How InsurTech Is Bringing Disruption to the Insurance Sector and How EarlyBirds Can Help Organisations Looking to Transform

EarlyBirds, an Australian company that operates the Early Birds, a business to business (B2B) innovation ecosystem that offers a way for innovators, early adopters, and subject matter experts (SMEs) to collaborate and push for technology advancement, wants to point out that InsurTech is bringing disruption to the insurance sector. InsurTech refers to the utilisation of technological innovations to boost efficiency and savings in the industry. Meanwhile, EarlyBirds can play an important role in helping organisations looking to transform their business through innovations.

InsurTech and digital innovations have been disrupting the current state of the insurance industry and transforming the habits and needs of insurance customers. The insurance industry has been changing very slowly but now, insurance professionals will need to adopt new technology if they want to progress or remain ahead of the competition.

The insurance sector is composed of companies that provide risk management through insurance contracts. The primary concept of insurance is that the insurer guarantees payment for an uncertain future occurrence while the insured pays a smaller premium to the insurer in exchange for protection against such an uncertain future event. As an industry, it is a safe sector for investors, but it is generally slow growing.

Meanwhile, the insurance sector is currently faced with a number of challenges and opportunities. These include: the shift in the balance of power in which the consumer has become more powerful; learning how to use big data properly; learning how to choose those technologies that can be applied to make the industry more efficient and enhance their services; understanding the cyber risks and getting protection against data breaches; learning how to deal with an on-demand economy; the increase in unpredictable serious catastrophic environmental events; the need to create worldwide standards for insurance; and the need to stay ahead of challenges.

As of the present time, several InsurTech successes have already been observed. One example is the automation of previously manually written notifications, payout computations, follow-ups, and underwriting that were typically boring to do. This led to better productivity, faster documentation, and enhanced efficiency. Specifically, robotic process automation (RPA) and machine learning have been applied to internal workflow automation that, in turn, boosts efficiency and productivity.

In addition, artificial intelligence (AI) insurance software has been reshaping claims processing with the benefits of faster processing and reduction of costs. For instance, in an agrarian insurance claim for a huge corporate client, the payout decision would have taken a long time to make a payout decision while they wait for the collection of data from the acres of land affected by drought. New technology, such as drones, machine learning algorithms, and AI software allow the elimination of the human factor and the drastic reduction in time and cost for this process.

Meanwhile, insurance companies who want to apply InsurTech to enhance their operations may be helped by EarlyBirds B2B open innovation ecosystem. Through EarlyBirds, businesses can partner with innovators and obtain advice from SMEs and ultimately unearth solutions as to how they can apply InsurTech to boost their operations and profits. The EarlyBirds platform has more than one million innovators from various parts of the world and has more than 100 SMEs and more than 500 organisations registered. That is a big number of innovators to choose from, which greatly increases the likelihood that insurance businesses will find innovators who can help them with their InsurTech projects.

The EarlyBirds open innovation ecosystem has two components self-service usage of the platform and their assisted programs . The Explorer program is designed for accelerating innovation for the whole organisation. It has several key features, such as: a platform enterprise license; weekly webinars to help stimulate innovation in the organisation; a nominated SME for the business; a focus on specific innovations; and quarterly and monthly innovation days. The Challenger program is designed for those who want to focus on just one challenge at a time for the organisation.

Those who are interested in learning more as to how the EarlyBirds can help insurance companies apply InsurTech to solve business and technical challenges can visit the EarlyBirds website at earlybirds.io or contact them through the telephone or via email.