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Pragmatic Blog
Insurance
The Return to Purpose-Driven Business Models: Spotlight on Insurance
Any leader in any company who sees a future for their business and career is feeling the pressure to innovate, find new ideas and business models, and create enduring client value that adds to the bottom line and strengthens the balance sheet. There is no one formula or set process to find and execute the…
What Happens to Insurance When We Can All Foresee Our Own Risks?
In a recent New York Times story, New Gene Test Poses Threat to Insurers, reporter Gina Kolata describes how data transparency and availability are disrupting underwriting for long term care insurance. Kolata discusses how this product, challenged for years by inaccurate claims forecasting and sky-high pricing, faces further threat of adverse selection — as a…
Strategy: Now is Not the Time, but Now is Always the Time
The Founder and CEO of an early stage company that has just closed a solid seed round tells me that what has benefited his business most in the past year, and allowed him to pivot towards a promising future, can be expressed in one word: Focus. The CEO of a late-stage startup who spent over…
Can the insurance sector move at the speed of change ?
Chances are you are presently or soon to be engaged in the annual planning cycle, taking stock of the year and anticipating your goals and targets for 2016. Annual planning feels anachronistic in a world where businesses survive only by operating at least at the speed of change, and where constant iteration is the order…
Eight Startups Aiming to Transform the Life Insurance Business
In my last post I described the state of the life insurance industry including the pain points where insurtech entrants can poise for impact. The life insurance industry is suffering from a dying (literally) distribution model, complex products and a flawed purchase funnel. New entrants can transform the industry by bringing a clean-sheet approach to:…
Can InsurTech make miracles happen in US healthcare?
As an American and the de facto administrator of my family’s health insurance, I am reminded routinely of some of the complexities of the methods we employ to maximize health and pay for care in this country. Forces are driving individuals, providers, insurers and employers to change their approaches or suffer the consequences. InsurTech companies…
Life Insurance #insurtech innovation: startups and carriers in pursuit
In my last post, I provided categories within which to organize the innovation players within life insurance. Both startups and legacy businesses are pursuing solutions to industry pain points. Attention is being paid to distribution, product, client experience, speed, productivity, big data, compliance and other areas within the life category where inefficiency exists or where…
Getting back in step with people’s needs
The origins of life insurance show up at least as long ago as the middle ages, when the notion of providing mutual aid emerged in organized structures. People came together, then via benefit societies for those in need and for the good of all. Similarly, modern-day carriers originated as mutual ownership based – a construct…
InsurTech Ventures Going After Big & Complex Health Insurance Pain Points
In my last post I outlined the four dimensions that are defining the opportunities for health insurtech innovation: the health of the American people, marketplace trends, the role of regulation, and the players. Incumbent health insurers are pursuing legacy tactics to compete in the ACA world: M&A (big deals either approved — Centene/Healthnet; facing regulatory…
Life Insurance Innovation: No Longer an Oxymoron
While most insurance technology startup activity in the US is concentrated in health and auto, there are signs of life (pun intended) in the life insurance sector. Given the business model challenges reported in my last post, optimists will see upside and big commercial white space throughout the ecosystem. People with the skills, smarts and…
About Amy Radin
Amy Radin is an adviser, speaker and author, working with executives and senior leaders to deliver growth through meaningful innovation. She offers an uncommonly pragmatic and disciplined approach that begins with pinpointing high-potential unmet market needs, and from there provides a proven framework for “what to do next” and how to lead through the inevitable, daily challenges any organization will face in pursuit of innovation.
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Amy is a leader who is demanding and relentless in the pursuit of the great.
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Kahina Van Dyke
Global Head, Digital Channels & Client Data Analytics; Standard Chartered Bank Board Member, Progressive Insurance