INSURANCE INDUSTRY NEWS

Catastrophes Caused Billions In Losses In 2019
The 2019 natural catastrophe year at a glance: 820 natural catastrophes caused overall losses of USD 150bn, which is broadly in line with the inflation-adjusted average of the past 30 years. A smaller portion of losses was insured compared with 2018 (due in part to high flood losses, which are often not insured to the same extent). Read more.

Weather, Climate & Catastrophe Insight: 2019
Economic losses from natural disasters topped USD 232bn in 2019, according to Aon plc's annual report evaluating the impact of global natural disaster events in order to identify trends, manage volatility, and enhance resilience. Read more.

Apollo, MIG Partners To Offer Digital Tools
Apollo Exchange is excited to announce a new partnership with MIG Insurance to enable a digital insurance buying experience in line with modern consumer expectations. Through this partnership, MIG is able to provide an eCommerce launchpad that clients can access 24/7 through the brokerage website. Read more.

IMS Brings Carrot UBI Platform To North America
IMS, a leading provider of connected car data solutions, is pleased to announce the availability of the UBI platform on which the award-winning Carrot Insurance program is built. This will enable North American insurers to rapidly scale next-generation UBI programs that go beyond offering discounts for sharing limited driving data. Read more.

Applied Rating Index Q4 & 2019 Results
Applied Systems® has announced the Q4 and year-end 2019 results of the Applied Rating Index™, the Canadian insurance industry's premium rate index. Throughout the year, all provinces experienced an increase in average premium change for both Personal Auto and Personal Property lines of business. Read more.

Industry Veterans Launch Vailo Insurance Services
The underwriting space is rife with competition. Vailo Insurance Services is joining the frenzy in 2020, led by three industry veterans with 100+ years of combined experience, and takes aim at larger, slower-moving competitors now struggling to meet the rapidly evolving expectations of today’s digitally-savvy brokers and consumers. Read more.

CFC Launches New Cyber Excess Policy
CFC is pleased to announce the release of its cyber excess solution, which gives small and medium sized businesses access to up to USD 10m of excess cyber capacity. Read more.

EMC Selects FRISS Fraud Detection
EMC Insurance Companies, a national property and casualty insurer, and FRISS, the leading provider of insurance fraud detection solutions worldwide, are pleased to announce they have partnered to reduce insurance fraud and increase profitability. Read more.

DAS, Wawanesa Partner On Legal Expense Insurance
DAS Legal Protection Inc. is proud to announce a new partnership with The Wawanesa Mutual Insurance Company, which protects its commercial policyholders when they encounter unexpected legal events. This partnership with DAS will make Legal Expense Insurance available to Wawanesa’s suite of Commercial Property & Casualty products. Read more.

CoreLogic Acquires Location, Inc.
CoreLogic®, a leading global property information, analytics and data-enabled services provider, has announced the completion of its acquisition of Location, Inc., a leader in geographic data sciences and predictive, location-based analytics for businesses across the U.S. and Canada. Read more.

Annual Catastrophe Loss Costs Decline Again
Insured losses from major natural catastrophes in 2019 totalled roughly USD 53bn, about 18% lower than the annual average since 2011. This continues a relative period of calm compared to 2017, according to the Summary of Natural Catastrophe Events 2019 newly published by Willis Re. Read more.

2019 Severe Weather Insured Damage Totals
Severe weather across Canada continues to highlight the financial costs of climate change to insurers and taxpayers. In 2019, floods, rain, snow and windstorms damaged homes, vehicles and commercial properties. Insured damage for these severe weather events reached CAD 1.3 billion last year, according to Catastrophe Indices and Quantification Inc. Read more.

Routine Managerial Work Will Be Fully Automated By 2024: Gartner
Artificial intelligence and emerging technologies such as virtual personal assistants and chatbots are rapidly making headway into the workplace. Gartner predicts that these technologies will replace almost 69% of a manager’s workload by 2024. Read more.

CFC Acquires InsurTech ThreatInformer
CFC, the specialist insurance provider and pioneer in emerging risk, is pleased to announce that it has acquired ThreatInformer, a London-based InsurTech. Leveraging big data and machine learning, ThreatInformer's technology helps insurance companies better understand their customers' exposures using a variety of external sources. Read more.

Checklist To Optimize Vendor Relationships
An insurance carrier's ability to select the right solution for tactical, transformational and long-term needs has never been more important. Novarica has released the first in a series of reports to provide insurer CIOs and their teams a set of guidelines and principles on how to start third-party relationships on the right foot. Read more.

Vexcel Acquires Imagery & Data Assets From Verisk
Vexcel Imaging, a leader in aerial imagery data, has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the imagery sourcing group from Verisk’s Geomni business. The acquisition will combine Geomni’s imagery surveying and content-related teams and assets into Vexcel. Verisk, a leading data analytics provider, will be a minority owner in Vexcel with full access to aerial imagery libraries. Read more.

Younger Workers Value Virtual Healthcare
Three-quarters of working Canadians would perceive their employer in a more positive light if their employer offered virtual care/telemedicine, a service which would eliminate the need to leave work or home, according to a recent RBC Insurance survey. This perception is driven mostly by younger working Canadians. Read more.

FM Global Launches Cyber Engineering Evaluations
As part of its continuing commitment to cyber risk assessment, prevention and control, FM Global has become one of the first insurance carriers to offer industrial control systems (ICS) evaluations at client locations as part of its routine engineering site visits. Read more.

KPMG, Project Management Institute Collaborate
KPMG LLP and Project Management Institute (PMI) have announced they are teaming up to develop programs to help the project management profession to embrace and leverage emerging and innovative technologies. Read more.

Featured job opportunities:

Personal Lines CSR
Brokers Trust Insurance Group
Woodbridge, ON

Marketing Assistant – Life Insurance & Group Benefits
SC Insurance
Scarborough, ON

ICTA NOMINATIONS

Cognition+ Community Transforms Reporting & Analytics
Data Analytics has become a primary concern within insurance, and this is true for the mutual insurance industry as well. The Cognition+ Mutual Insurance Community has enabled greater insights into their entire business operations through the implementation of the Cognition+ Insurance Analytics, leveraging their partnership with Cognition+ and BizXcel. Read more.

Duuo Tackles On-Demand Opportunity with Slice
Despite the popularity of short-term rentals – think Airbnb – many homeowners insurance policies do not cover the losses or damages that could occur. Recognizing the need to provide protection for homeowners participating in the short-term rental market, The Co-Operators launched Duuo, Canada's first on-demand insurance solution for short-term rental hosts. Read more.

Onlia Reinforces Safe Driving With Free App
Onlia Sense is a free mobile app, powered by IMS, that reinforces safe driving behaviors while highlighting the benefits of mindful driving awareness. Drivers have the option to sign up for a connected insurance program, on-demand insurance and other value-added services. Through Onlia Sense, Onlia (the parent organization) has entered Canada with an innovative, 100% pure digital insurance strategy that introduces a unique rewards system to drive engagement alongside an insurance cash-back approach – differentiating itself from more common UBI discount approaches. Read more.

UWInsure Builds A Broker System With ERP
UW Insure Brokers shares an account of our transformation to a digital business model, highlighting how our brokerage achieved a successful implementation of post-modern Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). Read more.

La Capitale Transforms Insurance Applications With Breathe Life Platform
Consumers' buying habits have changed dramatically, and although they still want to meet with advisors face-to-face, especially when applying for complex insurance products, they want the process to be seamless and digital. La Capitale launched the Breathe Life Enterprise Commerce Platform, a white-labeled carrier solution, to provide their advisors with the tools they need to provide a customer-centric experience – and advisors are responding by selling more products. Read more.

Mitchell & Whale Simplifies Commercial Quoting For Brokers
At Mitchell & Whale, we questioned why commercial insurance brokers had to work in the dark ages and couldn’t easily fulfil the most basic elements of broking for our clients.  We set out to solve this problem by developing Quotey, a broker-facing platform designed to dramatically change the dynamics of small business insurance from a customer, broker and insurer standpoint. Read more.

→ Discover the winners at ICTC2020!

“20/20 Foresight:
Keys To Success in a Dynamic World”

Feb. 25-26, 2020, in Toronto

It's the last week for early-bird rates!

Register for ICTC2020 by this Friday, Jan. 31 to take advantage of discounted fees!

Learn about key topics from industry-leading thinkers, including:

Reshaping Insurance With Data, Analytics, ML & AI
• Baiju Devani, SVP Data Science & Chief Data Officer, Aviva Canada

The Evolution of Innovation in Canadian P&C Insurance
• David Arbuthnot, Director - Innovation Outpost, Wawanesa Insurance

Transforming the Canadian Marketplace: Bringing a European Insurance Perspective to Canada
• Pieter Louter, Chief Executive Officer, Onlia

Visit insurance-canada.ca/ictc for more information.

From Doug Claims: No Longer [Entirely] MIA All remaining ICTA nominations have now been published, and at last, an example of innovation in the claims space. Given the industry attention to improving the claims experience, I had thought there might be more. This nomination is a relatively small niche – whether to repair or salvage a crashed vehicle. Applying some modern tech at the FNOL, a decision which used to take two weeks is now instantaneous in most cases – a dramatic difference for claimants. It also helps to reduce claim cost and improve adjuster satisfaction – a win-win-win. Most nominations address the customer experience on the acquisition side, either through customer-facing self-serve applications or indirectly through improvements in the quotation or underwriting processes. Others are more unique: setting up an innovation hub, on-demand insurance, commercial lines quoting, safety first, improved management information. Check out the nominations if you haven't. The ICTA finalists will be announced on this week, and the People’s Choice program will follow soon. Thanks to all those who are participating. The winners will be announced at ICTC2020! Doug Grant, CIP Partner Insurance-Canada.ca