tropical systems will churn near each other in the Atlantic, with Humberto forecast to strengthen and a second storm possibly forming as Imelda, raising risks of flooding and damaging winds in the United States.
A rare weather pattern is unfolding in the southwestern Atlantic with the possibility of two hurricanes developing within a few hundred miles of one another. At least one could make landfall along the United States coast early next week with the potential for heavy rain, flooding and high winds.
The setup is rare and highly complex. The last time something similar occurred near the U.S. was in 2016, when Hurricanes Matthew and Nicole were about 800 miles apart. Early next week, two hurricanes could be about half that distance apart, with the potential for interaction between them affecting the track and strength of each storm.
InsurTech/M&A/Finance💰/Collaboration
Datavant acquires Israel’s DigitalOwl for over $200 million | Ctech
The AI startup’s technology will streamline medical record analysis for insurers and law firms.
Insurtech startup DigitalOwl has been acquired by Datavant, a healthcare data-sharing platform. The deal value was not disclosed but is estimated at just over $200 million, most of it in cash.
Founded in 2018 by brothers Yuval (CEO) and Amit (CTO) Man, DigitalOwl developed an AI platform for rapid analysis of medical cases, serving insurance companies and law firms in the U.S., Canada, Israel, and Australia.
Since its inception, the company has raised $38 million from investors including RGA Insurance, Insight Partners, Fusion VC, and Ibex Investors, which held a 30% stake in the company and is one of the biggest winners in the deal. One of the early investors in the company is veteran entrepreneur Amnon Shashua, founder of Mobileye, AI21 Labs and AAI.
DigitalOwl employs about 70 people, with 50 based in Israel and the rest in the U.S.
MetLife Acquires 20% Stake in LatAm Insurtech Klimber | Insurtech Insights
Global insurer MetLife has acquired a 20 percent stake in insurtech firm Klimber, marking a strategic partnership aimed at transforming how insurance is accessed and distributed across Latin America.
Klimber said the investment strengthens its position in the rapidly evolving digital insurance landscape in the region. The company’s platform enables partners in banking, retail, fintech and e-commerce to seamlessly integrate and distribute insurance products. Its proprietary technology, powered by data and artificial intelligence, is designed to simplify the insurance process from underwriting to customer experience.
“We founded Klimber with the mission of making insurance simple, scalable, and accessible through the use of data and artificial intelligence,” said Julián Bersano, Klimber Global CEO. “Today, seeing more than 13.9 million people protected and nearly 300 million dollars in managed premiums is concrete proof of that vision. Our platform is helping transform insurance underwriting and the customer experience, expanding access to protection in under-penetrated markets.”
Onex Partners to Acquire Integrated Specialty Coverages from KKR | Insurtech Insights
Onex Corporation has announced that the Onex Partners Opportunities Fund will acquire Integrated Specialty Coverages, a technology-enabled insurance platform specialising in the design, underwriting and distribution of insurance solutions, from global investment firm KKR.
The deal is being completed in partnership with the Public Sector Pension Investment Board, Ardian through its Co-Investment strategy and other leading institutional equity partners. ISC’s management team and employees will remain significant shareholders once the transaction is finalised.
Headquartered in Carlsbad, California, Integrated Specialty Coverages is a leading multi-line programme administrator focused on underwriting excellence and client service. The company operates an end-to-end insurance platform powered by proprietary data analytics that connects a broad network of insurance markets and distribution channels. Its advanced technology transforms the way complex insurance programmes are underwritten and managed. KKR will fully exit its investment as part of this transaction.
Awards
Five Sigma just won Technology Partner of the Year at the Tech & Innovation Awards 2025! 🏆
The judges recognized our impact in transforming claims management through AI and automation, creating measurable value for our customers:
"Five Sigma is recognised for revolutionising claims management with its AI-powered platform and Clive™, the industry’s first AI Claims Adjuster. Used by Resorts World and other leading organisations, Clive has delivered $150K/month in cost savings, a 33% boost in adjuster productivity, and near-instant claim reviews. The judges were particularly impressed by the ability to combine automation, AI, and human expertise to deliver real-world efficiency gains at scale, without adding headcount. It represents a step-change in how insurers can modernise claims with measurable impact."
Our CPO, Gil Nechushtai, attended the awards gala last night alongside fellow industry leaders, proudly accepting the award on behalf of Five Sigma.
Thanks to Insurance Times for this recognition, and congratulations to the entire Five Sigma team for pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in claims innovation. You make moments like this a reality!
People
Chris Newman, a champion for global interoperability and digital data exchange in insurance, named CEO of ACORD Solutions Group
With a strong vision and mission for global interoperability in the insurance industry, Chris Newman has been appointed by the ACORD Board of Directors to lead ACORD Solutions Group (ASG) as Chief Executive Officer. ACORD Solutions Group provides the insurance industry with enterprise-class solutions to optimize the speed, cost, and accuracy of data exchange, connecting stakeholders regardless of geography, role, and legacy constraints.
ACORD Solutions Group was formed in 2016 as an industry-owned extension of ACORD, the standards-setting body for the global insurance industry, to help its members address critical technology challenges by delivering next-generation digital solutions and services. Newman, who joined ACORD Solutions Group in its first year, has been instrumental in fostering a cohesive and collaborative ecosystem of partnerships and driving rapid growth. ACORD Solutions Group welcomed its 250th client in 2024, and recently reported a 300% increase in digital transactions from 2023 to 2025.
"Chris's leadership, strategic vision, and proven track record make him exceptionally well suited to guide ASG through its next chapter," said ACORD Board Chair Robert Kelly AM (Founder, Managing Director & CEO of Steadfast).