Asia InsurTech Podcast

Embedded health is transforming the traditional role of insurers from passive claim-payers to active partners in their customers’ health journeys. By integrating health services—like wellness tools, virtual care, and personalized health content—directly into existing insurance apps and digital platforms, insurers can offer continuous value beyond claims. This shift not only enhances customer satisfaction and engagement but also drives tangible business outcomes, such as improved retention, increased acquisition, and reduced operational costs. The key is embedding these services where customers already are—whether in insurance apps, distribution channels, or even lifestyle and retail platforms. In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, Shane Di and Sebastien Gaudin of The CareVoice dive into the rapidly evolving world of embedded health within the insurance sector. They discuss how integrating health services directly into the digital lives of their customers create seamless experiences that go beyond policy management. Through a user-first approach, they’ve built a platform that not only engages customers but also foster long-term relationships. The key to their success? Speed, flexibility, and personalization that speak directly to the end user. Building flexible, scalable platforms that can be deployed quickly and adapted easily is essential to stay competitive for insurers. As digital health becomes central to the insurance value chain, the future lies in systems that are fast to launch, simple to manage, and built to evolve—always with the end user at the core. The post EP 245 – Can Insurers Move From Claims to Care With Embedded Health? – Shane Di and Sebastien Gaudin – The CareVoice appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

Insurance policies are designed to be comprehensive and legally sound, but their complexity often leaves both customers and professionals overwhelmed and uncertain. Bridging the gap between regulatory necessity and user understanding requires more than just simplifying language — it demands a new approach to structuring and accessing information. By distilling complex documents into clear, intuitive insights, it becomes possible to empower brokers, underwriters, and claims managers to make faster, more confident decisions, while restoring trust with customers who deserve transparency. In this episode, we spoke with Jasmin Flori-Hess, the Founder and CEO of Raindrop, about her mission to bring trust, clarity, and transparency to insurance. What began as a personal frustration — spending 15 hours reading through insurance policies before a family camping trip — led Jasmin to create a solution that transforms complex policy documents into simple, actionable insights.  Driven by a customer-first mindset and an outsider’s fresh perspective, Jasmin built Raindrop not just for consumers, but also for brokers, carriers, and claims managers who struggle to navigate the growing complexity of insurance products. Raindrop’s platform uses a specialized AI model, trained only on policy documents, to ensure accurate, explainable answers without bias — offering a new standard of trust in an industry that needs it more than ever. The post EP 244 – Why Transparent Policy Communication Matters More Than Ever – Jasmin Flori-Hess – Founder and CEO at Raindrop appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

While banking and investment platforms rapidly moved to mobile apps over a decade ago, the insurance industry’s transition has been slower. This delay has made it more difficult for the industry to adapt to newer technologies like AI and seamless digital integration. The result is a significant gap—especially visible in areas like personal insurance for high-value items—where consumers are left without quick, flexible, options.  In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, we talk to Stephan Kaiser, the CEO and Founder of KoverNow, about why the insurance industry has fallen behind in the digital race This delay has made it difficult for the industry to adapt to newer technologies like AI and seamless digital integration. The result is a significant gap—especially visible in areas like personal insurance for high-value items—where consumers are left without quick, flexible, or transparent options. At the same time, luxury goods markets are booming and increasingly shifting online, with younger, digital-native consumers leading the charge. These consumers expect instant, app-based experiences—including when it comes to insuring their expensive purchases. Traditional insurance, designed for static home contents, doesn’t match these expectations. A new approach is needed—one that blends mobile-first tech, standardized pricing for branded goods, and embedded insurance offered at the point of sale. The path forward also depends on updated regulatory frameworks and greater willingness from insurers to rethink distribution and customer engagement in the digital age. The post EP 243 – Can Luxury Goods Insurance Go Completely Digital? – Stephan Kaiser – Founder and CEO of KoverNow appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

Artificial intelligence is starting to play a powerful role in transforming the insurance industry, especially in how companies operate behind the scenes and connect with clients. While many insurers are still catching up to other parts of financial services, they are beginning to use AI to improve productivity, speed up processes, and support employees—particularly in areas like underwriting, customer service, and agent training.  However, deeply rooted legacy systems and a cautious approach to change continue to slow the pace of progress. The real challenge lies in reimagining old processes, not just automating them, and doing so in a way that builds trust and value for clients. At the same time, AI is opening new doors to rethink client engagement in a traditionally low-touch industry. In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, we explore how artificial intelligence is reshaping the insurance industry through a thoughtful conversation with Aneesh Chaudhry, Chief Data and Analytics Officer at Sun Life Asia. Aneesh shares how the industry is embracing AI, not just to improve internal operations like underwriting and policy processing, but also to enhance client experiences.  He explains that while insurance may not have the daily customer touchpoints of banking, AI is helping bridge that gap by enabling smarter, faster, and more personalized services—from using GenAI to train rookie advisors to gamifying financial literacy for young customers. The post EP 242 – How Can AI Help You Get Better Insurance? – Aneesh Chaudhry – Chief Data & Analytics Officer, Sun Life Asia appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The insurance industry is at a turning point, driven by the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence and digital technology. Traditional models of risk assessment and product creation can be slow and often fail to address the unique needs of individuals and businesses. Generative AI is changing this by enabling insurers to develop products faster, target micro-segments more effectively, and create policies that better match specific risks. By analyzing vast amounts of data, AI can refine underwriting processes, personalize offerings, and reduce the cost of serving customers. This shift not only enhances efficiency but also makes insurance more accessible and relevant to a wider range of consumers. In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, Amit Boni, CEO of Ensuredit breaks down precisely how generative AI is transforming insurance product creation, making it faster and more precise through micro-segmentation. He challenges the industry’s existing approach, arguing that AI can unlock hyper-personalized policies and better risk assessment, ultimately reducing costs and improving accessibility. From AI-powered customer interactions to embedded insurance that adapts to real-time events—like offering event cancellation coverage when booking flights to a concert—Amit reveals how technology is reshaping the insurance landscape. The post EP 241 – How Does AI Help Create the Best Insurance Policy for You? – Amit Boni – CEO of Ensuredit appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, Peter Tilocca, Head of Underwriting at NobleOak Insurance, dives into the transformative innovations reshaping the underwriting landscape. From digital tools becoming the baseline to the vast potential of wearable data, Peter highlights how technology and data are streamlining risk assessment and enhancing customer experiences. He emphasizes the need for ethical AI usage and smarter risk segmentation, moving away from outdated practices like mandatory medical exams. Wearables, gamification, and non-traditional data sources such as socio-economic factors are proving to be game-changers in improving affordability and personalization in life insurance. Peter also discusses the importance of balancing innovation with stable risk management. With climate impacts and real-time data shaping the industry, he advocates for collaboration with InsurTech startups to address life insurance challenges. Drawing on his work with InsurTech Australia, Peter shares how flexible roadmaps, AI ethics committees, and a customer-focused mindset can help insurers embrace new opportunities while maintaining responsibility. The post EP 240 – Is Life Insurance in Australia Ready to Embrace the Future? – Peter Tilocca – NobleOak appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast recently welcomed back Dhirendra Mahyavanshi, co-founder of Turtlemint, to discuss the transformative journey of his company and the InsurTech industry at large. We spoke about how the evolution of InsurTech is reshaping the way insurance and financial services are accessed and delivered, particularly in underserved markets. Technology has become a key driver of innovation, enabling companies to address gaps in distribution, personalization, and engagement. By leveraging artificial intelligence and embedded insurance models, businesses are creating frictionless experiences that reach consumers in tier-three and tier-four markets. Small-ticket insurance products are becoming entry points for financial inclusion, allowing first-time buyers to build trust and graduate to more comprehensive coverage and services. This approach not only improves access but also enhances consumer awareness about risk management and financial planning. Content and data-driven strategies are at the heart of this transformation. Hyper-localized, multi-lingual content ensures relevance for diverse audiences, while AI-powered tools streamline operations, reduce costs, and enable highly personalized customer interactions. The integration of additional financial products, such as mutual funds and loans, complements insurance offerings, creating a holistic ecosystem for consumers. As regulatory frameworks evolve, the challenge lies in balancing compliance with innovation to unlock the full potential of these technologies, making financial services more inclusive and efficient for all. The post EP 239 – Is Generative AI Revolutionizing Insurance for Underserved Communities in India? – Dhirendra Mahyavanshi – Turtlemint appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The insurance industry is on the brink of a technological revolution, and Satishwar Balakrishnan, Managing Director and CEO of Bandhan Life Insurance, is at the forefront of this transformation. In this episode, Satishwar shares how generative AI is reshaping life insurance by enabling hyper-personalized customer experiences and supercharging advisor productivity. By acting as a co-pilot, AI allows advisors to provide tailored solutions, anticipate customer needs, and even calculate policy adjustments in real time—all while maintaining the human touch.  This isn’t just about better service; it’s about breaking barriers, particularly for India’s vast self-employed population, a segment traditionally underserved due to underwriting challenges. Through data-driven innovation, Bandhan Life is rewriting the rules of insurance, catering to a growing class of freelancers and entrepreneurs who are redefining work itself. But it’s not just about customers; AI is revolutionizing the workplace, too. From assisting internal collaboration to streamlining complex tasks, AI is proving to be a powerful ally, not a replacement. Satishwar debunks the myth that technology eliminates jobs, emphasizing instead how it amplifies human potential, enabling organizations to scale like never before. As India embraces a startup boom and self-employment rises, Bandhan Life is using AI to meet the evolving needs of its customers while making insurance more accessible, efficient, and inclusive. The post EP 238 – How Is Generative AI Making Life Insurance More Accessible? – Satishwar Balakrishnan – Bandhan Life Insurance appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

Australia’s InsurTech scene is a hotbed for innovation. Simone Dossetor, CEO of InsurTech Australia, sheds light on why the country’s collaborative culture and global outlook make it an ideal place for InsurTech startups to thrive. With a single national regulatory framework, InsurTechs can efficiently scale and test new ideas in a manageable environment before expanding globally. Add to this Australia’s diversity—fueled by international talent from its renowned universities—and the result is a dynamic ecosystem that fosters creativity and cross-border collaborations. While Australia serves as a perfect launchpad for innovative solutions, the road to scaling globally demands a strong commercial lens and strategic partnerships. With InsurTech Australia acting as a connector between startups and industry giants, the ecosystem not only accelerates innovation but also addresses challenges like integrating emerging technologies and expanding into untapped sectors like climate tech and health tech. The future of Australia’a InsurTech ecosystem lies in its ability to expand into adjacent sectors like climate tech, property tech, and health tech, leveraging innovation to meet evolving challenges. With a growing focus on efficiency and value chain improvements, Australia’s streamlined regulatory framework, diverse talent pool, and robust infrastructure make it an ideal testing ground for new products and ideas, which can then be scaled and adapted for global markets. The post EP 237 – Is Australia Building the Future of Global Insurance? – Simone Dossetor – CEO of InsurTech Australia appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, we explore how embedded insurance is transforming the insurance industry with Nigel Fellowes-Freeman, the CEO of Kanopi. Embedded insurance simplifies the buying process by offering tailored coverage directly within products or services consumers already use, eliminating the confusion of traditional insurance purchases. Nigel highlights how businesses can benefit from embedding insurance by boosting customer engagement, generating new revenue streams, and offering personalized, relevant coverage in real time. Though the technical challenges are significant, the convenience and value this model offers to both consumers and companies are undeniable. Nigel also delves into the future of the insurance landscape, where embedded insurance could help close the growing global protection gap. As more services adopt embedded insurance, more consumers will gain access to coverage, especially in underserved markets. While brokers won’t be replaced, their role will evolve from selling transactional policies to providing expert advice on complex insurance needs. With embedded insurance, the shift toward more integrated, data-driven solutions is reshaping how insurance is delivered, opening up new opportunities for both businesses and consumers alike. The post EP 236 – Will Embedded Insurance Change How We Buy Protection Forever? – Nigel Fellowes-Freeman – Kanopi appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, we dive deep into the entrepreneurial journey of Tetiana George, co-founder and CEO of Curium. Tetiana opens up about the challenges of fundraising and why she chose to walk away from investors who offered terms she found restrictive. Instead of being held back by “handcuffs” that limited her vision, Tetiana pivoted Curium by listening to its target market and focusing on compliance automation, a key area that industry players were eager for but hadn’t fully articulated. This decisive move enabled Curium to stay nimble, build a solution that small insurers and brokers could easily adopt, and ultimately secure a more strategic partnership that aligns with Curium’s long-term goals. Tetiana’s approach to leadership is equally bold—she’s built a fast-moving, lean team where everyone, regardless of title, contributes to the company’s growth. By fostering a culture of autonomy and deep listening to both customers and employees, Curium has become a compliance powerhouse, with plans to expand globally. In this episode, Tetiana shares hard-earned lessons on staying true to your vision, avoiding bad investor deals, and the critical importance of adapting quickly to market signals. The post EP 235 – Pivoting Under Pressure Could Be the Secret to Startup Success – Tetiana George – Curium appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

In this episode, we dive into the challenges and opportunities facing the insurance industry with Julien Condamines, co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer at Novo AI. Julien believes there is an urgent need for change, and he highlights the growing gap between claims payments and premiums, driven by inefficiencies and many other factors. He also believes that outdated technology, particularly in claims processing, is creating operational bottlenecks and holding insurers back from achieving higher productivity and profitability. Julien explains how AI, specifically generative AI, can help redefine the claims value chain and improve operational efficiency. Rather than replacing jobs, AI has the potential to enhance the workforce by automating repetitive tasks, allowing teams to focus on higher-value work. He stresses the importance of shifting the focus from digital distribution to operational optimization, helping insurers streamline processes, increase accuracy, and tackle fraud. The key takeaway is that by embracing AI-driven solutions, the insurance industry can improve both customer experiences and internal operations. The post EP 234 – How Generative AI Is Reshaping the Insurance Industry – Julien Condamines – Novo AI appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, Ronak Shah, CEO of QBE Singapore, shares his 20+ years of experience in the insurance industry, shedding light on its significant impact on people’s lives. He emphasizes how insurance provides a critical safety net, protecting individuals and families during life’s most challenging moments. Ronak’s personal story of stumbling into the industry and staying because of its far-reaching effects highlights how essential and often under appreciated insurance is. He also discusses the importance of SMEs in Southeast Asia, which make up 99% of businesses in Singapore, and how they are often underserved and underinsured. This presents both a challenge and a significant opportunity for the insurance industry. Ronak also delves into the evolving role of technology, particularly artificial intelligence, in insurance. While AI can streamline processes and enhance productivity, especially in areas like underwriting and claims, Ronak stresses that it is meant to augment rather than replace human roles. He also emphasizes the need for empathy and human connection in the industry, especially when dealing with claims and customer service. Finally, he discusses the Singaporean government’s critical role in fostering innovation and long-term planning, making Singapore a global hub for insurance and financial services. The post EP 233 – How Insurance Provides a Critical Safety Net for Families and Businesses – Ronak Shah – CEO QBE Singapore appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

“I do think AI is going to start to play a bigger and bigger role. Because I think it’s just naturally something, when you start to think about opportunities we talked about with data, AI can be used to produce data, so injecting that within business processes where it could take over some mundane tests, but more importantly, help augment what you do in terms of data to maybe less than the dependency on, on going and seeking that data…” – Jeff Heine In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, Jeffrey Heine, Chief Revenue Officer of Novidea, shared insights from his extensive career in the insurance industry. Heine emphasized the importance of firsthand experience in claims, which gave him a deeper understanding of the industry’s core mission to support customers during difficult times. He highlighted the unique challenges and opportunities in Asia, noting the region’s advanced state of digital transformation and strong focus on customer engagement. Heine underscored the necessity of proactive customer interactions and the potential of using data to improve service delivery and risk management. Heine also discussed the significant benefits of operational efficiencies and data connectivity within insurance companies, which can enhance internal relationships and customer service. He pointed to the transformative role of artificial intelligence (AI) in handling mundane tasks and providing real-time insights. Additionally, Heine envisioned a future where insurance ecosystems integrate with various platforms, such as e-commerce and ride-hailing services, to offer personalized solutions based on customers’ life events. This interconnected approach aims to improve the overall customer experience and ensure that the industry fulfills its promise of protection and support. The post EP 232 – Navigating Unique Challenges and Opportunities in the Asian Insurance Market – Jeff Heine – Chief Revenue Officer, Novidea appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, we sat down with Yamini Bhat, co-founder and CEO of Vymo, to discuss the intricacies of global expansion and the strategic insights she has gained from growing Vymo. Yamini highlighted the critical importance of localizing business strategies to fit different markets, from Japan’s preference for small, highly compliant behavioral changes to the U.S.’s flexible approach that offers a variety of options for sellers. She shared how Vymo leverages data to coach and enable salespeople, tailoring the platform to meet the diverse regulatory and cultural needs of markets across Southeast Asia, Japan, and the U.S. Yamini also discussed the operational strategies that have propelled Vymo’s growth, emphasizing the balance between maintaining a global brand and adapting to local markets. By building a global yet local team, Vymo ensures responsiveness to customer needs while leveraging centralized expertise. She underscored the importance of adapting to macroeconomic trends and integrating AI technologies to enhance the platform’s capabilities. Yamini’s insights provide a valuable blueprint for any company looking to scale internationally, highlighting the necessity of being globally ambitious and locally adept. The post EP 231 – Global Expansion: Data-Driven Local Strategies for Sales Excellence – Yamini Bhat – co-Founder and the CEO of Vymo appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

“I feel like there’s a convergence going on. And that’s, that’s with InsurTech and FinTech. And what’s being left behind in the world of InsurTech is increasingly, in my view, core systems, a new generation of core systems. But everything else, like when you talk about embedded insurance, it’s becoming part of embedded finance. And it’s this whole kind of movement to make insurance invisible.” – Anthony Lee The Asia InsurTech Podcast was joined by Anthony Lee, a co-founder and CEO of Lydia.ai in which we delved into the transformative intersection of InsurTech and FinTech. Anthony explained how these sectors are converging, with embedded insurance becoming a seamless part of financial transactions, aiming to make insurance coverage as effortless as possible. Lydia.ai leverages health data from universal healthcare systems to create risk scores that automate the underwriting process, enabling insurers to offer simplified insurance products without medical exams. This approach not only streamlines the insurance buying process but also integrates insurance into everyday financial activities, making it practically invisible to the consumer. Anthony also highlighted the role of personalized health recommendations derived from AI and data analysis. Lydia.ai’s platform analyzes activity data from smartphones and wearables to provide tailored health advice, leading to better insurance offers. By embedding health risk scores into digital banking and e-commerce platforms, Lydia.ai is making insurance more accessible and integrated into daily life. This innovative approach reflects a significant shift towards a more customer-centric insurance model, driven by the advancements in AI and the strategic use of health data. The post EP 230 – The Convergence of InsurTech and FinTech: Making Insurance Invisible – Anthony Lee – co-Founder and CEO of LydiaAI appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

“So we’re getting great conversion rates on eligible items. And we’re just in that period. Now. We’re moving to convert those customers to paid customers. So I’ll keep you posted on what that looks like. But really, I mean, honestly, you know, when you launch something, you go, this is going to be crickets. I am prepared for silence. I agree. We’re very prepared for the champagne moment, the launch and then nothing. So the fact that customers are even clicking or understanding what we’re offering us, or seeing it there, online is a huge win for us.” – Katherine Clayton The Asia InsurTech Podcast was joined by Katherine Clayton during which she shared her extensive experience in transforming legacy industries and the unique challenges she has navigated in launching her latest venture in the insurance sector. Coming from a background in organizational and business transformation across various traditional industries such as oil, gas, and mining, Katherine has leveraged her expertise to innovate within the insurance space. She emphasized the importance of keeping businesses relevant in the face of rapidly evolving technology and consumer preferences, drawing examples from successful transformations like Netflix, and failures like Blockbuster. Katherine also discussed the strategic approach behind Peachii’s product design and market engagement. Recognizing the gap in traditional insurance offerings for younger consumers, Peachii innovates by providing insurance for individual high-value items directly at the point of sale, simplifying the insurance process and making it more accessible. This model not only appeals to a demographic with evolving asset ownership patterns but also embeds insurance into everyday shopping experiences through partnerships with trusted retailers. These efforts are underpinned by a commitment to build consumer trust and educate new markets about the value of insurance. The post EP 229 – From Legacy to Leading Edge: Transparent, Affordable and Flexible Item-by-Item Insurance – Katherine Clayton – co-Founder and CEO of Peachii Insurance appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

“Health is not a sprint. Health is a marathon. We spent seven years only creating the health score. 400 million man years of clinical data. So it was an enormous undertaking to create that health score.” – Peter Ohnemus In this episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, Peter Ohnemus, President & CEO of dacadoo, discusses the development of its Health Score & AI-based Lifestyle Navigation Platform that integrates clinical data to evaluate individual health comprehensively. Peter notes that dacadoo spent seven years analyzing 400 million man-years of data to create this scoring system. This effort aims to make health status understandable and actionable for consumers, thus fostering better personal health management. Throughout the discussion, Peter emphasizes the transformative potential of technology in health and insurance sectors. He explains how traditional methods in these industries are being overhauled by innovations that offer personalized insights and proactive health management. The conversation also touches on the broader implications of such technologies, including their ability to drive down insurance costs and improve overall societal health by promoting healthier lifestyles through data-driven insights and individualized health metrics. The post EP 228 – Building Meaningful Health Scores: Understanding Health in the Digital Age – Peter Ohnemus – President and CEO of dacadoo appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

“When you talk to customers, I would say both we have to make sure that insurers are willing to embark on the journey with us and that it addresses their needs. But ultimately, the end user is super important, if solutions are not compelling for the end users, you know, it doesn’t work.” – Sebastien Gaudin The Asia InsurTech Podcast welcomed back Sebastien Gaudin, the Founder & CEO of The CareVoice, after his last appearance on the show in 2021! Clearly, a lot has changed since then, and this episode dives into those changes, especially focusing on the company’s product evolution and geographic expansion. Sebastien discusses the shift from a standalone app to a platform that allows seamless integration of digital health services into the interfaces of various insurers. This platform is now operational in 15 countries across all continents, marking significant progress in their global expansion. Sebastien also highlights the importance of engagement management in their services, explaining how it increases user activity and satisfaction. Additionally, Sebastien shares insights from their recent Series B funding round, emphasizing how it will help scale their operations and invest in product and commercial development. The post EP 227 – Revolutionizing Health Insurance: Embedded Health Solutions and Driving Customer Engagement – Sebastien Gaudin – Founder and CEO of The CareVoice appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

“Asia, of course, is a construct of many, many geographies. And each geography is very different…I see a real opportunity to leapfrog and not go through all the stages… Here in Asia, you can make markets, you can create markets.” – Bernhard Kotanko In this second episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast featuring Bernhard Kotanko, a Senior Partner at McKinsey & Company, we do a deep dive into the future of Property and Casualty (P&C) Insurance in Asia. Amidst a backdrop of rapid technological advancements and evolving societal needs, Bernhard explores the untapped potential within the region’s P&C insurance sector, examining the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. As emerging markets in Asia show significantly lower insurance penetration compared to their GDP growth, Bernhard sheds light on the need for innovative solutions to bridge this gap. From the rise of digital and embedded insurance to the integration of AI for better risk management, this episode navigates the complex landscape of insurance in Asia, discussing how technology continues to reshape the industry. Bernhard addresses distribution, insurance literacy, and the impact of new risks like cyber threats and climate change on the sector. This conversation balances the technical with the transformative and explores how the P&C Insurance market in Asia is poised for a leap into the future, driven by innovation and a deeper understanding of customer needs.  McKinsey & Company’s “Global Insurance Report: The Future of Asia P&C Insurance” can be downloaded here. The post EP 226 – Bernhard Kotanko – McKinsey & Company – Overcoming Obstacles and Seizing Value in Asia’s P&C Insurance Market appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

Amidst a backdrop of slowed growth rates in Life Insurance, both developed and developing markets in Asia are facing critical junctures. In an insightful episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, Bernhard Kotanko, a Senior Partner and Asia-Pacific Insurance Practice leader at McKinsey & Company delves into the transformative shifts within Asia’s Life Insurance sector. Bernhard emphasizes the importance of adopting customer-centric strategies to bridge the gap between consumer expectations and insurance offerings. Despite the rise in digitalization efforts, the penetration of purely digital insurance sales remains minimal, indicating significant room for improvement and innovation. A crucial part of navigating these shifts involves making bold decisions in the realms of talent and technology. Bernhard suggests that the future of the industry depends on attracting diverse skill sets and leveraging technologies such as generative AI to enhance customer interactions and operational efficiencies. Moreover, he advocates for a reinvigoration of the insurance sector’s purpose, highlighting its unique position as a “triple win” industry that aligns the interests of customers, shareholders, and employees alike. McKinsey & Company’s “Global Insurance Report: A Paradigm Shift in Asia Life Insurance” can be downloaded here. The post EP 225 – Bernhard Kotanko – McKinsey & Company – A Paradigm Shift – Navigating APAC’s Dynamic Life Insurance Landscape appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

In a truly fascinating episode of the Asia InsurTech Podcast, Damola Oloko and Victoria Olorunmola dive deep into the transformative potential of InsurTech across the African continent. Highlighting the critical importance of tailoring insurance technology solutions to local cultures and consumer behaviors, they discuss how understanding regional nuances can drive the adoption of insurance products. From the success of funeral insurance in Ghana, rooted in deep cultural traditions, to leveraging Africa’s youthful, digital-first demographic, the conversation underscores the unique opportunities and challenges that shape the InsurTech landscape in Africa. The dialogue also sheds light on the power of storytelling and community building in enhancing insurance literacy and fostering a collaborative ecosystem for innovation. As professionals who transitioned from communications to the forefront of InsurTech, Victoria and Damola exemplify the impact of bringing diverse perspectives to the sector. Their journey underscores the significance of adaptability, continuous learning, and the collaborative spirit in driving the future of insurance, offering valuable lessons not just for Africa, but for global markets navigating the complexities of InsurTech. The post EP 224 – Adedamola Oloko and Victoria Olorunmola – AXA Mansard – A Deep Dive into Africa’s InsurTech Evolution appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast was joined by Gourab Mukherjee, CEO and co-founder of Aktivo Labs, to discuss the transformative power of technology in the health and insurance sectors. Gourab highlighted the significant advancements in health monitoring and management through the integration of real-time data, personalization, and digital health ecosystems. Utilizing smartphone data, wearables, and sophisticated algorithms, Aktivo Labs aims to empower individuals with actionable insights for healthier living. The conversation also touched on the accuracy and evolving capabilities of health-related technologies, underscoring their potential to revolutionize personal health and wellness practices. Gourab shared insights into Aktivo Labs’ global expansion strategy, emphasizing the importance of understanding and adapting to local markets, as demonstrated by their ventures into the United States and Japan. Through strategic partnerships and a keen awareness of macroeconomic tailwinds, Aktivo Labs tailors its approach to meet the unique needs of diverse demographics, from aging populations in Japan to younger ones in Africa. Looking ahead, he envisions a future where health and technology are seamlessly integrated, enabling individuals to make informed decisions about their health and lifestyle. This future promises a more engaged, healthier global population, driven by innovations that bridge the gap between health, technology, and everyday life. The post EP 223 – Gourab Mukherjee – CEO of Aktivo Labs – It’s Going to Be a $7 Trillion Health Care Bill appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The world of InsurTech continues to rapidly evolve, driven by technological advancements, innovative products, and a push to expand insurance penetration in emerging markets. The podcast was joined by Jack Xia, the Chief Actuary at Igloo, who shed light on several critical insights into the InsurTech landscape, particularly in Southeast Asia. Jack explored how Igloo leverages AI to transform insurance offerings, from automating policies to introducing microinsurance products that cater to the unmet needs of emerging markets. Jack also sheds light on the challenges and successes of introducing novel products like weather index insurance for farmers in Vietnam, highlighting the importance of adapting and educating the market. By embracing technology, focusing on education, and continuously innovating, InsurTechs are not only redefining the role of insurance in people’s lives but are also paving the way for a more inclusive and accessible insurance ecosystem globally. The post EP 222 – Jack Xia – Chief Actuary at Igloo – Using Math and Statistics to Predict and Manage Financial Risk appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

Welcome back to the AIP News RoundUp co-hosted by Michael Waitze and Theresa Blissing. This episode focuses on key developments in the InsurTech sector for January 2024, highlighting significant trends and strategic movements within Asia’s insurance industry.  Theresa and Michael discuss the notable acquisition of Singlife by Sumitomo Life, marking a significant move in mergers and acquisitions in the region. We also examine OneDegree’s expansion into the UAE, offering cyber policies for cryptocurrency exchanges, and PhonePe’s innovative approach to insurance distribution in India, which has led to a substantial increase in digital two-wheeler insurance.  Furthermore, we explore the transition of companies like Roojai.com from niche markets to full-stack insurers, reflecting the growing maturity of the InsurTech space. Lastly, we look into PolicyStreet’s foray into Takaful insurance in Malaysia, underscoring the sector’s responsiveness to regulatory and market needs. The post AIP News RoundUp – EP 65 – Theresa Blissing and Michael Waitze – Mergers, Consolidation, and Strategic Market Expansion appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast recently spoke with Dr. Avi Baruch, a co-Founder and COO of Previsico. Avi shared his insights on the important global issue of flooding, emphasizing its far-reaching impacts beyond just financial loss. He described how his journey from academia to entrepreneurship led to the development of innovative flood forecasting technology at Previsico. This technology, born from his team’s research at Loughborough University, aims to minimize the impact of flooding worldwide by providing early warnings and enabling preventative actions. Avi also discussed how Previsico’s works with the insurance industry. He explained how Previsico’s approach complements traditional insurance by reducing the severity of flood impacts through strategic partnerships with insurers. This integration enhances insurers’ offerings, shifting their role from underwriting risks to actively helping clients mitigate them. Moreover, Avi highlighted the importance of real-time data from sensors in understanding and adapting to site-specific flood challenges, marking a significant step towards more effective flood risk management and a future where insurance transcends financial coverage to encompass active risk reduction. The post EP 221 – Avinoam Baruch – COO at Previsico – To Be Flooded Is a Devastating Experience appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

Shaun Quincey, co-founder and CEO of Simfuni, is a self-proclaimed “payments geek” who has dedicated his career to building elegant payment experiences. His initial experience in payments led him to start a successful buy now, pay later business, which was later sold to Latitude in 2019. Driven by a desire to continue to innovate in the payment space, Quincey co-founded Simfuni, aiming to revolutionize the payment experience in the insurance industry. Simfuni’s goal is to digitize payment processes, making them more efficient and user-friendly for both consumers and internal stakeholders. This involves understanding customers’ payment preferences, offering flexible payment options, and integrating payment systems with industry-specific software to improve the overall experience. Simfuni’s vision extends beyond mere transaction processing. Simfuni views payment systems as crucial enablers of service consumption, striving for frictionless and elegant experiences. Simfuni aims to transform the insurance payment experience, making it intuitive and satisfying for the modern consumer, while also serving as a channel for insurance sellers to engage with customers, enhancing their understanding of policies and payment options. The post EP 220 – Shaun Quincey – Simfuni – Capitalizing on the Payment Interactions to Enable More Experiences appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

When we wrapped 2022, we did a list of the pod’s top ten episodes. This year was a bit different. AIP split into two shows and birthed a brand new podcast we called InsurTech Amplified to give us the opportunity to cover all of the excitement in the Insurance and InsurTech spaces outside of Asia. This allowed us to broaden our guest list to the entire globe. This also means that we rotate weekly between InsurTech Amplified and Asia InsurTech Podcast. This year we covered our top 5 AIP episodes, our top 9 countries and the top ten topics we covered all year. All in all, 2023 was an amazing year for the podcast and we expecting even bigger things for 2024. Here are 2023’s top 5: 5. Jeffrey Khoo – Vice Chairman APAC at Arbol – Why Am I So in Love With Parametric Insurance – https://bit.ly/3H41JPT 4. Tom Gerritsen – AIA – This is the iPhone Moment of AI – https://bit.ly/3NKwbSI 3. Amit Patel – co-Founder and CEO at Peachy – It’s Time to Rewrite the Proposition – https://bit.ly/41Eeb22 2. Raunak Mehta – co-Founder and CEO at Igloo – People Want to Be Protected – https://bit.ly/3GZSMXF Jonathan Rake – Swiss Re Corporate Solutions – Working Off the same Single Source of Truth – https://bit.ly/3S0y68i Happy New Year to everyone and thank you for your continuing support! The post Year End Special 2023 appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast hosted Fred Hegner, an expert in life and health insurance claims. Fred’s deep passion for the insurance industry, particularly in the realm of claims, makes for a compelling dialogue. Drawing inspiration from his father’s legacy in the field, Fred shares his unique perspective on the evolution of insurance claims, emphasizing the importance of maintaining the promise to customers, especially in their moments of need. We dive into the transformative role of technology in insurance claims. Fred explores how advancements like AI, machine learning, and chatbots have revolutionized claims processing, enhancing speed and efficiency. We also discuss the impact of wearable health technology on underwriting and risk assessment, and the potential future directions of the industry, including blockchain’s role in claims verification and the concept of open insurance. The post EP 219 – Fred Hegner – Insurance Industry Expert – The Fundamental of the Claim Is the Promise to the Customer appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast was joined by Divyajot Singh, the Principal Product Strategist at Neutrinos. He dove into the topic of democratizing insurance through the use of technology and low-code platforms. Neutrinos is a platform that helps insurers and carriers overcome the complexities and backlogs in their IT departments, enabling them to move faster in their digital transformation journey. Divyajot explains how their platform allows for the creation and sharing of digital assets and templates among different insurance companies, similar to how GitHub functions for developers. We also discuss the impact of artificial intelligence on insurance processes, particularly in claims management, and the integration of Neutrinos with communication platforms like WhatsApp and Line. Finally, DJ explores the future of insurance, including the simplification and personalization of insurance products. The post EP 218 – Divyajot Singh – Neutrinos – The Introduction of Technology in Abundance appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast had the pleasure of speaking with Theresa Blissing, the Founder of AIP and the best-selling author of the book “The Future of Insurance Volume IV,  Asia Rising”. Theresa grew up in a household with parents who owned an insurance agency, she was constantly surrounded by conversations about the challenges and developments in the industry.  While discussing her book and her journey in the insurance industry, Theresa shared several key insights about insurance innovation in Asia. 1. The Challenges and Opportunities of the Asian Insurance Market When Theresa moved to Generali’s Asia regional headquarters in Hong Kong in 2009, she realized the unique challenges and opportunities in the Asian insurance market, especially in emerging markets such as Indonesia, Thailand, and India. She found it exciting to witness the differences in the industry compared to her experience in Germany. This understanding of the local market dynamics and consumer needs is crucial for insurance companies looking to expand their operations in Asia. 2. The Progressive Attitude of Asian Regulators Theresa discussed how Asian regulators, in many cases, are very open to innovation and change. She cited examples of regulators in Hong Kong and Thailand being receptive to new ideas and collaborating with startups and InsurTech companies. This open-mindedness allows for experimentation and innovation within the insurance industry in Asia. 3. The Power of Partnerships and Ecosystems Theresa highlighted the success of companies like Ping An and bolttech in leveraging partnerships and ecosystems to drive innovation. She praised Ping An for its ecosystem strategy, treating each venture as a separate entity with its own KPIs. Similarly, bolttech’s approach to solving partners’ problems and creating value for customers through insurance-enabled solutions demonstrates the power of collaboration in driving industry transformation. 4. The Changing Perception of Insurance Theresa acknowledged that insurance often has a negative reputation and is perceived as unexciting by many people. However, she emphasized the noble purpose of the insurance industry, with professionals dedicated to helping individuals and businesses during times of vulnerability. Changing the perception of insurance requires highlighting the positive impact it can have on people’s lives and showcasing the industry’s commitment to customer service and protection. You can find Theresa Blissing’s best-selling book, “The Future of Insurance Volume IV,  Asia Rising” here and in other locations where Amazon sells books. The post EP 217 – Theresa Blissing – co-Founder AIP – The Future of Insurance, Volume IV – Asia Rising appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast spoke with Michail Chopra, CEO of Mayfair Group, and unveiled an in-depth exploration of the shifting terrains of the insurance industry, particularly through the lens of technology and empathetic cultural practices.  Michail and his team leveraged technological advancements, transforming traditionally cumbersome insurance processes into a seamless, user-friendly digital experience. The journey starts from identifying a gap in the market for affordable insurance for IT professionals traveling abroad, leading to the development of innovative policies and a digital platform that prioritizes both functionality and user accessibility.  Furthermore, the discourse delves into the intricate balance of integrating artificial intelligence in claims processing while maintaining a palpable human touch, emphasizing the role of empathy, especially in the expatriate context. The discussion also reflects upon the market potential within India’s burgeoning young populace and how Mayfair managed to navigate through the challenging waves of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Michail underscores the potent influence of a compassionate and inclusive company culture, wherein the symbiotic relationship between the company and its “members” – not merely customers – catalyzes both its longstanding success and its humanitarian impact globally. The post EP 216 – Michail Chopra – Mayfair Group – A 30 Year Journey of Insurance Innovation appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast spoke with Terence Ho, Chief Commercial Officer at Nanoinsure, and delves into the evolution of the insurance industry in Hong Kong, especially its digital transformation. A significant highlight was the development of a self-configuration platform by a bootstrapped company, leading to significant growth in their revenue. This platform enabled the creation of tailored insurance products, particularly for FWD insurance companies. A standout technological advancement discussed was the conversion of Excel spreadsheet logic into a database through an API, an innovation that boosts efficiency and minimizes errors. Additionally, the episode touches upon the developments in InsurTech, such as the creation of offline digital sales platforms and the incorporation of a microservices architecture. Terence shares the journey of establishing a tech company, shedding light on the challenges faced, the importance of customer trust, and the significance of maintaining a transparent and supportive company culture. The overarching message is clear: for startups, the focus should remain on the product, the customers, transparency, and delivering on promises. The post EP 215 – Terence Ho – Chief Commercial Officer at Nanoinsure – We Just Love Insurance appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast spoke with Mark Simmons, the CEO of bolttech for Europe and Asia, and delved into the changing landscape of insurance and insurtech, focusing on emerging trends in Asia and Europe. Highlighting the concept of “life of the asset,” Mark explains how building services around an asset, be it a car, mobile phone, or even a family, can prevent loss. With a past in mobile phone insurance and being pivotal in Asia’s restaurant delivery evolution—culminating in the launch of Food Panda after selling to Rocket Internet—Mark has a rich entrepreneurial background. He underscores the significance of explaining to potential clients the importance of products and how they fulfill their needs. The podcast touches upon the revolution of embedded insurance. The goal? To eliminate friction, making products more accessible and straightforward. This has been achieved through advancements in technology and strategic partnerships, especially with e-commerce platforms. With the protection gap remaining a concern, especially in low-income sectors, bolttech aims to bridge this divide. When queried about bolttech’s potential to become a ‘super app’, Mark discusses the company’s dual approach, catering to both B2B and B2C sectors. They provide comprehensive solutions for businesses like Grab, Rabbit Line Pay, while their product, ‘bolttech home’, aggregates home technology, even offering cyber coverage options. Mark believes insurance plays a pivotal role in consistent client engagement, referencing a telematics experience in Latin America and drawing inspiration from giants like Amazon for best-in-class customer experience. The discussion then shifts to the role of AI in insurance. Mark elaborates on its importance in improving accessibility and affordability, allowing for dynamic risk management and enhancing customer communication strategies. On the expansion front, bolttech boasts of significant capital raises, setting records in insurtech equity series. They are strategically targeting digital capabilities and potential business acquisitions. In the podcast’s concluding segment, Mark hints at the possibility of opening up bolttech’s platform, likening it to WordPress’s successful open-source strategy. The idea is to move ‘bolttech home’ in a direction that offers diverse services, ranging from security and cyber protection to insurance, aiming to create a seamless and holistic customer experience. The post EP 214 – Mark Simmons – CEO Europe and Asia at bolttech – I See It as a Way to Supercharge Customer Experience appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast spoke with Marco Mirabella, the founder and CEO of Ensuro to discuss trends in the insurance industry, parametric insurance, and how blockchain can revolutionize this sector. Ensuro, a blockchain-based reinsurance company, uses cryptocurrency as solvency capital for its parametric insurance products. The company’s blockchain component significantly reduces the cost and time needed for recording transactions, increasing efficiency and transparency. Marco talks about his journey into the insurance field and how his experiences in venture capital and education in Italy and Shanghai influenced his career. Ensuro is a Bermuda regulated entity, and Mirabella discusses the regulatory challenges and the legal framework associated with such a setup. They leverage technology like zero knowledge proofs for KYC and KYP processes, allowing participants to remain anonymous while ensuring secure information storage. Marco also discusses the investment opportunities in the company, with an accreditation necessity for investors. The company has partnered with a French broker for their first product, a travel insurance offering. Marco explains how the company’s infrastructure is designed to deploy capital as needed, with growth potential factored into the policies. Lastly, he clarifies how Ensuro makes money – by taking a cut from the premiums collected when a policy is sold. He also discusses the barriers to scale in the insurtech space and stresses the importance of proving to people that blockchain and cryptocurrency can be used for legitimate and beneficial purposes. The post EP 213 – Marco Mirabella – Ensuro – Certainty of Payment and a Simple Claims Process appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast spoke with Carolina Dreifuss, Co-founder and CEO at SyncTechnologies, discusses the company’s mission to create a digital twin solution for the construction industry. She explains how the construction industry faces challenges with coordinating information among multiple players working with different systems, resulting in inefficiencies and delays. SyncTechnologies aims to address these challenges by providing access to visual data through their platform, eliminating the need for extensive hardware investments and streamlining the coordination process. Carolina also explains how SyncTechnologies entered the insurance sector by recognizing the construction industry’s need for efficient claims management processes. Multiple homes are impacted after natural disasters or events, and the traditional process of assessing and documenting the damage is time-consuming and costly. SyncTechnologies offers a solution by creating 3D models of properties using reality capture techniques such as laser scanning and photogrammetry. These models are uploaded to their platform, allowing different stakeholders, including insurance companies, loss adjusters, and builders, to review and analyze the data remotely, reducing the time and resources required for claims management. The episode also discusses SyncTechnologies’ participation in the Lloyd’s Lab pitch competition and the opportunity it presents for the company to further refine its product and pitch to industry leaders. Carolina highlights the importance of navigating through challenges and maintaining a positive mindset in the startup world. She emphasizes the value of having a strong team and the need to adapt quickly to changing circumstances. The episode concludes with Carolina expressing her excitement about the potential impact of participating in the Lloyd’s Lab program and the opportunity to accelerate SyncTechnologies’ growth and expansion in the insurance industry. The post EP 212 – Carolina Dreifuss – SyncTechnologies – There Is Always a Family or a Business Behind the Claim appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast spoke with Japhire Gopi Kannan, the founder and CEO of Jaguar Transit, an insurtech that addresses the challenges faced by the trillion-dollar cash, gold, and valuables in-transit industry. Combining on-demand insurance, high-security bags, and a risk intelligence technology platform, it offers an innovative approach to in-transit insurance. Japhire shares the unique process through which he identified his niche market segment and how his business attracted the attention of market chasers. He explains how his company transformed into a platform rather than merely an application, emphasizing that it serves as a single source of truth for security and logistics. He details the company’s focus on the lower tier of delivery, leading to a global expansion plan that’s underway, with Europe and the US being major targets. Japhire discusses the future of insurance in the US and how it fits into the ecosystem. The conversation then takes a turn towards the innovative use of telemetrics for car insurance and welfare medical insurance for low-income groups. He notes how technology has significantly transformed the insurance industry. Japhire provides valuable advice to young entrepreneurs, underscoring the challenges they face in their journey. He concludes with an interesting perspective on overnight success, emphasizing that there’s no shortcut and every success story is a result of continuous struggle and perseverance. The post EP 211 – Japhire Gopi Kannan – Jaguar Transit – Technology Became an Empowering Tool For Us appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast had an in-depth conversation with Jonathan Rake, CEO of Swiss Re Corporate Solutions. Key Topics Discussed:  Insurance Trends Jonathan mentions generative AI and partnership ecosystems as strong emerging trends in insurance and insure tech in Asia and globally. They discuss the changing customer perspectives, moving from a singular view on insurance to a more holistic, multi-dimensional view on risk. The conversation veers towards the role of partnerships and ecosystems in the insurance industry, and how it is important to address evolving customer needs. Partnerships Jonathan talks about the shift in strategies based on learnings, and the importance of knowing exactly what problem to address with fintech. He highlights the need for companies to have an end-to-end single data foundation which can help adapt to other offerings and bring in other tools, models, and partnerships. He argues that it’s not just about enhancing offerings with fintechs, but looking at the whole solution and the end-to-end platform. Fast-changing Insurance Environment The discussion moves on to how companies can stay ahead in the rapidly changing insurance environment. Jonathan emphasises the importance of organising and structuring data, and the role of partnerships in achieving this. He talks about Swiss Re Solutions’ ‘risk data services’ campaign, which uses their data capabilities to enhance understanding of a company’s risk profile. Jonathan highlights that being prepared and having a single source of data truth is key to taking on new technologies and applying models for the benefit of customers. Generative AI  Jonathan believes the implementation of generative AI can be revolutionary, enhancing the efficiency and capability of insurance companies. He underscores the importance of considering the customer and ensuring the security and consistency of generative AI delivery. However, he admits that finding the best areas for deployment to improve business and customer offering is a challenge many companies are still grappling with. The Single Source of Truth According to Jonathan, having a single source of truth in the form of a massive data lake enhances internal communication and decision-making, as everyone works with the same facts. It also aids in improving the data capabilities of external partners. This, he says, has allowed them to use their capabilities to help customers improve. Data First Company Jonathan recalls a conversation with the Chief Digital Officer of the company who suggests that instead of being a solutions company, they should become a data-first company. This would prevent a “spaghetti effect” that occurs when starting with the solution. By starting with data, they can ensure consistency, use the same language, and deploy the data to various areas as needed. Growth Assurance and Parametric Solutions Jonathan shares the concept of growth assurance, where insurance benefits the sales and marketing side of a business. He provides an example of a fertilizer company that utilized a parametric solution to help farmers affected by floods, thus increasing their sales and differentiating their offering. Influencing Business Decisions Jonathan mentions their ability to use data and their models to help companies, such as a real estate manufacturing company, improve their products and solutions. They can guide decisions around product development and investment by understanding materials, climate changes, and risk concentration. Insurance Distribution and Business Growth The concept of growth insurance is discussed in the context of businesses using insurance distribution to protect their business, particularly in regions with low insurance penetration like Asia. Closing the Insurance Gap through Innovation Jonathan reveals that just over 50% of the estimated $284 billion economic losses in 2022 were uninsured. He believes that innovative solutions, and not just traditional insurance cover, can improve and close the insurance gap, especially in developing countries in Asia. Evolving nature of risk and the role of insurance Risk, according to Jonathan, is always evolving and insurance companies need to be adept at recognizing and understanding these changes. He emphasized the importance of maintaining up-to-date models to navigate through the risks and ensure sustainability. Attracting talent in the insurance industry Jonathan speaks about the challenges and strides made in attracting talent into the insurance industry. He mentioned how awareness and focus on risk insurance in educational institutions could increase interest in insurance as a career. The post EP 210 – Jonathan Rake – Swiss Re Corporate Solutions – Working Off the Same Single Source of Truth appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast spoke with Tom Gerritsen, Head of Group Data Analytics at AIA, about the impact and implications of AI in the insurance industry. Tom highlights AI as the most significant emerging trend in insurance and insurtech with transformative capabilities for customer engagement and business operations. Tom perceives the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT as an “iPhone moment” for AI, democratizing its usage, although he notes that many businesses are yet to fully integrate AI into their operations. At AIA, Tom’s team uses AI to personalize customer interactions and assist in agent hiring. The team envisions AI supporting insurance agents in real-time, providing data-based insights during customer interactions. Tom also emphasizes the critical role of data quality in achieving accurate and useful AI outcomes, advocating for continued improvements in this area. The discussion also extends to AI’s impact on business aspects like decision-making, fraud detection, and localization, underlining AI’s capability to optimize efficiency and streamline processes. Gerritsen shares how AIA has leveraged AI to expedite their claims process and improve fraud detection, with AI handling a majority of customer interactions. The conversation concludes with a discussion on AI’s potential in personalized marketing, the significance of compute power accessibility in enabling comprehensive data analysis, and Sam Altman‘s statement about the decreasing marginal utility of adding more data to large language models, suggesting a shift towards identifying real use cases for AI. Topics we discussed: Emerging trends in insurance and insurtech, focusing on the increasing application and impact of AI. AIA’s use of AI for enhancing customer interactions, agent recruitment, and claims processing, and the role of data quality in these processes. The influence of advancements in AI, such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, on business operations and their acceptance. The potential and challenges of AI in creating hyper-personalized marketing and products, and its role in localization and error prevention. The implications of increasing computational power and bandwidth on data analysis and the broader use of AI. The future direction of AI technology, including a shift towards real use cases and hybrid customer service models, combining human agents and AI. The post EP 209 – Tom Gerritsen – AIA – This Is the iPhone Moment of AI appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

In partnership with ITC Asia, the Asia Insurtech Podcast discussed ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) investing in the context of insurance and insurtechs with the panelists Lapman Lee, Professor of Practice ESG FinTech and Climate Tech, and Alex Taylor, Global Head of Emerging Technology at QBE Ventures. The panel emphasized the importance of understanding and managing risks associated with climate change, both in the present and the future. This involves helping companies assess and mitigate their exposure to climate events, as well as encouraging sustainable practices. The panelists highlight the need for insurers to go beyond traditional risk assessment and consider long-term impacts and resilience. The conversation touches on various topics, including the use of technology such as IoT and machine learning to gather data, assess risks, and incentivize behavior change. Examples are given of how analyzing rooftop data prior to hurricanes can lead to proactive repairs, reducing carbon emissions and minimizing business disruptions. The potential of parametric insurance and IoT devices to improve risk assessment and response to climate events is explored. The discussion also covers the concept of carbon intensity in portfolios, where companies evaluate their carbon impact and transition risks. The panel emphasize the importance of quantifying and addressing these risks, considering different scenarios, and making informed decisions to contribute to a sustainable future. Find our best effort transcript below. Michael Waitze  00:05 Hi, this is Michael Waitze and welcome to a very special edition of the Asia inshore tech podcast in partnership with ITC Asia 2023. We are going to discuss ESG environmental, social and governance investing in the context of insurance and insurtechs today. ITC Asia kicks off tomorrow, May 30. And today will be your last day and your last chance to get tickets use the discount code AIP 200 to get $200 off the current ticket price. Now, let me quickly introduce our panelists for today’s conversation. Lapman Lee, Professor of Practice ESG FinTech and climate tech and Willers Towers Watson APAC climate and ESG insurance leader and Alex Taylor, Global Head of emerging technology, QBE ventures at QBE insurance. I just want to say thank you to both of you for coming back on the show. We’ve had both of you on multiple times. Actually, it’s great to have you here. How are you doing today? Lapman Lee  01:02 Now I’m great. Thanks for having us here. And Michael could not love to talk about my my, my dream topics of ESG, FinTech and governance. Michael Waitze  01:14 So let’s do this. Let’s just jump right into this right. And let me know, I want to start with you. Can you give us a definition of climate risk? And I’m particularly interested in this fiscal and transition climate risk as well. And then maybe the follow on both of you can talk about some ways emerging ways to measure this transition risk. Please go ahead. Lapman Lee  01:31 No, no, it sounds sounds good. I mean, maybe for the audience very good to get started with most of the listed companies are required to follow the recommendations of the SoCal tcfd task force for climate related financial disclosures. And one of their one of their four pillars of reporting relates to risk management. I think if you look at climate risk, there are really three parts to it, there is departs called fiscal climate risk, which is basically you have acute and you have chronic climate fiscal climate was chronic meaning your did your rising temperatures, sea level rises, how does it impact your assets and liabilities, and you also have your acute your natural catastrophes due to extreme weather events, floods, typhoons, wildfires. So fiscal was really about direct damage to your assets or your property. If we then move on to transition risk, it is that is more related to the financial risks that your are, as a company are exposed to due to social, economical, political, technological risk from moving to a low carbon economy. So could for example, if you have, I’m going to talk with an insurer and the investor tomorrow anyway. What are your assets and liabilities today, for example, you invest in oral companies, what is that worth? After regulation, of course, is a big question mark, how that will develop. And then lastly, what tcfd also stipulates is something called liability risk, which is basically potential of stakeholder litigation or regulatory enforcement of not meeting regulatory requirements. So physical risk, transmission risk and liability risk, are the three main pillars of climate risk. Got it? Alex, maybe Michael Waitze  03:20 you want to talk about emerging ways to measure this risk and some of the data categories around this as well? Alex Taylor  03:26 Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, just leading on from what Lachman said there, it’s it’s interesting to reflect on the interconnectedness of all of the components that he’s just mentioned. So when you look at the the acute risk and the cost of a major natural catastrophes, and also both the the opportunity cost of both participating in transition components, particularly around limiting carbon emissions and other emissions from organizations, but, but also the cost or our economy of migrating away from those things. So you know, it all acts in concert. But to your point, the challenge that we’re seeing at the moment is that measurement piece, and there’s some really interesting things that are starting to pop up in this space, particularly around the challenge when we’ve got many millions of organizations globally, and all of them are reporting in different ways that they’re not structured into any defined format. You know, the use of technology, like large language models, for example, is a key example of this where we can start to look at reading entire company reports almost instantaneously and extracting standardized structured information around carbon emissions, methane emissions, and so on. So this is an area that’s pushing forward very rapidly. But, you know, frankly, I think it’s one the world’s going to have to get a lot better at because it’s very difficult to actually understand where you’re going unless you understand where you are. Now, how important Michael Waitze  04:51 is this reporting standardization or you might you do make a really good point you can take an LLM. You can read through these company reports, but they’re all written and structured in a complete The different way, how important is it to standardize this? And maybe both of you can talk about this a little bit as well, because then you can compare apples to apples as opposed to apples to fish, right? Alex Taylor  05:10 Yeah, look incredibly important. And I mean, obviously, Lachman, you can jump in here. But this is a big area of your study. But the one challenge I think we’ve got globally is not just the standardization of reporting, but also the fact that there’s not really an incentive in some cases to report clearly, it depends on the economy and the climate, but making sure that we are comparing apples to apples is a fundamental component of transmission risk itself. Lapman Lee  05:37 Sure. So I think if tcfd disaster for climate related financial disclosures is very often used as a basis for reporting requirements. For example, the Hong Kong exchange is work requiring companies to report against tcfd. And what does it mean tcfd As the pillar around governance, basically, they want to, they want an organization to disclose what is your governance and risks around climate, not just risk, actually, also risk and opportunities that you’re getting? Through climate change? They look at strategy, what’s your strategy to address that to take advantage of these opportunities or address a risk? There’s a risk management part where you talk about physical climate risk, transmission risk and liability. And then I think the last part, which is probably useful is metrics and stat and targets that you’re setting. And in that respect, there are a number of studies out there that talk about what are metrics that companies need to, by default, as a standards provide? Maybe I want to introduce a new concept here as well, please, in sustainability reporting, there is this concept of double materiality? And what does double materiality mean is, it’s on the one hand, what’s the impact of climate change on your firm that so outside in but also inside out? What’s the impact of your firm on climate change itself? So obviously, if you look at the impact of climate change on your firm, you need to look at those transition with fiscal risks, liability risk measures, there could be for example, I don’t want to sum all of them up could be what’s your exposure to carbon related assets, by by sector? What’s your impacts from technologies, there are a number of measures out there to stick a little bit with this point of impact of climate change on a firm, there are measures that look at climate Value at Risk that mingle physical and transition risk, which is sometimes maybe a little bit difficult, not too much marketing, my role at Willis Towers Watson, but they do have a measure called Climate transition value at risk, which only looks at climate transition value risk on your bones and your equities, goes without saying I can see it in your minds as well. There are lots is a lot of judgment call, by sector by industry, because we don’t know exactly the path how regulation, how technology will evolve, as well. So the last part moving to depart on the impact that the firm can have on climate change itself. It could be look at your investment portfolio. How do you decarbonize it? How do you mobilize transition finance? How do you currently finance emission? What do you do in the future? So does double materiality and tcfd. Looking at four pillars is a is a good start in my mind to read these reports. Michael Waitze  08:36 Alex, can I ask you to comment in the context of your investments in your investment theses, where this fits in in the insurance and the inshore tech world? And in particular? I mean, I know that this CT var thing is particular to Willis towers, Watson but the VAR itself Value at Risk is something that markets have been using forever. Right? So as a concept, it’s actually super important. Can you talk about that as well? Alex Taylor  08:58 Yeah, absolutely. And one thing that we’ve been trying to do a lot of at QB II, as you know, citizens within the insurance industry, is to help the companies that we insure understand their risk, not just today, but in a longitudinal fashion as well. And if you look at some of our recent investments in companies like Jupiter intelligence intensified, and in geo site, a lot of the time the discussions that we find ourselves having is as much about not just the risk, they represented the way that we price a policy now, but what that might look like in 20 years and 25 years, or what happens when the next hurricane or tornado or flooding event hits. We’re even starting to have discussions with some organizations now looking at the decisions that they might make. Should I build a new corporate site at this location? What is my forest fire explosion here? You know, should or should I be doing something fundamentally different? And more importantly, perhaps what’s happened to other customers that I can learn from? And broadly and this is actually the subject of my talk at at ITC. Asia, how can we encourage our industry to be more resilient, so that from a VAR perspective, we drive down the cost of major events because of their exposure to major climate events, and also make better decisions to help decarbonize the economy as well. And to my point before, all of these things are fundamentally interconnected. But the key to all of this is knowing and understanding statistically measurably the impact that we as an industry as an insurance company, as an insurance industry, and our customers and the carbon economy participation that they represent, collectively adds together to make sure that we can actually make sensible decisions together. And fundamentally, this is the thing that things like the NZTA, the net zero insurance Alliance recognize it’s that there will be certain activities and certain locations that fundamentally become uninsurable, our collective responsibility is to make sure that that’s not disruptive, and then everybody’s acting on the same information. Michael Waitze  11:03 There are so many things to unpack here. Can we talk a little bit more about this connectivity for me? What exactly can an insurance company do to incentivize the companies and the the assets that they’re insuring to become close to this net zero, that the NCI is trying to encourage people to do? Do you know what I mean? In other words, sure, if they don’t insure something, then the hope is that that activity, if it’s not, if it’s bad for the environment, if it’s bad for climate, that they won’t do it, but what other types of things can insurance companies do so that they can still insure things but still encourage people to behave properly? Alex Taylor  11:37 I think that’s a really important thing that sort of the other way around there. And it’s about the things that could be insured or that in some cases aren’t being at the moment, okay, that act as carbon positive inputs into the economy. So the classic example is the challenge that a lot of renewable energy projects have in attaining insurance, particularly things like offshore wind, large solar panel installations and solar farms, lithium battery projects, a lot of the challenge with any new risk in an insurance context is that from an actuarial perspective, it takes time to evolve decision around what the risk actually is, and how to price for that. The challenge we’re seeing now with a lot of these things are moving so quickly that understanding the particular risk of a particular lithium battery chemistry or the resilience of a particular type of glass and solar panels, or what types of weather effects are going to damage offshore wind turbines, it’s a real challenge. But the cost of not doing these things to our collective economy is actually higher. So what we need to create as an industry, what we are creating as an industry is a way to engage in these projects to make sure that it’s fundamentally practical, but as well as that, that we can incentivize the creation of things that contribute to the NZTA goals. Michael Waitze  12:50 Alex, do you think this is a place where parametric insurance right so where it’s not being indemnified, but where there’s an automatic payout, particularly for offshore wind and for other climate related in whether related stuff? Is that is that a role that parametric insurance can help play where it offsets a little bit of it at first, and then you worry about sort of the indemnity part later. And Alex Taylor  13:09 that’s the great thing about parametric, of course, is the way you do have a risk that’s difficult to quantize, where there’s this challenge on exposure, that you can understand in advance what your limits might be, and lets you offer an insurance like product in a fundamentally challenging market? And the answer is absolutely yes. And I think we’re starting to see some really interesting parametric projects out there that are doing some very meaningful work or ether risk is a great example of this. And in crop insurance in in weather related impacts on the eastern seaboard of the United States, where we’re starting to see things like this pop up, where there’s an identified gap in the market that some of the traditional players aren’t filling. And as a result, you know, in pure capitalistic tendencies where there’s an opportunity or product appears, which is one of the wonderful things about this space. Michael Waitze  13:59 And I mean, maybe you can comment on this as well, right? Like, what are some of these initiatives that the insurers even in particular in Hong Kong are taking to encourage this kind of behavior? Lapman Lee  14:08 Of course, so I think bigger picture definitely, I think the insurance industry is a very important industry, we ride probably more than 6 trillion in premium volume globally. That’s the insurance part, insurers are also investors produce 46 trillion in assets. So think I really like Alex’s part around resilience. So I think as long only institutional investors, insurers definitely have a lot of incentive to divert their capital to climate resilient enterprises. And just also tie back to the part when we spoke about physical and transition risks. Many companies are looking at what is the carbon intensity of their portfolios, but if you think about it, it’s very possible that portfolios that have high transmission risk, no necessarily have a high or low or carbon intensity. So I think people need probably to move beyond only carbon intensity but focus also more on them transition was because it does hurt your wallet at the end of the day. But to go back to your question Waitze avec in Hong Kong that insurers are engaged in companies as part of TDI, I’m also helping out to interview Hong Kong based insurance CEOs, the lifestyle of the AIA, AXA and HSBC. And if you look, in all those interview, one thing that comes back is that they say, Okay, we don’t want to just talk about us as an insurer, we’re an insurer or investor. We are also a responsible, well, employer as well. So they show typically initiative under each of those pillars. And I think the pillar that they didn’t mention is the part where they influence other companies, as Alex was saying, to incentivize new innovation, as well, if I think about debts, these insurance can help to foster climate tech. And climate tech is to me different things, by different industries. And I would probably look at the industries that are emitting a lot transport, agriculture, energy. And I think there are probably classification under each of those sectors. So you have different technologies that can play a role and different companies. So that’s probably by industry. And then the other layer would be around companies that help with ESG reporting. How do that do you do that data, especially if you’re a smaller listed company? How can you make the cost of being compliant or a good citizen easier to think it’s more than to stimulate invest, like QB is doing investing themselves into ventures to show that it is working? I think that that’s well put your money where your mouth walked to talk where your mouth is? Basically, that makes perfect sense. Michael Waitze  16:53 Alex, did you want to add something? Alex Taylor  16:56 Yeah, absolutely. And look, I mean, LePen just touched on it, the the big thing that’s being, I suppose, not ignored, but there’s less focus on is the reporting challenge with smaller entities as well. I mean, we have to remember that the significant percentage that small companies globally represent in terms of total carbon output. The big challenge we have is there a standards in place for listed companies for for major industries like banking and insurance. But when it comes to to local agricultural concerns and production, there’s so little information out there, that the cost of obtaining particularly emissions reporting often outstrips from an insurance context, the value of the premium that you get in the door. So coming up with easier ways for companies to report on emissions, to even discover their own emissions is key. And this is something that I love. I mean, there’s a great company, I think they UK based called geo financial, we have no association with them. But they’re a very interesting company that do space based methane reporting. So for a company being able to understand methane emissions, and of course, methane is actually a much worse climate gas than than co2, that does break down to the atmosphere relatively quickly. But it’s not fantastic. But in many cases, when you show a company that methane emissions, they’re genuinely surprised. And in many cases, it can actually lead to an improvement in efficiency and operations by capturing that and doing something with it, rather than just laying it off gas. So there are these great interconnected moments, again, where you get a net positive because of a discovery of something related to your emissions, but it also benefits your operations directly and your bottom line. And that, you know, frankly, I can’t think of a better example of something where, by looking at admissions and reporting, we can actually drive forward things not just from a capitalist sense, but also from a transition risk perspective to Michael Waitze  18:46 how do we make this easier for SMEs? I mean, both of you did mention this idea of large companies, right. And they do have the resources to do both the measuring the reporting, and also they have, they do have transition risk, which I want to get back to in a second, because I think it’s kind of important. But how do SMEs handle this? Right? Because they’re hard to it’s hard enough for them just to stay in business. And to keep up, they may not even be aware of how to measure and how to do this. Is there a big opportunity? Do you think for an InsurTech to come in and just say, we’re going to build the full stack for SMEs to be able to then participate in this net zero, right, whether it’s methane or carbon or anything, but just to lower their impact on the on the environment? Lapman Lee  19:25 Yeah, no, no, definitely. If I may say, I think if there are a number of InsurTech out there that do exactly that they provide, for example, if if I’m SME ABC, they basically ask you, what industry are you in? You can take for example, do I want to comply with Hong Kong changed, or I want to apply with other regulators? They then show you what requirements they ask you what are your material risk and opportunity? And de dem basically provide a template that’s linked to a workflow where you can say, Oh, my risk officer look after this strategy, look out for that. That’s a relatively inexpensive way to way to go about these requirements instead of having a expensive consulting firm look through everything and makes it more standardized as was I think there are definitely solutions out there for SMEs. At the same time. I think there are, I think governments or regulators are also looking at providing more guidance and standardized templates to companies themselves. And when I say that, I’m thinking about climate scenario analysis and stress testing very often people like, what does it mean, for example, the UK, I spoke with the UK inaugural ESG director, Sasha Saddam, he told me that they’re also providing more guidance around how does your transition plan look like? What What are your risk? What are your opportunities? How do you put it together, which makes it easier for the investor as well, if there’s that standardization, again, back to to Apples versus pears idea. So he is one and governments regulators providing more guidance templates, and insurtechs. Helping? Well, companies SMEs, to start to have a start Alex Taylor  21:05 a practical example, if I could. And this is an area that’s been particularly fascinating to me in recent months, is looking at hurricane Aiden. In Florida as a case study, we’ve been doing some really interesting work with geo site looking at rooftop analytics, particularly where we can using machine learning models identify damage to rooftops prior to them being destroyed in a hurricane. And there’s a really fascinating picture of that, that I showed a customer recently, where there are two properties next to each other one that has a galvanized tin roof. The other one next to it has a classic bitumen tile roof, the title, the bitumen tile roof was completely destroyed in the hurricane, the tin roof has all been fine. And you imagine that when you’ve got hundreds of 1000s of roofs that you’re repairing in Florida are replacing entirely the the net output of carbon emissions as a result of all of that construction work, and the negative effect on the economy. To your point, Michael, the existential threat that organizations face, you know, if the roof is torn off the building, and we had a customer like this, where, you know, they they went out of business as a result of of a leak in a roof that that was, you know, covered to a point but you know, it couldn’t cover their stock and certain other things. So, you know, the impact of making sensible decisions prior to a major event, particularly where you’re exposed to those things, we’re starting to look at the behavioral analytics pieces of this. So if you have a discussion with a customer, and say, Look, you know, your roof is damaged, we can see this already. And here’s someone that could fix this. And this is what might not happen as a result of the next major hurricane, if you replicate that 100,000 200,000 times. And not only are you saving probably millions of tons of carbon from being emitted in the atmosphere as a result of remediation and rectification work. But there are businesses that will be in business that might not have been previously. So everybody benefits from this awareness and the information. But ultimately, it’s up to the individual up to the company to make decisions as to what they might choose to do, frankly, watching them do it is an insight in itself. Michael Waitze  23:08 Yeah, can I get your can I get both of your opinions on this idea that I’ve heard. And that is, I was having a conversation a couple of days ago with one of the founders of wind, right, so they installed IoT devices into buildings, new buildings and existing buildings to measure the normal and the abnormal behavior of water, with the idea that water is actually more dangerous than fire, right. And if you can measure all that stuff, then the follow on to the insurance industry is you gather all this data, and then maybe you can write better policies, but you can also encourage better behavior. You just talked about roofs and having 100,000 roofs and hurricane in. And I wonder if there’s a way to distribute the cost, right, in the same way that we talked about with the water and IoT sensors, by installing sensors, you know, opt in on everybody’s roof buildings, homes, you know, commercials and residences and stuff like that, to gather weather data on a regular basis in a distributed fashion. And for people that put that stuff on the top of their building, or inside the building, however you want to do it, you can lower their insurance premiums as a trade off for getting the data, is there a way to do that as well, which then helps on both the parametric and the indemnity side for Netcat events, right, that are directly related to climate change. Does that make sense? Alex Taylor  24:21 Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, it’s, it’s fascinating when you look at a lot of these endeavors. And look, I love IoT. I’m a technologist and an engineer by heart. The challenge on commercial terms as always, the cost of such an endeavor versus the reward. Yeah, I mean, water leak, classic example. I mean, expensive shutoff valves don’t look that expensive in the individual. But when you look at deploying them to an entire portfolio, you can be talking hundreds of millions or billions of dollars. Having said that, there are recent nascent technology changes that makes certain of these things that weren’t previously possible, suddenly possible. There’s a great example in this so I don’t think a lot of people know this, but you In the iPhone that a lot of people have these days, in fact, in most Android phones, you’ve actually got a pressure sensor, it can very accurately detect the pressure in the air to the point where you move it a couple of feet upwards and downwards. And it can see that it can also see, when the pressure Drummond, the air pressure dramatically drops as a result of a, you know, an upcoming Stormfront. One thing that’s been quite fascinating, Michael Waitze  25:22 there’s a barometer. Is that what you’re saying? Yeah, go ahead. Alex Taylor  25:25 Absolutely. It’s actually use the reason it’s there is not just for fun. So that in combination with the pedometer, you can actually see people moving upstairs, and you can see that water with pattern. But using the same technology, and some insurers have embedded using this feature in their app, they can tell their customers, when a hailstorm is coming they can tell them to shut their windows or to to cover their cars or whatever it happens to be, or in some cases get themselves out of personal danger like in you know an oncoming hurricane or tornado, which which translates to fairly rapid drops. But that’s the classic example where the economy itself has incentivized the deployment of a mass IoT fleet that most people don’t even realize is there, the net cost of taking advantage of it is essentially zero. So this is the kind of innovation that I really love, where you get these 10 Gentle effects of decisions that are made by companies like Apple and Google that have real knock on effects to citizen weather gathering, for example. Michael Waitze  26:23 I love this as an idea. Let me Can we talk a little bit about his carbon intensity in the portfolio as well, unless you wanted to add on to what Alex was just saying, because I want to understand what it is better? Go ahead. Lapman Lee  26:32 Sure. Now, I do want to add some of that is actually a great opportunity for the insurance industry to to improve its image even further. Because there’s a certain image that the insurance industry has in Hong Kong, for example, agents selling insurance, I think people are more and more are realizing also fruit to health and wellness to wearables that insurers can provide advice. If you give them some info, they are willing to provide your rebate in or a discount in insurance. I think this is a good opportunity to provide tools, advice to rebrands, the insurance sector, I mean, a lot of my students, they don’t consider the insurance industry. But but when they understand that, well, one, the money being paid at the top levels of insurance, or what it really is about that a lot of technology, a lot of the latest innovation is actually happening in insurance. I think this is an opportunity to make insurance exciting as well. Climate tech, using IoT, etc. It’s fun. Yeah. Michael Waitze  27:34 Yeah. I mean, I was just gonna say that was the whole idea that I was talking about earlier. If you believe that a Fitbit and an Apple Watch is going to help you on the insurance side? Well, I was just thinking that the IoT on the roof is just a Fitbit for your house or a Fitbit for your building. And of course, you have to do it at scale. But it’s just the same idea. Alex Taylor  27:51 It absolutely is. I mean, one place that we’ve seen this particularly strong is in larger commercial building management. So there’s an Australian company called sim CITM. So what they do essentially, is deploy a piece of infrastructure that connects to a thing called BACnet. And BACnet, is essentially the infrastructure control system. That’s almost an industry standard across every major commercial building, it connects to H back and to elevators, and to lighting, and so on and so forth. So this is the system and through platforms like sim you can understand your energy usage. Is it the elevators? Is it the lights? Is it something else that contributing to my emissions to my power use, but also predictive failure? You know, our event in the the elevator going to fail? Is something gonna go wrong with a track? What can I do that might prevent this from happening to do predictive maintenance and predictive failure? But I think we’re going to start seeing a slow migration of this technology into to smaller buildings into homes, that covers not just the electrical components, but other components as well. What do I need to do now, that can prevent some kind of negative outcome in the future? And from the studies that we’ve done, there’s a direct correlation between customers that are willing to engage with the nature of their risk and loss ratio. So that’s quite a profound concept when you think about it, that customers that understand risk, generally have better outcomes and risk. And that’s the whole concept behind resilience. Michael Waitze  29:16 Let them Did you want to add something because I do want I want to go back to this idea of the carbon intensity in the portfolio just for people that may not understand what that means, what it actually means, and then how you measure that as well. Yeah, Lapman Lee  29:26 I think you’d be like, look at climate transition value at risk in your portfolio. What do you do that say you have five steps to look at your portfolio? First of all, you look at what look at different scenarios that are out there, whether it is a 1.5 degree limit of temperature rise or different scenarios that are pretty standard that you can look at applying those scenarios into models, look at what is the impact and then then that’s the part where you need to do a lot of judgment calls around how will that impact your demands? Say for example, it differs obviously if you’re an oil company for his word or your electric vehicles manufacturer, how does it impact your demand, not just your, your product itself, but also your raw materials. It could be that right now, it might be very carbon intensive to get to cobalt, nickel, etc. But in the longer term, if you use those in electric vehicle you might save. So you have to look at both short, medium and longer term to see the impact. And the first step of climate transition values at risk. How do you quantify that? How do you quantify those risk on your assets and for insurance also on your liabilities? And then fourthly, And fifthly? Look at your overall portfolio, are you exposed to certain risks? Are you concentrated? Should I be too exposed? In certain industries, areas or technologies? Even? Am I betting too much on one or the other? I mean, if you look at Asia, I think it’s, it’s an interesting region as well, for everyone, home to 60% of the world’s population, obviously a significant contributor to the world’s greenhouse gases. But at the same time, you know, you we it needs to be a just, and fair and inclusive transition given the West Europe, US probably have gone through emitting a lot developing economies, whereas some of the Asian economies are still growing. So I think it can be a cookie cutter approach as well. So I think Asia is key in, in this fight against global climate change. So I think there are different steps to look at your portfolio, though it’s not all, how to say fully transparent, fully standardized, I do recommend companies to look at it at least you know, what you don’t know. And you can start taking informed decisions, which is what your boards are needing, otherwise, you will get the depart around liability risk you get. Yeah, you get litigated? I guess. So, Alex? Yeah, look, Alex Taylor  32:04 I think that’s a really important point there on the maturity of an economy versus the impact on transition risk. And, you know, obviously, a lot of Western economies have had not just a very long time to consider these things, but have a lot of historic wealth, that can be used as part of that transition to perhaps do things a little bit more cleanly a bit sooner. The the challenge we have here is that, you know, Asia is actually the powerhouse of the world that you know, her tremendous percentage of complete global economic output comes from the Asian economy, and is consumed in large part by the West. And we have to understand the relationship between mature economies that can transition particularly into clean energy, and the products they consume and where they’re from, and the impact that this transition is going to have on those economies. So again, that theme of interconnectedness, but very easy to forget, if we don’t consider it in this specific Michael Waitze  32:57 level. And you brought this up twice, actually, companies and automobile companies. I’m not an f1 fan. But it’s a big business. And one of the biggest sponsors of f1 is Aramco and Aramco, Saudi Aramco is obviously one of the biggest oil companies, if not the biggest oil company in the world. But they’re also doing some interesting work on working with the f1 group to transition all of the engines from, you know, oil based engines to electric. And I’m curious, and that’s at scale, right? It’s a gigantic company that everybody knows. So it’s very public as well. Is this the type of transition that you’re talking about? Because it’s an oil company that could just keep going and die as an oil company? Or move into becoming a technology company and electrical field, be vehicle related company and then own that space on top of it? Is this the type of transition you’re talking about? Lapman Lee  33:46 Yeah, it is. I mean, also, if you look at one thing that I always tell the regulators as well is, yes, there are green bonds, you can invest in products that are already doing good, but what you need to do to make to transition to a netzero economy is to help industries that are not so green now, but want to get there. So they’re the transition finance part is very important. So yes, definitely it is. If I were an investor, I will look as for example, in this case study, Aramco. How will they How will a a stock a share in them change in the next five or 10 years? I look, I try to look beyond statements PR, what is really happening or I think one good part that a number of exchange are looking at is also don’t just mention qualitative statements, how much money are you going to spend our invest? I think that is probably a good litmus test or a good demonstration of what our company is actually doing. And that will impact our transition. Obviously, the the path to technology innovation, and what technologies differs by industry, oil and gas is a different one. But at some point, you will see different industries probably competing are diverging. It’s a very complex system. But I think we do need to get that started. It’s a complex transition. Otherwise, we will have cops every here, cop 2728. But you will only get statements. But if we don’t move the needle will still end up nowhere. And again, I think insurers have a paramount role to play to foster invest, ensure de risk this journey to a low carbon economy. Alex, I’ll Michael Waitze  35:30 give you the last word. Alex Taylor  35:32 Yeah, look, I think that’s a really interesting point you brought up in the investment in industries that might look wasteful. And look, I mean, Formula One might from the outside look quite wasteful. But if you consider the research and innovation that’s gone into reducing drag coefficients for the electric vehicle and the benefits from even the kinetic energy recovery system and Formula One, you know, we can lead to the dynamos that are connected to the wheels and electric vehicles that allow kinetic energy to be recovered from going down hills. This is a great example of the way that traditional industries that might have been quite energy intensive emissions intensive historically, are allowing us to drive forward the world as we go through this carbon transition. And I’d like to say so much more of that. I think there are a lot of very good examples of exactly that. And the places we need to be looking. Michael Waitze  36:21 Okay, Lapman Lee, Professor of Practice ESG FinTech, climate tech and Willis Towers Watson APAC climate and ESG insurance leader Alex Taylor, Global Head of emerging technology, QBE ventures, QBE insurance. You guys are awesome. Thank you both again very much for joining us. Lapman Lee  36:38 Great to be here and thanks for being such a great host Alex Taylor  36:41 pleasure as always The post EP 208 – Alex Taylor and Lapman Lee – ITC Asia 2023 ESG Panel – All of These Things Are Fundamentally Interconnected appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast genuinely enjoyed speaking with Amit Patel, a Founder at Peachy. Some of the topics Amit covered in detail include: Technology paradigm shifts Controlled cannibalization and being brave Data-enabled product personalization Insurance as a Service Splitting Peachy into regulated and unregulated entities Some other titles we considered for this episode: Juggling Many Things Tech Enablement and Digital Transformation They’re Looking for Piece of Mind Some of the Patterns Are Still the Same Change Costs Money Please read the best-efforts transcript below: Michael Waitze 0:00Hi, this is Michael Waitze. And welcome back to the Asia InsurTech Podcast. Today we are joined by Amit Patel. Founder at Peachy. Amit, it’s great to have you on the show. Busy day. Like how are you? Amit Patel 0:15I’m good. Lovely to lovely to be on. Thank you so much. Yeah, I’m busy days always juggling many things. Michael Waitze 0:23Like as an entrepreneur, people forget, like you don’t leave your home for the most part and go to an office and do things and separate yourself from like your regular life, it really kind of gets intertwined. You know what I mean? Like when you hang up a sales call? You could be like feeding the dog like nobody knows. Right? And you would never do that if you went to an office anyway, I think it keeps us busy at a different level, I think then going to a regular job. Anyway, let’s jump right into this thing. What do you think is the biggest trend from your perspective? In insurance? And InsurTech? Let’s just say globally from your perch? Yeah. Amit Patel 0:59Yeah, I think that’s a really interesting question. I think for a while, as you know, tech enablement and digital transformation of an industry that’s been quite dinosaur like, has been going on sort of passively, I guess. And the inshore tech space has now started to really proliferate. And you’ve seen some bigger sized companies gain traction with incumbents and enterprise clients with their technology solutions or data solutions. And, you know, I’m bothered by the fact that the insurance industry has not managed to adopt technology, where it’s businesses all about risk management, and data models and analytics and so forth, to become more efficient. And, you know, we’re seeing that sort of play out more and more as time goes by. Yeah. Michael Waitze 1:56So why do you think and a lot of people talk about regulation, right. And I kind of want to move away from that unless you think this is the key here. But why do you think it’s taking longer in the insurance industry longer than let’s say where I was working like in a trading industry, which is also heavily regulated? To do the things you just talked about to have technology solutions to have data solutions? What was the stopping point? Amit Patel 2:19Yeah, I think it’s multifactorial, and it changes by line of insurance as well. And by market, frankly, but, you know, firstly, insurance by its sort of mere nature is something that it’s a risk management exercise, and therefore, you know, the default position is to be risk averse, I guess, in general. And I think that, you know, sort of embeds in the hearts and minds of many people and the culture of, you know, staff teams working in these types of companies, I think that sort of kicks it off. I also think, you know, it’s a regulated industry. So there’s quite a moat, you can’t just get into it without some degree of expertise, right. And so, you know, I’ll say this in the nicest of ways, insurance companies are in a privileged but lazy position in that, you know, competition from the outside until over the last, I would say, five to seven years hasn’t really caused them a problem, because they’ve just got such entrenched positions and defensible kind of regulatory status and balance sheets and so forth. I think also the kind of capability required to instigate this type of change, understanding of technology, data, particularly trends in the spaces that are emerging, and having those people as change agents, and giving them the autonomy and organizations, I don’t think that’s really the the kind of modus operandi of the general kind of teams that you find in these insurance companies. But think that’s another issue. And, and, of course, you know, sort of tied with the laziness point. Change costs money. It has a massive overhead when it comes to technology, because, you know, I think these businesses are so encumbered by legacy tech. And it takes time. And that time, I think people are starting to realize that actually, it takes a lot longer than one would think, and therefore, going slow or not doing it at all is sort of like a interesting alternative or an option. Michael Waitze 4:36When I walked into Morgan Stanley on my first day, and frankly, when I walked into Goldman Sachs on my first day, if you had seen the state of the technology that was there, particularly at Goldman, I think you would have been appalled. And it did take I would consider myself at the time like the next generations with the next generation of people to come in and say we could do way more with way less if we just had better technology. And it took a little bit of rabble rousing, actually, internally to say, Oh my God, why am I getting in at 530 in the morning when I could be getting in at seven o’clock in the morning, because the tech is just so upside down and backwards. And it took at least in Tokyo alone at Goldman, it took like four or five years to get things up to speed. And that’s with everybody being on board. But boy, if there had been people there who saying no, we can’t do this, it could have taken 10 years or more. Do you think that there’s a generational change taking place as well? Amit Patel 5:31Yeah, I think, you know, market needs, customer dynamics, all of these things are changing almost their global base, you know, on a daily basis, hour to hour, minute to minute, second second. And that pace, that the kind of delta between what companies are offering and what market needs and once are, is just getting bigger. And I just, you know, I’m quite bullish about the fact that you can’t, in most instances, trying to transform out of, you know, the sorts of situations digitally, is very, very difficult for many insurance companies. I’m not saying it applies to all sectors, and not in all insurance companies. But it’s a gross generalization. And actually, it’s sort of time to rewrite the proposition and build a new technology stack almost, which resets, you know, the way that the insurance company or industry starts to operate. Because I just think it’ll take too long to like, change it any other way. Michael Waitze 6:34So what does that reset look like to you? And again, I want to give you my perspective on this, when we came, when I moved to Goldman Sachs, we changed a lot of the front end systems made them a lot faster, made our interactions with the trading market much better. It was the back end systems that we had were all the data set where we were like, should we even touch that? Because if we do, if we get anything wrong, we call that that was our position management system. But it’s not really different than the policy management system at an insurance company. If you get that wrong, it could be fatal. Right? So the front end can get changed the interactions you have with clients that you know, all that digital transformation is great. But how do you do this transformation that you’re talking about the reset with all these back end legacy systems as well, which is where a lot of the risk stands? No. Amit Patel 7:21Yeah, no, I totally agree. I think, you know, there’s, there’s kind of different philosophical approaches to this. But what I’ve found is trying to, like move components of technology in the back end, to kind of upgrade them, if you like, yeah, it has not really worked in C optimizes a piece of that backend. But then the other parts that sit around it remain legacy if you like, and so the value that you’re trying to derive doesn’t really work because another part sort of fails you whether it’s from a performance perspective, or data synchronization perspective, or whatever it might be, and obviously takes time, I guess we’ve just had loads of paradigm shifts haven’t been technology like cloud native, you know, infrastructure relative to on prem, massive paradigm shift, the advent of serverless. So dynamically Elastic Compute, on demand, right? massive paradigm shift, the development of AI, and kind of machine learning and other exponential technologies like distributed ledger, yet another paradigm shift. And I think these sorts of shifts, that they they just don’t allow you to kind of change bit by bit, I think you have to do it in a wholesale way. But what I would say is, when you do it in a wholesale way, you create a new baby, if you like, this is a new platform, a new way of operating, it’s got a different, ideally, a more simplified process. It’s not just a digital incarnation of the thing that you used to do before, right? It can I think it’s about it can be Yeah, it can’t be. But the way to de risk that in my view, is to onboard customers are start to operate that new baby, if you like that new technology platform, that new proposition in a low risk way by having only some of the processes or customers or whatever, sort of migrate to that operating model. And an almost is like you have a startup you you get confidence in that operating model, and therefore migrate more of your customers or your processes or whatever over to that new way of operating. And the original platform or systems will start to atrophy in my view. But it’s quite important not to create undue legacy incumbrance and integrations into an old technology stack. Michael Waitze 9:59It’s a real Good point. And I like to make analogies for this right? I used to say again, when I was at Goldman it was like taking an engine out of a Formula One car and putting it into a fair, a Ford. Fairmont, it was like, yeah, the engine is great. But the legacy of the terrible tires, a terrible exhaust, the terrible steering in the Ford Fairmont was going to make that engine useless. And this is kind of what you’re saying, If you build these whiz bang systems, and then attach them to legacy, which is just like a shoulder shrug of like, why do we care? In a way? It doesn’t matter? Right? Amit Patel 10:29Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I think that’s absolutely right. And I to extend that analogy, I think of this as, I mean, it could be a Tesla, but it also could be a resto mod. You know, it could be like a Camaro 69. But with a brand new chassis with ABS, you know, whether a fuel injected LS seven, you know, all the mod cons that you could imagine, but still with the classic styling of that, that car from a body perspective. Yeah. And Michael Waitze 10:58that’s okay. Right. I mean, you’re right, it’s actually a great extension of that analogy, because the point that I was trying to make was that the internals in the Ford family and connecting it to a fast engine were useless. But you could then take all the internals, which is what you’re suggesting, just going junk them all. But this looks beautiful. And I’d love to be seen in a 69 Camaro, or a 64 in a 64 Corvette, but with all the updated stuff, so I can have my iPod in there and listen to my fancy music, right? So I get it completely. And it’s an interesting concept to write, you could build a brand new system and take none of your legacy clients. But like everybody over 18 signs, a new insurance policy just goes onto the new system and bit by bit by bit, that just becomes the system. Right. But to do that, does it mean you have to go to more Greenfield markets? Or can you do it in a mature market, like in the United States, like in Europe? Or do you have to come to Asia to do that? Amit Patel 11:54Well, that’s a very interesting question. I think, where in markets where there is limited infrastructure, and legacy systems, it’s sort of easier to do a greenfield build, if you like, I think in more mature markets, the issue is one of being brave. And and the other issue is one of, I think, controlled cannibalization. So, you know, insurance companies don’t want to create yet another innovative Wizzy division. Yeah, yeah, it’s likely to threaten their current entrenched position, but it’s better that they do it. And they can control the cannibalization from one platform more proposition to another, then someone else come and do it and just eat their, you know, their lunch. And I think that, you know, that should not be a reason not to do it. But it’s certainly easier in in front of Southeast Asia, I think, and and other markets such as that, like Africa, for example. Michael Waitze 13:03Yeah. Can you talk to me a little bit about this as well, right? Obviously, I live in I’ve lived in Asia for the past 30 something years, I’ve lived in Southeast Asia for the past 11 years. And my interest in emerging developing markets called whatever you want is super high. I look at what’s happened in Southeast Asia in the 11 years that I’ve lived here. And I kind of look over and see what’s happening in Africa as well. And I just think I know what’s going to happen. I don’t know the shape it’s going to take, but I kind of understand the pathway. Talk to me about what you think that looks like both in Southeast Asia, and in Africa as well, because I think that’s where the future is, but I’m curious what you think. Amit Patel 13:42Yeah, I think, you know, in this a generalization, but in these markets, the infrastructure is not as well developed. There hasn’t been as much investment in the past. And what and obviously, these markets are big, some of them China, India, in various other places, you know, the global population is sort of concentrated in these markets. If you if you think about sheer volume of people, yeah, in at the same time, whilst, you know, there hasn’t been that much kind of investment in infrastructure, yet technology, you know, God rest his soul. Mr. Moore, you know, Moore’s Law has has driven technology to, you know, new heights, dizzy heights, exponential growth, if you like. And so now, you know, you find yourself were in a place where, you know, even people in these economies where the GDP per capita is much lower than the western economies can afford technology such as laptops, mobile phones, smartphones, you know, all these these sorts of things, the types of things that are required to enable the type of futuristic propositions that we’re talking about and technology stacks from a customer customer interaction perspective. And therefore I find these markets you know, super sexy, and I’ve got to Like anecdotes, I guess, you know, a long time ago, I followed em Pacer. And it in Africa, you know, allowing movement of money via mobile phone. And, you know, also in India, fishermen near Goa that used to do, or still do go out fishing, you know, they figure out between each other through mobile communication where the best fishing places along the shoreline, and then to understand where market price along the shoreline is best for them, so that they go sell there because there’s demand. Yeah, yeah. And, and, you know, as fishermen to be able to leverage technology in such a way. And I know, it’s very simple example. I think that’s great. And, and the adoption curve of the sorts of solutions where you’ve got nothing is really spectacular, I think, relative to, you know, sort of Western more developed nations if you’d like. Michael Waitze 16:05Yeah. And you’ve actually just made me think about this in a different way, right. So if we go back 25 years, or 30 years into the Western world and think What did it cost to buy a desktop computer and who could really afford to get one, this may actually help explain why some of these legacy systems still exist. Because for people to interact digitally back then, obviously wasn’t happening on a phone. But computers were expensive for regular people. And while you could have bought an Amiga or a Commodore, once you put a keyboard and and a display with it, it was still expensive. But today, you can literally get like a throwaway smartphone. And you’re right. Even some not the poorest people in the world. But some people with like very low resource is can still get a phone. And it means I can go out fishing with the GPS, and they can communicate with other people in a way that they couldn’t do before. So it means that the things you can build have much bigger impact, but also have to be digital, where 30 years ago, they could have been, but in a way, it wouldn’t have mattered because even people in the middle class or upper middle class couldn’t afford the tools that would have made that possible. And that’s a really interesting thing, particularly in Southeast Asia. And M PESA. has been in Africa for a decade now. Is that right? I can’t I don’t know. But for a while. And that combined with we didn’t talk about this Yep. But UPI in India this ability to move money around frictionlessly means now that those types of products, whether they’re FinTech InsurTech, but anything having to do with money, and investment, and risk management is now available, possibly to anybody that has connectivity. And that’s just different. Amit Patel 17:42Yeah, absolutely. It’s fundamentally different. And it’s the volume of people. I mean, it’s yeah, it’s astounding, you know, mobile penetration in India. It’s astounding, you know, it’s it’s It dwarfs, you know, the UK, for example. Michael Waitze 18:00Yeah, it dwarfs the United States as well as towards Japan, it towards everywhere, really. And when I look at what’s happening there, and I think about sort of, let’s just say like the amount of data that’s getting accumulated, that was almost impossible to accumulate before, do you look at this as well, because you talked before about these products need to be not just newer and digitally native, but also need to be simpler. Do you think that the access to this mass amount of people that wasn’t possible before, plus all the data that they’re generating, makes it easier to both personalize but also simplify the products as well? Amit Patel 18:38Yeah, I think it should do definitely personalization, simplification. You know, that’s an interesting one. Yeah. Whether the data enables you to simplify or not, is a good question, I think, to be honest data, you know, allow, if the data is good quality, got provenance, then it allows you to draw insights. And those insights can help you to drive better customer experience of outcomes. And, and one of those areas is, you know, ask anyone, would you like simple products or complicated products? Everyone before? It’s that simple, right, right. And so I think the data can be weaponized in a way that enables simplicity to be drawn out of it, so you can cut through the noise. Michael Waitze 19:25Yeah, look, I was having this conversation this morning, as well with somebody in the insurance industry. I hesitated myself to buy health insurance for a bunch of years. And well, because in a way, right, it didn’t make sense to me. How to buy it because I’ve been given it my whole life. Right. And this is a weird concept. I mean, I worked at Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, it doesn’t matter. But I just walked in and on day one, they’re like, sign these forms. You have insurance. Your family has insurance. I didn’t know what it cost. I didn’t care. I didn’t have to. So I didn’t understand the complex. it. But once I had to get insurance myself, it took me a while. And to be fair to the person that actually sold it to me the best was the person that just made it the easiest. She was just like, here are the things you need. Here’s your age, just do this thing. And I was like I’m signing fine. And the price was right. Right. But but it wasn’t the price wasn’t that different from everything else. But it was just so easy for me to understand what she was offering that I just said, done. Right. Does that make sense as well? Amit Patel 20:28Yeah, I think it does. And so making the purchase decision more frictionless. Yeah. And enabling checkout faster, if you like. Yeah. And and also almost like a SaaS product, to be able to leave it. If it doesn’t work for you. For whatever reason that might be. It’s almost like a promise from the provider to say, Don’t worry, I’ve got your back. Because if you don’t, if you don’t get what you want from it, you can come out of it. I think that’s those are sort of interesting ways. People think about products these days. Michael Waitze 21:10Can we talk about insurance as a service? If you don’t mind? It, you said SAS, right. So software is a service, but we can call it I don’t know how you would pronounce IAS s and I don’t really care. But if insurance, if you can do it as a service, in the same way that I pay for Microsoft Excel monthly, or that I pay for Adobe Creative Suite monthly, should we be making insurance easy enough so that it can be just a monthly payment, right where I don’t have to pay $10,000 up for let’s just say $12,000 up front at the beginning of the year, but I can pay $1,000 A month or $500 a month, whatever it is, and still have the same coverage I have with the expectation that I’ve signed a year long contract or a two year long contracts that I will pay all that money, but that will pay it in pieces. Does that make sense as well? Amit Patel 21:55I think it does. I mean, you know, an interesting example, I guess, you see in many markets see here in the UK, income protection, critical illness, life, health insurance, pet insurance. For me, these are all sort of a constellation of protection products, either for you know, my pet, or, or me and my loved ones, yet they’re sold as individual products. And and they have similar question sets for underwriting if you like, but not the same, exactly the same. Yeah. And, and yet, you know, to try and buy these things, it’s a complete nightmare to do it individually. Whereas if someone just said, like, you know, instead of me giving you health insurance, like I’m gonna give you a protection product, right, and they have certain interplays, right, so if you’re off work, and you can’t, you know, walk for whatever reason, income protection kicks in, you get health insurance to be able to get you back to work. So the income protection comes off, you know, if you’re critically ill, and you can’t work, you know, we’ll pay you a lump sum of money or you go back to work at a reduced level, like, some of these things have overlaps as well. So it’s, so I see this move in the future, although you’ve got to get customers used to it brokers used to etc, of sort of just having a protection product, if you like, rather than multiple different products that you buy to cover different eventualities in your life related to protection. Michael Waitze 23:25So are you building those products at PG? Because that sounds like a product that I would want? Right? In other words, when I buy health insurance, why is it separate? And it’s a rhetorical question, right? But why is it separate from your right income protection insurance, where if I have a health problem, it’s likely that I can’t go to work, and that I won’t be able to afford my health insurance. But if I have income protection, then that kicks in when I can’t go to work anymore? As long as it’s legitimate, right, which can also then fund my health insurance. And when I go back to work, I don’t need the income protection anymore. This is a product I think that everybody would want. And are you building that and how hard is it to build that type of product, just the product itself? And then you can talk about how hard it is to market and sell their product as well, because it’s different. Yeah. Amit Patel 24:08So we’re not building that product at the moment. It’s hard enough to build a a single product? Well, I would say, but, you know, our ambitions and we’re quite we’re an early stage company, our ambitions, you know, there’s a number of avenues to explore in terms of strategic growth for us. And one of those dimensions is to look at how as we’ve just discussed health insurance intertwines with these various other products that are available into the in the market and whether there’s a possibility to create a consolidated protection product with a single premium, if you like, and it’s got some clear benefits in the different scenarios that one might find themselves in. I think that would make it a lot easier, like for companies for example, to cover their employees or individuals, you know, I think there’s there’s a point around individual circumstances, risk selection and individuals wanting to kind of tailor those products a lot more. But for companies, and particularly large ones that may often provide many of these products, albeit there silo products in various guises anywhere, and I just think it would make it much simpler to have them bundled and sold as a as a whole, if you like. Yeah, Michael Waitze 25:28I mean, one of the things that I wrote down was, Is this a b2b product, or is it a b2c product? Right? Because if I’m a company, and I have a cohort of employees, that can’t work, but I still need to pay them their salary. If I were insured for that, why would I care? I mean, I would care. Obviously, you don’t I mean, it would make my life a lot easier financially. And I had done that risk mitigation that we talked about at the beginning and the risk management so that that’s okay. And when they come back to work, you’re right, that single premium stops paying for this and starts again paying for their health insurance. But this brings up a bigger question as well. Do you see this merging or intertwining of health, fitness and financial fitness as well, where those two things are just becoming the same thing or they’re so closely related? Now? Amit Patel 26:15I think in in certain instances from if you put a customer lens to it, not not everyone jumps immediately to the conclusion that if I’m unwell, then I’m not going to be able to work. And so, you know, I need for ducks that will support me that that kind of articulation, although it’s implied, and you know, it’s quite obvious when someone states it, it’s not the first thing I don’t think customers necessarily just sort of think about what they’re looking for peace of mind that comes in various guises and ways. And I think that that sort of peace of mind should be the way forward, but I think hearts and minds still need to change a bit. Historically, people are used to buying these products in particular ways. And they are seeing, you know, as you say, these kind of sectors are sort of blending a little bit more. But I haven’t seen a killer product yet that that, you know, converges and all of those things together yet, Michael Waitze 27:14neither have I. But I do think that again, back to the comment you were making before, we there were so many products that we couldn’t create on the trading desk because of the legacy systems that we had, because there was no way to connect the things that we knew we wanted to connect but couldn’t. But once we started building new systems, we thought to ourselves, hey, wait a second, we can connect that thing to this thing. Well, that alone is a brand new product. So as you go through this digital transformation, right, and you move systems, from the old legacy systems onto brand new kind of Greenfield systems, my guesses, and again, tell me where I’m wrong here is that even just through serendipity, you’ll think I didn’t realize we could connect that thing to this thing. Here’s a brand new product that everyone’s gonna want. Are you thinking about this as well? Amit Patel 27:58Yeah, I think you know that that’s very interesting. The interoperability of systems and data flows, starts to unlock new worlds, that you can’t necessarily predict right now. Things are moving so fast that you don’t Michael Waitze 28:15know can we have? Can we end this conversation without talking about Chuck GPT. And the artificial intelligence stuff, I don’t like to talk about trendy stuff. But I feel like we’re at the beginning of it, like you said, this a paradigm shift. When I look at all the work that’s getting done in all, frankly, all of the work that we used to do back on the trading desk, using artificial intelligence, using machine learning to look at historically what had traded and how it was going to trade in the future. I see this now seeping into everything, particularly with all the noise around chat TPT, how is all this stuff around artificial intelligence, all these conversations, all this explosion of information, impacting what you’re building or thinking about building? Amit Patel 28:55So we like you don’t actually talk about any of that. And the reason why we don’t talk about any of that is our technology stack is AI and machine learning enabled? I think everyone’s is frankly, the reality of life. Any new stack is the reality of life is none of that, that important and good technology can be deployed if you don’t have good quality, high volume data. Yeah, this is the the facts of life. And so where we are at our stage of our company, you know, we don’t have the scale of data that makes deployment of machine learning and you know, AI models meaningful. But our data modeling and data architecture and the technology suite that we use, enables us to be able to deploy those sorts of technologies when we get that scale of data. Michael Waitze 29:51It’s such a great answer. You know, most people would give some gobbledygook answer about how everything is artificially intelligence and all this other stuff, but you’re right and again, And I was having this conversation this morning with somebody. To me, it’s just another tool like Linux. So it would be like asking you 15 or 20 years ago, do you use Linux? And going? Oh, we haven’t thought about it yet. But the reality is that everybody’s using it. It’s just there. And it’s just another tool. Talk to me as well about what it’s like being you’re in London. Yeah. Um, yeah, looking at markets outside of that region, as engines for potential growth. Amit Patel 30:27Yes. So, as part of our journey with our business, we recently optimized our corporate structure as I would call it. So we created underneath our group entity, we already had a regulated, managing general agent mga business, and what we’ve done is extracted the technology out of that and created a tech subsidiary. And, you know, the reason to do that, you know, there are a few reasons but one, you know, to segregate regulated and unregulated activities, to to preserve the solvency of the regulated entity, because we’re spending, you know, a lot of money on development, and so forth. And three, really, to be able to take that the technology that’s being built in that TEPCO out to others. And what I mean by others is other health insurance that we could effectively deliver them a new digital business, with a digital, by default, if you like operating model, and then I’ll say digital is actually bionic, because not everything is fully digital, there is human in the loop in areas that we can’t digitalize right now, and that some of that is because of scale of data. Others is because we’re just not mature enough yet in our technology evolution to manage and digitize those some of those processes. But I think is a really interesting opportunity to kind of say, you know, we’ve got this digital platform, right, we have a reference installation of that platform in the UK running as an mga already. And that platform could be leveraged to basically re platform existing products that you might have, or a version of those existing products on a new operating model, or to go and do what some of these guys have or and girls have always wanted to do, which is create new products with pace. But the sole difference being relative to other inshore tech platforms is we’ve built this with a domain driven design, specifically around health insurance. So of course, there are a lot of reusable components in there for other types of lines of business. But we understand this business, because this is the sort of business you know, myself and my co founders have been in for many, many years. And we are running an operating on the platform already. Michael Waitze 32:58So this is interesting to me, because you know that you know what already works, right? Because you’re using yourself for your own MGA. Right. So if you offer it to somebody else, it’s not like, it’s not like, like, again, a greenfield installation for you. Because you know, the tech already works. Yeah, we talked about Asia, we talked about India as well. You know, every market out here has its own little different market microstructure has its own different regulations, and its own idiosyncrasies. To me, that was always exciting. You know, again, if I had to do a trade in New Zealand, it was definitely different than doing a trade in Greece or doing a trade in India, and I loved the different market. microstructures. Is this interesting and exciting for you as well, you know what I mean, because Indonesia is not Vietnam. Amit Patel 33:38Yeah, incredibly, so. I, you know, obviously Lea with the healthy economies, the intertwining between public and private health systems, and penetration of health insurance and the type of products, provider networks, they’re all different around the world, and I think, coined the phrase variety is the spice of life. Right? It keeps it interesting, it does. But some of the patterns, you know, if you just map out a customer journey, some of the patterns are still the same. You know, someone will go look for these types of products, they need a place to discover them and learn about them, right? They need to find a way of modulating the price and picking benefits, if that’s the way the product works. They’ll need a payment gateway, they need a rate, we’d need to have a rate engine built. They need a way to manage the policy when it’s in flight. Whether it’s changes or access providers or access, make a claim those sorts of scenarios. So, in my view, the patterns of there are certain patterns commonality and front end customer experience, which has particular implications for reusable components at the back end. Yeah. And then there are things which you know, will vary dramatically pricing product structure The number of providers and the way they wish to operate with, you know, the insurance company and their tech platform. Those things change. Michael Waitze 35:10So before I let you go, just one more thing. I like to say that no one succeeds alone. Right, particularly if you’re entering new markets. And I believe this really strongly I do it for my own business as well. I’m always looking for strong partners, when you expand outside of your own region. And you look to Southeast Asia, you look to Africa to expand, are you also looking for partners that to expand with as well? Amit Patel 35:32Absolutely. So we’re looking for, you know, insurers that are already playing in the health vertical, or want to get into the health vertical, who want to be able to have a digital first platform and operating model to service their customers. And this is where we want to, you know, find new partners, create new opportunities for ourselves and our platform to be able to kind of license it out and build the infrastructure, you know, in a particular geography, or multiple geographies. Michael Waitze 36:09To be fair, right. Okay. Thank you so much for doing this. Amit Patel, Founder of Peachy. I really appreciate your time today. Amit Patel 36:17Thanks a lot, Michael. Really, really good talking. The post EP 207 – Amit Patel – a co-Founder and CEO at Peachy – It’s Time to Rewrite the Proposition appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast was impressed by Jeffrey Khoo’s energy level and his love of parametric insurance. Jeffrey is the Vice Chairman in APAC for Arbol, the future of climate risk management. Some of the topics that Jeffrey covered: Climate change and its impact on the agriculture sector and the overall economy as well Data decentralization and blockchain dClimate and the creation of a decentralized marketplace for weather data Artificial Intelligence and the role it plays in the InsurTech stack Parametric Insurance! Some other titles we considered for this episode: Credibility of Data Is Very Important Not All Data is Good Data The Risk Experience Must Fit the Solution Doing A Lot of Good for Climate Change You Summed It Up Quite Nicely Please read the best-efforts transcript below: Michael Waitze 0:03And now we are on. Hi, this is Michael Waitze. And welcome back to the Asia InsurTech. Podcast. Today we have Jeffrey Khoo, the Vice Chairman in APAC at Arbol. Did I say Arbol right? Jeffrey Khoo 0:16Absolutely. Right. Absolutely. Right. Michael Waitze 0:19Jeffrey, it’s great to have you on the show. Let’s just jump right into this. What do you think is the biggest trend or emerging trend of insurance and InsurTech in Southeast Asia? And why do you think that’s the case? Jeffrey Khoo 0:32I think, you know, with climate change is a story that will be repeating over and over again, over the new and old, all kinds of chat groups, I think that has driven a lot of what we call the green economy in this part of the world, right. So a lot of governments are getting used to it. And as a result of which, technologies like AI and blockchain have come to the forefront, because a lot of these can be utilized for mitigating climate change or spreading out the risk for climate change in a way. So in terms of the technology is at the forefront. Now. The discussions the forefront now will be aI about decentralization of data, and of course, Blockchain. So these are the few things that are upfront now in effect. Michael Waitze 1:11Got it? Okay. And can we also back up a little bit and just get some of your background? And then I’d want to talk about how you got from where you were into what you’re doing now. Jeffrey Khoo 1:22Okay, so this is a long story, because I’m of a certain certain vintage sort of thing is that? I mean, Michael Waitze 1:30What does that mean? Jeffrey Khoo 1:33Ah, certainly, this means they have a certain age, you know, I heard it from someone that that’s a better way to describe it, instead of saying you’re old. Michael Waitze 1:40You’re definitely not. So go ahead. Jeffrey Khoo 1:44So, okay, where do I start off? Right? So my interest in this space, I would say, started off in botany, or some people may call it agriculture. And for a small country like Singapore, this is a little bit of an oddity, right? I mean, we don’t have much space for any agriculture here. So I did a degree in botany, Honours Degree in it, and I did pretty well in school, got myself on the Dean’s List, etc, etc. And when I came out, it was pretty difficult to find a job that’s related to it at that point of time, right? It was 1994 1995. Right. So I ended up, you know, getting involved with stuff like manufacturing, or cosmetics and all that because I biochemistry background, but that’s for a short period of time. And after that, I went to fertilizer distribution, fertilizer manufacturing. At a certain point later, I became general manager of a listed company that was involved in forestry involved in tissue culture. And from there, I sort of evolved into doing agriculture investments. So I went around in APAC, looking for good investments, where you can pretty much good returns, I would say, in terms of, let’s say, plantations, livestock farms, and so on. Right. So I did a lot of that. And then insurance came knocking, right? So I ended up joining sushri. Michael Waitze 2:59Before we get to insurance, can I ask you this? So you, us, you study botany? You have to understand science and chemistry. You go out into the work world, right? And you start doing stuff in the agricultural space, also in the in the chemistry in the chemical space, right. But while you’re going through and doing this, are you thinking there’s something missing? Or you’re just going through and doing it trying to make a living and stuff like that? And then later on, you realized, Oh, I get it, we need something? Do you know what I mean? Like, when did this absolutely. Jeffrey Khoo 3:26Okay, this change, I would say that my passion for this triggered when I was the general manager of that listed company in Singapore, and I spent a lot of time in China, and a lot of time in Malaysia. And they are also actually exposed to weather problems, you know, when I had ran a banana plantation, and one day, coincidentally, I wasn’t there, the entire partition was basically devastated. Right. And so it’s sort of a little typhoon or heavy wind event going through, and then I lost all my trees. So they remind me very clearly, despite of all the efforts you do to grow that thing, right, keeping pests away using the right kinds of fertilizers getting the right guys to come in and work on it. Well, it was all gone in one fell swoop, you know, literally in two hours. Finished, right? Yeah. So months of work has gone. So I’ve realized that actually, weather played a very instrumental part in agriculture. So that that was a point when it hit me. Michael Waitze 4:22Okay, so then you said you joined Swiss Re, and what took you into the insurance industry? Because it’s a completely different thing at some level? No. Jeffrey Khoo 4:32Yep. I think it was just the right timing. At that point of time, we’re looking for somebody who was mixed between agriculture and understood a little bit about weather, right. So maybe I take a step back before I entered two, three, I was actually at a private equity firm called cortex Asia. Okay. And at that point of time, I was running around looking for investment opportunities in the agri space. And in particular, because when I looked at I faced the same problems right when I talk To invest in in rice farms, you wanted to know whether there was say, drought prone area, or whether they were impacted by various issues like disease and all that. So all these things came into play. So when when they started to talk to me and say, Hey, we want to do something for Asia Pacific, is this something you want to do? So yeah, by all means this again, affecting me, and if it can be insured, and it’s something that I can sort of market and it’s useful to farmers, I’ll do it. So I ended up mystery street. Michael Waitze 5:28What was the learning curve like though, right? Because as as, as a person who’s external to the insurance industry, you can go look at it and think, Okay, I have my own insurance policy of life insurance, maybe I’ve got a whole life policy, I have health insurance, maybe I have a family. So I’ve got health insurance for them as well. But you kind of don’t know anything about it. At least I know, I didn’t, until I started really getting involved in it. So what was the learning curve? Like when you got it? And you were like, I want to solve all these problems in the agriculture space. But oh, boy, this is a lot different than I thought it was. Jeffrey Khoo 6:00Very good question. And this is why I’m more or less in love with parametric insurance, which is the thing I talk about every single day, right? Because their learning curve wasn’t really, I will say much of a curve for me, in a sense is because at that point, when I joined to three, this was still rather in its infancy stage. So when nobody that was in let’s do 2015, okay, around 2015 Yeah, 2015. I was there. And then, you know, we did I mean, it was it’s a new, there’s a new setup necess that not many deals will close. And they weren’t close in effect. So when I came in, I started closing deals. Now maybe to answer that question as to you know, what was the learning curve was a little bit of difficulty, because insurance is a pretty complicated business and regulated right. But the beauty behind it, and I would say quite clearly, it is easier for someone who has Zippo experience in insurance to learn about parametric insurance than somebody who is sort of embedded with all the history behind it. And all the wonderful terminology behind it. Michael Waitze 7:01It’s such a good point, though, right? Because you come in and someone says, okay, parametric insurance, you take these parameters in real time, or close to real time, and then we do these calculations, then we can make some payouts based on some pre agreed payouts based on this thing. And you go, that sounds like it makes sense. Whereas if you’d been in the insurance industry for 25 years, you would have said, Wait a second, oh, how does that affect this system? And non-system and these other things, then how about that thing? And then what’s the risk? And what are the underwriters say? And how about the, you know, all these things, but for you, it was easier, just like, Okay, I get it parametric? Makes sense? Yeah. Jeffrey Khoo 7:31Yeah. It’s, it’s easy, and in the sense to understand and then the applications are, I would say, almost limitless, you know, to wherever they go ahead. Exactly. It’s a wonderful thing to be working with to be promoting and all that, right. It’s at the center. Of course, it’s difficult, because, you know, to change mindsets, is it’s not something that’s that simple. But the key if you want to work through brokers, and they say, Hey, you know, what’s the, you know, what claims procedure, for example, because there’s no claims procedure and things, things of that nature? Or can we layer it up, there’s no layering up, you know, it’s just a trigger, and it hits any piece. So sometimes because of its simplicity, it becomes difficult to understand for certain individuals. Let’s put it that way. Yeah. Michael Waitze 8:17Yeah. Because you’re just not used to it. When you when you first started doing this, and you first got interested in introduced to parametric insurance, then you went back to your connections in the agriculture industry. And you said to them, would you consider doing this right, because there’s a big difference actually in I don’t want to say claims but in the payouts that are associated with parametric and indemnity insurance, right. So an indemnity insurance could be a much larger payout potentially, whereas parametric is it happened, the trigger got hit, here’s a million bucks, even if there was $10 million of damage, and I’m just making up numbers, right? Yeah. What was the response from because before it existed, nobody kind of knew about it. When you went back to your ag tech connections, what was their response to this? Jeffrey Khoo 9:02Well, you know, because selling fertilizers for a long period of time and spoke to many different agriculture firms, of course, I went back to them and told them this. There are now doing this, you know, I’m going to sell this to you. Now. I depended on the client, right? So there’s a reality behind it. Let’s say rice farmers, rice, farmers barely make 1% net profit out of whatever they produce. So they don’t have enough money to even use parametric as a sort of insurance tool. Right. But if you look at larger firms, multinationals, that’s what we’re interested, right, because they had a budget to do these things. I mean, it’s not free, it’s parametric is not free. And cost is so simple in this way of paying out. But it also sort of affects the cost law. It’s not you will not be you know, that cheap per se. No indemnity insurance. There’s the ability to argue maybe there’s ability to claw back a certain amount, you know, so insurance companies might depending on the structure, the solution gives you a very attractive premium offer. But it comes with a lot of, you know, exclusions, what if, etc, and it’s all there. And so the insurance company has a possibility of maybe throwing back a certain amount like say, Hey, I can’t pay you this amount because of this. But in parametric insurance, where the policy wording is barely 1015 pages right? Now, insurance company has no choice but to pay. It triggers pay less, there’s no, there’s no what if, what if whatever, then I don’t pay right doesn’t exist, right. So as a result, sometimes depending on the structure, not always, the pricing can be more of a challenging, so it sort of fits certain clients. Michael Waitze 10:37So how do we make it so that the farmers that are most at risk, right? So I don’t want to necessarily just say smallholder farmers, but smaller farms, right, that aren’t industrial farms, and aren’t corporate farms, where if they miss a planting season, or if they miss a harvest season, like that really could go bankrupt, they could go out of business, where the insurance in this case could come in really handy, right, like a storm, you said, destroys your entire Banana Farm, your banana plantation. Yeah. Now how am I going to eat? Because I can’t even eat the bananas? Do you know what I mean? If worse comes to worse? Absolutely. How do you democratize it down so that it’s reasonably priced enough so that smallholder farmers can do it? And not just big corporate farms? Yeah. Yep. Jeffrey Khoo 11:18That’s a very good question. I work a lot with NGOs. I work with, you know, donors, that would be willing to actually pay up the premium for the farmers or even governments actually willing to pay out the premiums for the farmers are a majority, larger portion of the premiums on behalf of the farmers, get them on their feet. Yeah. So So you know, instead of, let’s say, a certain foundation donating billions after the event has happened, probably donate a little bit before the event has happened. And then then we can cover them for these, you know, major, I would say weather events, I mean, severe events, right? Michael Waitze 11:52So you were at Swiss Re but now you’re the vice chairman at Arbol what is Arbol? How do you get involved here? And then how do you just like, dig deeply into this? Jeffrey Khoo 12:06Okay, I was at Swiss Re for about five years odd. And after that, I moved on to a company called Donna. And they also had what we call them, mga as they call it, basically the right to write insurance deals for forestry. And I did a bit of parametric there. But there was during the COVID periods, so things are all, you know, difficult to do anything. So when I came out of COVID, I joined our board, the founder, the company gentleman called Syd Jha. So he connected up with me. In fact, he connected up, essentially, we knew each other. And while I mean, he did a wonderful job, the company just just grew exponentially. And he said, Why don’t you come and join us? Since you love to do this thing? And you’re the noisiest guy in APEC, always talking about this come in, come come on board. And here’s what I did. Right? I think I’m doing more or less the same thing, in terms of promoting parametric insurance. But what I really love about this company, is that, unlike when I was in surgery, and you know, that kind of ground, I also had the opportunity to look at new technology. What does that mean? Okay, so maybe let me let me explain a little bit about the technology, because Apple is not purely what we call an insurance company right? Now, when I was still in Swift, three, St. John, the founder of Apple approached me, we had friends, mutual friends. And so I shared with him what I was doing its history, right. And a couple of years later, to my big surprise, and joy, in fact, that he actually grew such a large company, and it’s grown exponentially. I think it’s one of the fastest growing tech firms around. And so he called me up about last year, and they said, Hey, why don’t you join us? Right now, you’re very familiar AIPAC. You know, you’re someone who is speaking very loudly about advocating about it. So and, you know, a lot of people in this place, right, and I speak a couple of Asian languages, so just as well. So I thought that was a great opportunity. But But what really attracted me wasn’t really this because, you know, I could have gone back to history come back to Munich reorder larger companies. The thing is that Apple had InsurTech. Now, it’s a common word to use. But the thing is that these guys really know what they’re doing. They have blockchain AI, and all the very nifty stuff. And they use AI to actually work out the premiums at times, right, and also to work out the, you know, there’s a lot of data that’s involved, you know, in weather, right. So, AI will come in to do the calculation, you give it, give it, give it some parameters, and then come up with the pricing is amazing. You know, they can do this, and of course, blockchain and everything else, so they were driven into that space. There was a company called D climate, which actually spun out of our board. And that’s the world’s first decentralized marketplace for weather data. They have a lot of data stored and all kinds of people contributing to it. So the climate was also invested by this famous US investor called Mark Cuban. So he put in some money to this, believing that it will grow big. And so far, they’ve come up with pretty good products at a very fast rate. So that’s one of the reasons and I think the main reason why I actually ended up in our board, right? Michael Waitze 15:26So when I was on a sales trading desk, right, when I sat on a portfolio trading desk, we would take a lot of back tested stock data, right? So we’d get a lot of stock trading information data, we would clean that data up to make sure that it was all right and valid. And then we would use that to build trading models. We didn’t call it artificial intelligence. But we did write algorithms that tried to understand what the patterns were, and then predict what the pattern would be today and also the next day and stuff like that. And we would build algos to then do trading for us. Are you suggesting that they are also gathering all of this climate data feeding that climate data that’s historic into our bowls, kind of actuarial information, whether they give it to actuaries or not is a different story, but into the artificial intelligence and then coming up with pricing for parametric insurance based on historical weather data, and maybe predictions about future data as well. Jeffrey Khoo 16:23Yep, you summed it up quite correctly. Yep. I see that you’re already part of this company. Yeah, I think, you know, let’s put it this way, where the data, generally speaking, is plentiful in mature economies, like the US mature economies like Australia, but no places, you know, far flung, you know, some places in Vietnam, some locations, even in India, you don’t really have good data, right? Okay, you need a workstation to do that. And all that. So data is something that the camera keeps on collecting. I mean, it’s all across the globe, it doesn’t also mean that all satellite data, it can be to ground sensors, IoT, so on so forth, but all this data can be, you know, used to structure products, as you said correctly earlier. And we do that, right. And of course, being parametric, you need that data to pay out or go to you got to ensure that the data is third party, which is one reason why, you know, in the sense that our boy and D climate are more or less separate companies in a way. Yeah. Michael Waitze 17:25Yeah. I mean, in a way, look, if you go look at Sid’s background, and I’d love to have him on the show as well. He comes out of an applied mathematics background. So taking a very different take on what that data means. Right, if you go back to the way indemnity insurance is built through actuarial mathematics, which again, is very sophisticated and complex, but actuarial tables as well, it’s different than taking applied mathematics, taking the real time data, and then being able to project forward about what this is going to be in a parametric way. The other interesting question for me as well, as you said, like even in countries like India, and Vietnam and stuff like that, because there haven’t historically been weather stations, is there a possibility that you go out and build your own weather stations to get this proprietary data that feeds into D climate? Because I presume you that company was was spun out so that everybody can have access to that data, of course, on a paid basis, but that anybody else that wants to do it, then can white label that data into their own analyses and create their own products? Yeah. Jeffrey Khoo 18:26Yep. Yep. I think the advantage of it being decentralized, so encourage more people to contribute data to it, you know, because they’re really far flung places to set up all these sensors. Yeah. And so there’s a commercial challenge there, right to make it profitable to mean to sort of companies and all that currently, I don’t think that’s in the, in the plan yet. But we do get a lot of disparate data from very far flung places on the globe, that, that we can sort of use and collect and analyze within within d climate. Michael Waitze 18:57Yeah, it’s just so interesting to think about what that business itself is going to look like, Jeffrey Khoo 19:02ah, that business, I will say, You got to be careful with it. You know, I’ve done this kind of, it’s not right for me to say which country and all that. I mean, you’ve got weather data coming from certain weather stations that, you know, when there’s a thunderstorm went through a typhoon has went through, and then the data reads nothing. So So I mean, the credibility of data is very important. Yeah. So I mean, I don’t know whether the guidance meaning the police are sleeping easy. So these are things that that’s the job of parametric insurance. Not all data is good data. So you know, I’ve done certain deals in Southeast Asian country for yield data. Right. And it’s amazing, same thing, that a drop down there, but the harvest was, what is, I mean, it’s not possible, right. Keylogger, right. So I mean, and you expect me to use that data as a trigger point to pay out? Wow, that’s going to be very difficult, right? Yeah. So the one part about the parametric design is to make sure your data is genuine. And to make sure that the way you collected the data has been similar in the entire time span, I mean, if you collected it differently 20 years ago, and you collect it now. So I mean, I wouldn’t consider the data I can use to price it, right? Michael Waitze 20:14Is there a tokenization aspect of this business as well, right to encourage people to contribute really clean data to it, they get tokens, and then maybe that they can use those as, like a source to be able to buy some parametric insurance, if that makes sense. Jeffrey Khoo 20:32Yeah, that sounds I think for for this part of the world, when it comes to tokenization. And all that is still still something they read on the news, they haven’t done it yet. So at least from my side of the fence, in the Asia Pacific is difficult because and to be very frank, right, in terms of just normal insurance, penetration within Southeast Asia and all these very low, yeah, so me tokenization they’re far from it, they got to get insurance. And they gotta understand the value of insurance. Let’s, before we get there. Michael Waitze 21:02So we’ve talked a lot about the benefits of parametric insurance. Are there any challenges or any downsides to this? And then how did those get resolved as well? Jeffrey Khoo 21:10Okay, let me let me tell you the challenges and the downside, maybe all at one go. I think that the challenge is we know, acceptance, right. And sometimes the cost, and sometimes even the understanding, so these are the issues that the challenges that we face, right? And data will also be a challenge to make sure the right kind of data, and not all solutions that you know, I mean, you cannot, cannot just come to find and say, Look, you know, let’s find out the x amount of rainfall you need, or X amount of temperature you need. All that is not really precise, a lot of work needs to be done to structure in such a way that is more precise, right? Because this isn’t as simple as if the more rains, I pay you tomorrow doesn’t rain, I don’t pay you. First of all, they may not be that sophisticated, but sophisticated enough to know that he may not pay out so so or even they think he’s gambling, right. So we have to avoid that. That’s the biggest challenge. Right? In, in terms of avoiding that. Now, in terms of, you know, another portion of that challenge, I would say is what we call patients risk, which sort of adds on to what I said earlier on your your your this solution that you create for them. I give an example the best way to wrap up an example. So for example, the client says you know, Jeffrey, I want to buy a category three typhoon cover, if a category typhoon, three, three typhoon hits my location, or near my location, I want to pay up. Now here’s the problem, a category one type of disease location and everything is wiped out. And I don’t pay him anything because it doesn’t get category three, right? So this is more or less what we call basis risk, right? The risk experience must fit this solution. If it doesn’t fit the solution what’s going to happen is going to walk away very very unhappy clients and to breach that is the problem. Now one thing to breach there’s a problem in certain places in this world not to mention which part of APEC category track three Typhoons are a norm every single year yeah. Now to ensure that it’s not a matter of insurance anymore it’s a guaranteed will happen kind of thing like the Philippines Hong Kong, we can insure those. Yeah, exactly. It’s gonna hit Yeah, absolutely. Right. And I know insurance, right mind will say okay, what, gotta do it, right. I mean, everybody we dumping their money in buying premium, but because the shopI out. So these are things that parametric insurance cannot do, it cannot insure something that is truly uninsurable, when you know, a certain as a sunrise that you hit then is no longer considered insurance, right, you got to find some other ways to mitigate that risk. So parametric insurance when talking about business risk, that is the part where you request skill, you need time to actually talk to the client to understand more, get the proper data, and then do the right analysis behind it. Right. So something interesting, I learned about parametric insurance and about pricing can give to two different underwriters using the same data in the same company, and you get two different prices. Sure. Yeah. So so so there’s a little bit of art involved in this thing, right? A little bit of business sense involved in this thing to actually get it right. So it is exciting in a sense, because sometimes you come up with a deal doesn’t well go back to the drawing board and try to to get to make sense and then bringing it back to the client. So there’s a lot of back and forth here. But through it all, the client learns a little bit more about a race and we also learn a bit more about how we should price deals for them. What’s the Michael Waitze 24:23right balance for a para indemnity insurance, right in the sense that you do want to have parametric insurance you can get that immediate payout but like we said, if the immediate payout is not large enough to cover all of your losses, you can also combine this with an generally accepted I mean indemnity insurance and say, you may actually get a larger claim in this case, it is a claim if it’s indemnity insurance, right. How do you package those two things together? Jeffrey Khoo 24:50Okay, well, it’s strange that you said this word right? Because this word I remember the rest is history. This one afternoon, and I was just fooling around with words and say Have you know how about this? We just call this paradigm Lila. And you know, strangely enough, put it on a LinkedIn and add a few people call me up, you know, because I’ve got a pretty large LinkedIn following and all that. But safe to say I don’t think that word has been going around much. But it comes out this way. It’s more like something to do with a mix between parametric indemnity. Yeah. Okay. The way it works, is this right? I think it’s a mixture, when it comes to the payout, a certain portion, actually would meet Vasa just to be involved. And it says a portion is immediate trigger. So for example, you’re talking about category three type of dating, right? Well, maybe the entirety of $1 million. You say, look, I tell you what, in this case, we pay a half a million first because your image needs to settle. And the rest will be using, you know, normal ways of people going down loss of justice and checking and everything else. So it can be a mixture of that. In that case, you can sort of control the cost, if you would, this way, by having other portions of it as parametric, instead of portions of it going to the normal claims adjusters and so on. Michael Waitze 26:00What are the biggest markets in Southeast Asia for Arbol right now? And do you get the sense that countries like Indonesia, I’m gonna leave China separate? Because I feel like it’s its own sort of domestic market? But if you feel like countries like Indonesia, with very large farming populations, but also India as well, I mean, look, to be fair, there’s also Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, right? Where those countries alone have almost 2 billion people in them combined. Are those going to be big markets for these types of products as well? And I know you said before, and I don’t disagree with you on this, that penetration for traditional insurance is still low, you have to get kind of past that hurdle. But these things are I think you’re gonna happen in unison, but you look at those big countries as the biggest opportunities as well. Speaker 2 26:45Yeah, they all do. I think that that opportunities, definitely, they’re different pockets. And I would, I would venture to say not only for agriculture, right permission can be used for so many things along the value chain. So if you’re just at the front end, where the farmers are, and all that, that sort of limits you. So you know, you know, simple, not simple, I would say things like factories, need to operate anywhere heavy rainfall, and you’re in an area that’s easily flooded, then, you know, you buy parametric insurance to for events, large scale football matches, concerts, and so on, so forth. And they could be badly affected if you suddenly have a huge thunderstorm in the area. And parametric issues can also be used in those cases. So we will not be limiting ourselves to just weather for agriculture, but also weather for industries, businesses, and all kinds of weather related kinds of research. So it’s not related or purely for agriculture. Yeah, so in that sense, we are sort of spread out. I mean, let’s put it this way. If there’s a heavy thunderstorm planes can fly off. Now, somebody’s got to pay that too, right. So we can come in and do something. But having said that, having said that, let me share with you something that I’ve learned in Japan, you know, I tried to sell some of this in Japan. And interestingly, I spoke to a broker. And interestingly, I experienced it myself. He said, what happens to Thai food business will be affected people cannot go to the shops can go to restaurants. I really understood that wasn’t correct. Because I was there for when they there was a typhoon category tree that hit in Tokyo about probably about four or five years ago, I was there in the middle of Tokyo in a hotel. And guess what, the next day, I read the news, I heard it on the news, two people passed away. And I was staying in the train station itself, you know, just text, the train station in the train station. And jolly well, next day, everybody was lining up to still go to work. So you know, it’s also partly due to the resilience of the people. So I’ve also realized that it works, you know, unless, of course, it’s much more severe. So, but resilience of people also means that, hey, they wouldn’t bother you still go to the restaurant? whatever it’s worth, right. So so it’s a cultural thing. And it depends on which country right, so for the Japanese kudos to you guys. Because, wow, I mean, even the toughest stuff, you still go and as a five, we’ll just carry on as normal. Michael Waitze 29:01Interestingly enough, I am going to publish an episode today. For the for this show. That is titled Japan is built for long term resilience. So I completely agree with you. The last thing I’ll ask you, before I let you go is this is that once you’ve built all these systems, right, they can handle parametric insurance. And once you understand the mathematics around it, right, so and you’ve gathered all this weather data, does Arbol look at other places where they can potentially use the same infrastructure, but not just for weather? Like maybe for connectivity, or for gig workers that can’t go to their job? Because they don’t they’re not connected to the Internet or because the weather is bothering them. Like are there other places where you can use us that aren’t weather related? Jeffrey Khoo 29:50Very good question. In fact, that’s one area we’re working on and you know, you know, the carbon markets, carbon credits and all the lingo for that. We’ve been doing a lot of work in areas it’s very exciting. The rate of climate change, everybody is going for this carbon credits, offsets, so on so forth. Now Apple is working very intently, we do have product now that we’re going to sort of promote. And that’s basically ability of using satellite data to look at basically the amount of carbon in certain forestry and plantations. You know, it’s amazing, right? Instead of having to go down there and say, how much how much carbon they have sitting here, right? And it’s almost real time, you know, because this satellites go around probably every day or two, and then you’ll be able to actually capture the information, right? So the biggest problem the carbon market is now is that people resell the same piece of forestry again and again and again sometime. Yeah, exactly. So it ends up hurting the planet instead, right doesn’t solve the climate change problem. In fact, it makes it worse. So this adds a lot of clarity. So the technology, Blockchain AI, is all utilized in this kind of solution. And we are slowly promoting it of this new stuff that we need to improve and tighten and make it a lot better. But that’s the direction that we are taking very seriously. And I say that it excites me because I think that this helps future generations, because we get it when it comes to analyzing carbon credits and making sure that there’s totally transparent and no double counting. I think they’ll do a lot of good for climate change. So I think Apple plays a very important role there Michael Waitze 31:27and love it. Okay, I’m gonna let you go. You are a great supporter of parametric insurance. Jeffrey Khoo… Jeffrey Khoo 31:33I love the business. Michael Waitze 31:35I know I can feel it. Jeffrey Khoo, the Vice Chairman in APAC at Arbol. Thank you so much for doing this today. I really appreciate your time. Jeffrey Khoo 31:42Thank you. The post EP 206 – Jeffrey Khoo – Vice Chairman APAC at Arbol – Why Am I So in Love With Parametric Insurance? appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The conversation with Samantha Ghiotti, a co-founder and the CEO of Habitto, both started and ended with a smile. It also included a ton of interesting insights from Sam, who frankly surprised me with her knowledge of the nuances of the Japanese market and the culture into which it is deeply embedded (pun intended). Some of the topics that Sam covered: Some of the challenges of being a female AND foreign founder in Japan Building a business in Japan with few cultural references and limited language skills The enormity of the Japanese market and how Habitto is addressing it differently The fascinating psychology the Japanese have about money and risk-taking Building a new brand and making it relatable A few other titles we considered for this episode: There Is Only One and You Are Speaking to Her Start from the Premise of Being Different Simple, Practical Choices Listen, Empathize, Sell Changing Money Habits The post EP 205 – Samantha Ghiotti – co-Founder and CEO at Habitto – Japan Is Built for Resilience and Long-Term Stability appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast had a great back-and-forth conversation with Raunak Mehta, a co-founder and the CEO of Igloo. Some of the topics Raunak discussed: The intertwining of health and economic well-being How outlier events can set back families financially for years Customer centricity as a core principle for building a business Expanding the customer segment by reaching out to mid-income households Artificial Intelligence across the value chain Star Wars Some other titles we also considered: You Have to Go to the Most Fundamental Aspect of a Problem Big Companies Survive on Sustainable Disruption Trying to Make Insurance More Contextual Please read the best-efforts transcript below: Michael Waitze 0:00That’s, let’s go. Hi, this is Michael Waitze. And welcome back to the Asia InsurTech Podcast. Today we are joined by Raunak Mehta, the r and the CEO at Igloo, I always want people to hear the conversation we have before we start recording so they can know why I’m laughing when I’m just saying, Yeah, but anyway, Ruanak, it’s great to have you on the show. How are you doing? Raunak Mehta 0:25I’m great. Michael Waitze 0:28Yeah, thank you for joining us. And thanks for all the shenanigans around airpods and stuff like that. It’s not our problem. Anyway, before we get into the main thing, what do you think is the biggest trend or emerging trends in insurance and InsurTech in Asia, and I would say, by extension, the rest of the world. Raunak Mehta 0:46I think what we’re seeing in Asia, especially post pandemic is, people getting a bit more concerned about the personal well being, especially when it comes to health, savings, etc. So quite a lot of products, or other product categories that were having average growth before pandemic now seem to be having above average growth. So the usual events, health related, income related, the regulators also have seen to a certain extent, a slight shift in the consumer behavior and have now responded in terms of focusing a lot on digital intermediaries, which tend to reach out to a larger section of the population. So that’s, that’s, I would say these are, what do you call as the umbrella trends that you’re seeing? And if somebody wants to double click, I would say across the world, I mean, you know, what has happened? Right? In the last two, three years, a lot of businesses, a lot of retail, consumers have moved digital. And when you move on from offline to online at such a fast pace, of course, the infrastructure isn’t there to support from security standpoint and all. So there’s a lot of emphasis now on cybersecurity, for small and medium size enterprises, and also for retail customers. Michael Waitze 2:10There are so many things there. You know, you said health and income related. And I think maybe before COVID, if we had put those two things together and conflated them, somebody would have said, maybe not we were crazy, but that we were stretching. But do you feel like that’s really changed now? Where people look at their health, in the context of their economic health as well, not just their physical health? Raunak Mehta 2:34I mean, I would look at it from various dimensions, right. Gohan, as you mentioned, physical health. So you saw right, a lot of insurance and insurer tech companies are focusing on ensuring that their policyholders are in the best of health. Yeah, because they were in the best of health claims will be lesser, they will be able to pass on cost savings to their consumers. And it’s a virtuous cycle. Now, come COVID, you had a larger section of the population that you could say to a certain extent paranoia to a certain extent, they really got impacted their life savings and all got impacted because they ended up in the hospitals or in the quarantine centers. And all as a result of this, this thing really blew up. So people across the spectrum, I would say from I mean, the class, you could say the income class, that that has a very high penetration of insurance to the low to mid income class. Now you are finding that people some way or the other want to be protected with a certain health product, right? It doesn’t always has to be a full blown inpatient outpatient sort of thing. People are fine in getting a very, how should I say away infectious disease centered one away income protections and one but they need some sort of is just good industry, which is the industry because it drives penetration on its own, especially in a region like Southeast Asia. Michael Waitze 4:02Did you just say drives penetration on its own? Yeah, yeah, it does. Right. Look, one of the things that was said to me on one of the other shows that I do, I do a show called India Game Changer where we talk specifically about how technology is changing the game in India. This gentleman puce Jain, who runs this thing called Impact Guru said that, you know, India’s middle class and I would posit ages middle class is just kind of one hospital bill away from poverty, right. So, yeah, it can get really, really expensive. And then I had an operation. It’s almost two years ago now. And yeah, it was really expensive to do. I mean, I think thankfully, I could pay for it. But this idea of the mixing of your health and your financial health, your physical health and your financial threat, Franklin, your mental health is something that I think is super important, particularly out here, right? If you look in the Western world, it’s a little bit different. But frankly, those things are emerging as well, I think. Yeah. Raunak Mehta 4:55I agree. And I think one of the things that you mentioned right that you are one hospital visit away from going into poverty that actually happens that. And if you talk about the segment of the population, a good 70 1970 In some countries, then 75 to 80% of the population is in the low to mid income household. Yeah, right. In that segment when you are hit with certain outlier events, right, and when I say outlier events, it could be a fire, or let’s say, you having an accident and landing up in the hospital, what do you generally do, you tap into your single or multiple income sources that you’ve had, and whatever savings you had out of that, or you would end up taking a sort of a friendly loan from your family, wider family or friends. That’s, that’s the only way they can possibly be in a position to pay hospital bills. And then what happens? It sets you back by a good 345 years. Yeah, right. Your whole especially high? No, I mean, it sets you back three to five years. And on an average, and not just that, I mean, you’re talking about now you’ve entered a high inflation, sort of a macro environment, right. Yeah. Which makes it even more difficult for you to be able to service your whatever unstructured unsecured debts that you have taken over a period of time. So yeah, I mean, you get caught into what I call as a vicious cycle, which can ultimately be sort of a debt spiral for a lot of a lot of families. Michael Waitze 6:33Yeah, it can get really, really hard, right? And you’re right, because inflationary expectations mean that people expect prices to be higher in the future, which means that you’re paying back today’s bill with money that has less value in the future, in a rising interest rate, and what we can talk about macro until you’re blue in the face as well, right? Because I used to trade bonds. So I understand this, too. But yeah, it’s just a really hard situation. I’m just gonna keep making you laugh. Like, that’s my goal for the rest of this podcast. Raunak Mehta 6:59I actually wanted to hear somebody say that they have been trading bonds. And I want you to see how they feel. Especially, because if you have been trading long term, I mean, the long, long treasury bonds or any kind of such bonds, I mean, I totally get your pain, then. Michael Waitze 7:19Well, yeah. Because, look, I mean, we can spend a lot of time talking about the macro environment, and what the impact is of rising short term rates or overnight rates from the Federal Reserve on the federal we call the Fed path, right in the bond curve, the yield curve. And the idea that a yield curve is inverted, right? It’s different than an upward sloping, which is a normal type of environment yield curve. But in that situation, you should not be buying long term bonds to mitigate short term risks. Anyway, it’s a completely different conversation. But when I think that both of us understand it, happy to have that conversation whenever you want, I want to go back a little bit. You’ve been in the startup world for a long time. And you’ve actually been really, I used to use the word lucky. But I’m not going to say that because I think people make their own luck. But I’m very fortunate to work at some pretty cool places. When you go back and look at like the end of your experience that I don’t know, Flipkart, which was feels like yesterday, but it’s a long time ago. Now. What do you think are some of the biggest changes in building venture funded businesses between back then? And today? Raunak Mehta 8:24I have looked at things from that perspective, right. When I was at Flipkart, and this this goes back easily. 12 years. Michael Waitze 8:30Yeah. At the beginning, for sure. Yeah. Raunak Mehta 8:33Yeah. I mean, that is the Genesis, right? I mean, if you wish to think of, of startups in India, Flipkart was Genesis block. And in a way, I would say, the biggest difference between then and now is, at that point of time, you really needed the first principles approach. Because there were some, I mean, Flipkart was part of organized retail, organized, retail was largely offline, there are certain assumptions that were there. But those assumptions could not be in a way teleported from offline to online, which meant that you really have to go to the most fundamental aspect of a problem. Question it and it needs to have a binary answer. I mean, that’s, that’s how much you have to dig, to go to that fundamental aspect of the problem. If you rule for over 10 years now, there is quite a base of, let’s say, assumptions, of how things work in a, in a startup environment to which you can latch on to and be able to find those answers a lot quicker. You don’t really have to Michael Waitze 9:46say what are those things right, you’re right. 13 years ago, when Flipkart first started. AWS probably wasn’t as prevalent as it is today. So you probably had to build a lot of your own server environment. Right, exactly. It’s just time consuming and very expensive and you needed a different cut tie. above tech team, we can fast forward today and say that people that are on AWS can also use some of their artificial intelligence stuff as well. And those tools weren’t weren’t there either. But you mentioned the word first principles, right? And it’s kind of this axiomatic feeling of what are just the core things we know to be true. And then can we build on those things with other assumptions, right. But what are those things today? Because they’re very different than they were like you said, 13 years ago, when you were at Flipkart. What are those first principles today? Raunak Mehta 10:30First, first and foremost, I think across the 12 years, one thing that has stood out and has not, I think that has stood the test of time is customer centricity. Right? No matter what kind of business you are doing, if you are able to go back to the root cause of every problem, and try to solve it, using the lens or the dimension of customer centricity more often than not, you build something that that provides value to you with respect to serving your customers. Fair enough. So I would say, I would say that part has been there. The second part, one of the things that you mentioned, right? How much has technology in a way? And you’re right, 1020 years back from an enterprise perspective, a lot of things were being built in house. Yeah. Today. Today, Amazon using its AWS, Microsoft Yugen, as your and all provides you a ready made set of tools. And I will say feature set that you can potentially use. Right, right. And as you’ve seen coding itself has undergone such a massive change, right? I mean, now, I’ve got my engineering folks working on Gaulin, we are living in a zero code sort of an environment coding has become a lot more easier. Yeah. I would want to believe it. They may have different opinion. But I definitely I definitely think that a large part of, of what you try to do on your code base is now available as of some libraries, right. Michael Waitze 12:01How do you how do you navigate this? This idea that you’ve just said kind of offhandedly? Like, coding has just become so much easier. But the dev team may not think so maybe they do. But maybe they’re worried, right? Like how do you navigate this idea that you can kind of outsource I like to say abstraction, right? In other words, you said a lot of stuff was done in house. But what’s happening now is whether it’s the human resources function, and insurance function, or any function, big companies are looking and saying, How can we abstract that out, and then give it to somebody else to do and then they do it at scale, which means instead of paying $2,000 a month, on average, for x, we’ll pay $20 for it. So we can be 10 times more efficient by letting somebody abstract it out. And do it for the whole industry as opposed to just for us. But coding is this really kind of tricky thing where, you know, the salaries for people to write code have been going up exponentially for the past 10 years. And I choose the word exponentially on purpose. Maybe it’s not, maybe it’s really just in factors. But now we’re getting to a point where, like, all of human knowledge seems to be available through an API, and that includes the code writing, how does that change the way you build stuff then? Raunak Mehta 13:14So they’re doing looking at it, right? The way I look at it is 10 years, 11 years back, a large part of this was not available outside your company, right? Because you were building it, it was considered as core. Of course, you had systems of if I remember, customer service related systems, you could get from a vendor marketing analytics, or for instance, recommendation engine with just coming through. They were they were not there and they’re about all the warehousing management systems and order management systems are completely built in house right. Now, a large part of it could be available, as you already said, through an API call, and everything. But so that in a way, I think, oversimplifying the situation right now, what I see is that the pace at which coding changes and the pace at which your expectation from your engineering team, the delta, actually has a much steeper slope, because every I mean, let me give you an idea. 2017 2018 If you go back to the history of artificial intelligence, and all, it was around 2015 2016, that, that things really started getting heated up, right when, you know, Facebook, Baidu, and Google started having their own teams and Google I think, by that time, had acquired DeepMind in London, and they were coming up with their own sort of models and and Google came up with this TPU the tensor flow from the artificial intelligence side of it. 2018 igloo was one One of the companies that was using it for, for for something that today sounds like really trivial, right, which was object identification, how to focus on an object in a particular image once you have got it, how do you find whether that image is intact or not? Or whether it has been in a way tampered with? And all sounded very cool back then, right? Five years now everybody’s doing it. Right, right. And now, of course, the bandwagon has moved on to charge GPD, three, four, and multiple other mean, GPT sort of software. So I think now the change in technology is a lot higher, whereas things at your disposal also are there. But now the expectation is a lot more so smaller engineering teams, I would say, as I mean, if, if I had to look at it 10 years ago, for what is happening now, I would have to be required a team that was two and a half times bigger. Well, this, probably may have costed me a little less, but considering inflation and everything, I would say, I mean, when you have a lot of information at your disposal, you tend to move fast, right? So that is what is happening. And not just for the engineering team or the product team you need. Now if you’re a start that that uses technology as an enabler, you need to be very impressed with it, I would say. Michael Waitze 16:23So one of the things that we did when I was at Goldman Sachs was we implemented algorithmic trading for regular clients through a business that we purchase called Hole trading, rebranded to Goldman Sachs, algorithmic trading, GE said, we could see years before, as we were building out this automated trading technology, the algorithms right that we were going to be out of a job, we literally were building a business that was going to make us not necessary. We did it on purpose. And frankly, we didn’t care. As I got closer and closer to the end of my career, I was happy to automate myself. So that was fine. But what it did was it gave us scale, one of the things that we learned really early on was that the more technology we employ, the more productive we can become. And the more we could go from trading $100 million a day to $4 billion a day without missing a beat. And that’s the that’s the genesis really of a venture scaled business, right, is that if you, if you’re gonna get venture funding, you have to be able to scale it’s at size, right? And does all this artificial intelligence in the context of the coding, make it easier to do that as well? Raunak Mehta 17:29I’m glad you brought up that algorithmic trading example, right? And the way you looked at it that while you were building it, you thought that it’s going to take you out of the job, but it really made the humans more productive. Let’s put it this way. I think I have, I have always looked at technology. And I think even at its most emerging frontiers, I’ve always looked at technology as a way that adds productivity to us. I don’t think I mean, I’m saying it with a pinch of salt, that it’s not going to massively replace a large part of the human working population, there is going to be some amount of substitution. But it’s not going to be that it helps us upskill it helps us become better species is what really substitutes. manpower is, is globalization, which is a completely different topic, right? Where what is happening in one country gets starts getting done by someone in some other country attributable cost of better efficiency, that I think has resulted in more upheavals in, in the I would say, The job outlook in a particular country than technology. Michael Waitze 18:43I agree with you. And I’ve been saying this for years, I think technology is this enabler, it’s it creates a hybrid world. And I said, I was happy to beat myself out of a job, I was very specific with the terminology that I use, but it’s not gonna automate everybody who did what I did. And to be fair, the guys and gals that were great at the role that I had, were super powered. And I say this all the time, by the algorithms, because it allowed them to do 17 things at once, as opposed to seven things at once. And they got so much better at their jobs. And the service from a customer centric standpoint, became so much better. Because the mundane the mundaneness of the tasks, that stuff got automated, but the thinking part of it, the how can we take this piece of information that I just got through an automated system, and this piece and say, I need to tell Lisa about this because she was the one who was asked me about it two days ago, and there’s no way that the AI would know that. So I agree with you completely. The second thing, though, is almost as important, if not more important, is that globalization has moved tasks from high wage countries to low wage countries. But here’s the key question for you. Right, because India has been a low wage country, historically. But that’s also radically changing right as India starts to build not for the rest of the world on We but for India itself, and as it does that it starts to innovate, right. And what that means is that those salaries are going to start to normalize. So this idea of globalization being an equalizer for labor is happening. But this idea of outsourcing to a cheaper place like those places are disappearing unless we find people on Mars or on Saturn that are going to do low cost jobs. Is that fair? Raunak Mehta 20:23No, that actually, that’s a very thick, because I think you would also believe that everything has a start date and an end date, right? I think and it goes through crests and troughs, the kind of world we live in today, it is fair to say that countries are becoming a bit more protectionist, it happens, I mean, you go through some stages, and in I would say evolution and all. And I think that has had an adverse adverse impact on globalization. And of course, some low income countries like India, that used to be the playground of, of outsourcing and all their itself, there has been a humongous, I would say, move in terms of knowledge capital that people were holding, and thereby, I mean, India is one of those countries, you know, which, if you look at it purely from a financial standpoint, could be a completely self sufficient unit in itself. Yeah, whatever you produce in terms of products and services can be completely consumed within the country and play food. And they, exactly, and thereby, thereby, people across the skill spectrum, right, from the best engineers all the way down to somebody working in the Customer Service domain, can can find a job that that’s there. So but yes, I mean, we have a text center in India. And I can tell you that I not consider it in any ways that, hey, I’m outsourcing the job there. Because it’s largely from a skill perspective, I would say, because, again, going back to the startup discussion that we were having, because now after 12 years, or rather, I would say 1516 years of startups in India, now you’ve got a ready made base of employees who can actually come on board and hit the ground running rather than understanding the startup 101 principles there. Michael Waitze 22:19Exactly. And you’re also seeing this, what’s the right way to say this? I think part of the tipping point is when very well educated people from a certain country go overseas, whether it’s going to Australia or going to the UK, which is a popular place or going to work in Silicon Valley, or in Boston or Chicago, where they get there, they work there, and they look back and they’re like, Oh my God, that’s a much bigger opportunity. Again, whether it’s in India, in Southeast Asia, or just in Singapore, they’re like, I need to be there. instead. That’s the tipping point, you feel like, it’s not outsourcing anymore. We are in the midst of an AI and knowledge economy boom. And it’s happening in this region. And I think that’s what makes it so exciting for me, which is why I love these conversations with you. And with people like you because I can feel the difference. Like if you asked me, What’s the difference between today on the Asian short tech podcast, and 2019? I would say three things. One is all the conversations before used to start with insurance is not sexy. Nobody says this anymore. It couldn’t be sexier to is they would talk about like how they were outsourcing to low cost countries like Vietnam and India, and maybe even Thailand. Right. And the third was they were building for somebody else as opposed to building for themselves. And now all three of those things are reversed. People want to be here because there are more people, again, within a four hour flight of me and you then are outside of that flight path. And that’s awesome. Yeah. Raunak Mehta 23:55And there’s one more thing, right. And I think this is where I talk about destruction, a large part of outsourcing or if you speak of the 90s, or the first decade of the 21st century, right? Certain countries that were outsourcing hotbeds were largely adding incremental value to a value chain. Right. COMM startups, startups by theory, were looked upon, as you could say, platforms or channels of, of destruction and disruption in the proper sense that Clayton Christensen spoke about right, where you are actually identifying a completely new market, right? Or you are bringing a completely new product or you are starting at the at the lowest end of the market, and then slowly and steadily. You’re weighing out the incumbents and all right. So I think that disruption has happened quite a bit and people who have been, I won’t won’t even say it’s not about With the CEOs and the founders who who have been the champions of this kind of disruption, people who have been throughout this journey, have their learning curve has been exponential as compared to people who are doing that’s a very incremental sort of value add. And I mean, I think I guess people do incremental value add, because big companies survive on something I call sustainable disruption. I serve as this customer base, and I will keep serving this customer base better, I will keep adding more products, more services, thereby extracting more margins from this customer is I don’t think they have any incentive, nor are they pushed by their shareholders to be going out after a completely new market segment. Because going there may erode their financial, you could say performance, so yeah, I mean, I mean, that’s how that’s how it has always been. Michael Waitze 25:49And where does the igloo fit into this scenario? From your perspective? Raunak Mehta 25:54Oh, I might make sure about this. I think thankfully, I think igloo and I can again, draw comparison, right? You would agree that a lot of this column tech vendors, big, multibillion dollar tech vendors that you had coming out of India, and of course, from other parts of the world, were largely doing very customized development for the financial services segment, right. So yeah, digitizing the value chain, and so on. They were in creating a new consumer segment for you, they weren’t creating new products for you, their job was zero to one has happened, let me take you from one to two or from 50 to 51. I think igloo over the last four or five years, I would want to believe that we have really expanded the customer segment. Why because the customer segment we reached, we reach out to the low to mid income housing segment is where there is massive under insurance and uninsurance. I mean, you have people who have never been exposed to insurance, or you have people who have had some basic insurance policies against their name, I think we are reaching out to that segment of the population, and thereby really expanding the overall market size of, of the industry. So I would want to believe and I may have some bias towards it, that we are truly disrupting the market. However, not disrupting the market at the expense of the incumbents, we work hand in hand with the incumbents. Because at the end of the day, it’s a regulated industry, right? And you need and you need in the right, you need to have the right concoction of, of the incumbents or the traditional players and technology at play to be able to better serve your beneficiaries Michael Waitze 27:45gets a really good point, right? I think, again, if we had done this conversation in 2019, we would have talked a lot more about disruption and a lot less about cooperation. And I think that somewhere in the middle now, right? Where whether it’s an InsurTech of FinTech, neobank, or whatever it is, is that you’re looking at the incumbents, not you. But one is looking at the incumbents now and saying they’re slow moving, it’s harder for them to innovate. But they have a balance sheet that has like $15 billion on it. And we can help them, we can help them use that balance sheet in a way that they’ve never had access to before by building these other things on the other side to get access to a client base that they haven’t had access to before. And that’s awesome, right? Because that’s I think the way it should be. I’m curious as well about how the conversation has changed with these underserved and under insured households. Literally five years ago, if you’d walked in knocked on their door, they just would have been like, Who are you guys? What are you doing? Why are you talking to us? But now a lot of them are coming on board. Right? You can see the penetration numbers changing slowly, but surely, they are changing, not just you know, not just in Southeast Asia, but all over Asia. Bit by bit. People are thinking and maybe COVID Did part of this too. But people are thinking, I have a little bit of disposable income. And I want to protect the things that I’ve built. And then I’ve worked so hard for over the past four or five years. And insurance feels like the right way to do that. Are you seeing the sales conversations change over time, particularly as you go to the next uninsured household and say, like, can all your neighbors are doing this? You really should think about it. Are those conversations changing as well? Yeah. Again, it Raunak Mehta 29:23depends on the reference, right? What is your frame of reference? If we are growing at 3x year on year, of course, when you look at the GDP growth in countries, it doesn’t matter. Right. So the change is coming. I personally believe that change is coming and there are a lot of I would say both quite a lot of factors, right? Part of them are fairly micro in nature. Remember when the interest rates were low, people, people were not parking their money in banks or let’s say treasuries and all, which were the safest way of putting money, right. So thereby they were looking at, and money had become cheap. So they were looking at various ways where they can get a better bang for the buck. Right. And, and this, this, of course, would spill over to insurance that always tends to be very closely related to banking. And All right, so I think that definitely legs some upswing, at the end of the day, when you look at a country level, what you need is that the GWP growth is higher than the GDP growth, if that is happening, that means penetration is moving in the right direction. But when you double click on it, you know, I generally I don’t like average as a very good measure of central tendency, I think it’s abused a lot because of wide extremes, very similar to when when you do for a country, GDP per capita, its meaning doesn’t make any sense. Michael Waitze 30:58It’s meaningless. Because let’s be fair, just as just as an aside, in the country where I live, that GDP per capita in Bangkok is like the GDP per capita in in in Boston, exactly what the GDP per capita income can or in a smaller city is not like the GDP per capita in Charlottesville. It’s just completely different. So I agree with you please go ahead. Raunak Mehta 31:19Yeah. If you break down that GWP per capita, right, from the top to the bottom, I mean, in the in the bottom half, in the last two quartiles? It it’s like, absent. That’s the best way to define it. It’s just not there. Yeah, right. I mean, to give you an idea, Malaysia and Thailand, if I’m not wrong, the GWP per capita is in excess of, let’s say, 400 to 500. US dollars, right. But if you were to bring it to the below 50% population, that that will probably go down to $5 or $6. Now you have to ask yourself, yeah, maybe yeah, that is also a very, I would say aggressive that. Now you have to ask yourself $5 to $6. At a yearly level, is that good enough to cover you for all the exigencies that that you can come across. So. So I think that is where that is a segment we are target. What helps us target that segment is because again, as I said, for an incumbent who’s already having fairly steady balance sheet, if they have not written COVID products, if they are having fairly steady balance sheets, they would not want to go after this segment, for multitude of reasons, right? General, the general assumptions that you hear, Oh, this is a, this is a very high risk segment, right? distribution costs will be very high. And remember, insurance has always been a push industry. Right? Right? You first. So how insurance used to work is, here’s a product, we first make the product and then you push it right. And if you’re lucky, some people will buy if you’re not lucky, you will make some incremental changes, it’s never done the other way, like in a lot of industries, where you do a lot of market research and you come up with what is the latent need in the market. So the product market fit is is is not there. So that is what I think players like us are trying to resolve trying to make insurance more contextual. And as a result of which we are definitely seeing quite a lot of green shoots coming up in the gig economy segment in the MSME segment. I would say these two are the standout ones. Yes, we have done projects with respect to the climate change and all performing community in Vietnam and all. But that is still I would say in its between its infancy and growth stage. But it is actually the MSME segment and the UK economy segment where we are seeing massive uptake. Michael Waitze 33:49You’ve just made me think about something in a different way. And I want to make sure that I’m thinking about this in the right way. I did an entire what’s the right word event a couple of days ago about third party logistics, distribution, that type of thing. And it’s been my contention that big players like DHL Federal Express, pick whoever you want, right? We’re really, really good at taking a big pallet and a big box from let’s say, Taiwan, getting into LA on a ship in a very efficient and cost effective way. And then getting it from the port to some big department store or some distribution center. But the piece that they missed was and that was easy and efficient. And they made a ton of money doing that they never considered the E commerce side of this, which is everything that’s in that box if there are 600 things in here now get needs to get broken down into. Let’s just say 401 pieces, because 200 still goes to the store. Right? But 400 of them now need to go to individual people they never solved for that. And it kind of seems like what you’re doing in the insurance industry is the same thing is that big companies could give big insurance and big insurance policies to big groups of people, but that the fragmented groups of people, which is the commerce and put it in quotes side, that distribution died because it was so hard to do. And it required new companies in Asia like Lala move or E commerce or Ninja van to come up with models and technology to be able to do that. And I presume that’s what you’re doing in the insurance space. Do I have that? Right? Yeah, I Raunak Mehta 35:24actually got the analogy back on because I actually started my career with Flipkart logistics, right? This was exactly the problem, what you’re speaking about at that point of time Logistics was bulk movement, right. And we used to call it the problem of one item pick up one item delivery, that was virtually non existent, right, exactly like this, right. Today, you talk about an insurance industry, which for all things have been done has a very fixed way of bringing products to the market and serving a certain consumer base. Now, if you really want to reach out to data segment, right, you have to have the capability to be able to distribute a very short version of that product, which which is which is meant to serve a core need of the consumer, because, again, you have a look at it this way that in the financial services industry, one of the best ways of bringing down the entry barrier is pricing. Education comes later, no matter how you if the entry barrier, if if entry barrier has a very high index of pricing, no matter how much you educate people are not going to be able to pass on pass over that hurdle. So when you are able to chop the product into addressing a certain core problem that the consumer wants to be solved, you bring down the pricing and thereby more people get acquainted with the product, education becomes a lot more easier because it’s, it’s very direct. in that form. It doesn’t have a lot of you could say razzmatazz around it to be able to push through. Michael Waitze 37:04I mean, this is something we learn through Procter and Gamble, right? With sachet shampoos, sachet marketing, right. It’s in a way, it’s kind of the same thing. But just going from off the offline world to the online world. How can we make it small enough, but effective enough at the right price, so that people can afford to buy it, but they can they still want to buy like a full bottle of shampoo, but they can’t pay for it all at once. So let’s give them a week’s worth. And as they as their economic life improves, they’ll say I’ve been buying Pearl shampoo my whole life. Just in sachets. Now I’m just going to buy it and bigger in bulk in the same way that you should you would do that with insurance. I’ll cover myself for September because that’s my biggest Work Month. I have money left over. Let’s do October two. I made more money. Let’s do it for the whole year is kind of the way you’re talking right? Yep. Interesting. I love when there are these equivalencies from offline to online, but also when you can go back 25 or 30, or actually Procter and Gamble’s 4040 years ago. Wow. And just make those things effective today. Talk to me about Star Wars. Who are you? Obi Wan Kenobi like, where are you? Where do you fit in the Star Wars universe? You’re not Oh, good. But you’re not old enough to receive the original Star Wars in the theater? That’s got to be a fact. No. Yeah, you’re right, because I did. Raunak Mehta 38:24I’m not I’m not that old. Sorry. I mean, if you have seen it in the theater, I have immense respect. I mean, and I mean, I’m just a Star Wars fan, like diehard fan of Star Wars. I don’t think I don’t think I don’t think in our lifetime. We going to see a franchisee that that’s been there for like five decades now. I’m not wrong. Michael Waitze 38:481970 something? Yeah. Because I was 11 years old when I came out. Yeah. Raunak Mehta 38:52Five decades and has so much of underlying wisdom has so much of how we are in reality. So I mean, if you were to ask, it’s very difficult to answer because there is there is that the dark side and the light side, right. I think I would be a mix of let me take the light side as I don’t know if you know this character called Ezra Bridger. I mean, he was an inhabitant of Lothal was trained by one of the last surviving Jedi is an all and he’s a very important character. I mean, he’s going to come into he was part of the Star Wars rebel, animated series, and he’s going to come again. And I would say on the dark side, that model. Michael Waitze 39:45But isn’t this true for everybody? Exactly. I think if you look at everybody you’ve ever met, there’s a good side and a bad side. There’s a light side and a dark side and it’s just what you do with them. That matters, right? I mean, this was the big conflict between Luke Skywalker and his father, Darth Vader. It’s like, can’t be all bad, can you? But then the flipside was, I have information you don’t have access to. Yeah, right. So you don’t know why I do what I do all you know is you don’t approve of it. Yeah. But don’t but don’t you think that there’s, but isn’t there part of, and I didn’t want to bring this back. But don’t you think this part of being a CEO that’s like that, you have this firehose of information seriously, that’s coming at you. And it comes just at you, whether it’s through your proxies, or through your assistance, whatever comes right to you. And sometimes there’s not enough time to socialize it and then give a response. Sometimes you just have to respond. And everybody else is looking going, that makes no sense at all. And they’re chit chatting in private about, why did we do that. But again, they don’t have access to the information you have, they don’t know that some competitors trying to shoot you kind of thing. And you just have to act on something. And I think in that sentence, you almost have to have the dark side to be able to succeed at some level, because you have to be Machiavellian to get through certain points of management. Is that fair? Raunak Mehta 41:05No, absolutely. I think the cost of the cost of taking a decision with whatever limited information you have on hand is always lesser than the cost of not taking a decision and waiting for that incremental information to come through. Right. That’s absolutely there. And I think that is why on my table, you will find a replica of Darth Vader’s helmet, the real helmet, actually, to which I get the inspiration and through which I think that that is why a company meets all the targets. Michael Waitze 41:37That’s why the company meets because people walk into your office see that help and just think the dude’s got a lightsaber somewhere. I feel scared, I’m gonna go out and meet my KPIs. My OKRs. Raunak Mehta 41:48Maybe, I don’t know. I mean, but yeah, Michael Waitze 41:51I like it a lot. Are there these kinds of latent discussions now that weren’t present three, even just three or four months ago about chat GPT and open open AI, inside the company where you hear people unsolicited, right and unprompted, asking, how is this going to impact what we do? And I guess the follow on to that is, are they all also coming up with things that maybe you hadn’t considered, but some great ideas for? You know, we’ve been working on this process. And if we attack it with AI, maybe we can do this more efficiently? Is that happening as well? Raunak Mehta 42:24100%. And I like the term you use unsolicited? Right? Yeah. So. So a lot of it, a lot of IT people across various departments are are looking at charge GPT as, as something that’s going to solve all problems for us. Good discussions, I would say discussion, because as you can understand, I mean, artificial general, intelligence is something that that can really help the insurance industry. I mean, you got a policy document, how do you generalize? How do you make it very general, for the consumer on the other side? I think that is where we are working towards? And I think you may see some prototype from us coming fairly soon in the, in the future, but I mean, I’ve got my HR team, talking about chargeability. Which, which, which I really find good. I mean, they’re, they’re saying that it helps them write better job descriptions that are JTC tells them exactly. I mean, you know, exactly the point that we were discussing, if it helps you become more productive. And it’s good, right, which gives you that much time to be able to reach out to better candidates, and with a better narrative of what’s really needed. I mean, I have nothing against it. I mean, the marketing department is looking at it in a completely different way. So, yes, as a company, we’ve always pushed at the edges of the frontiers of technologies, and I don’t think we’ll be left behind on the charges inside of you will probably see something coming out from igloo fairly soon. Michael Waitze 44:08Can not wait to see it, I want to thank you. I want to thank Raunak Mehta, a co founder and CEO of Igloo. This was awesome. I really appreciate you taking the time to do this. Let’s do more. Let’s do more. Thank you again. Raunak Mehta 44:21Absolutely. Thanks for having me, Michael. Thanks a lot. The post EP 204 – Raunak Mehta – co-Founder and CEO at Igloo – People Want to Be Protected appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast team got together again to go over some of the biggest stories from the region in March 2023. We started off with the news that Grab has partnered with Dhipaya Insurance to create Thailand’s first-ever pay-as-you-go insurance for ride-hailing drivers and their passengers. We transitioned to a discussion of the nuances of both Roojai and Qoala’s funding announcements…with Roojai raising a significant USD $42MM and Qoala topping up their Series B with another USD $7.5MM. India’s PhonePe announced an additional contribution of USD $200MM from Walmart, while Malaysia’s Lexasure noted it was going the SPAC route to list on the public markets. Finally, we spoke about PolicyStreet’s new Australian license and why this matters. The post AIP News RoundUp – EP 64 – Theresa Blissing and Michael Waitze – Insurance for Public Passenger Vehicles via Electronic Systems appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast welcomed Anjana Rao, the Chief Strategy Officer of IndiaFirst Life. IndiaFirst Life’s new-age intuitiveness drives its value through state-of-the-art digitalization initiatives across its value chain. Some of the topics Anjana covered: How the entire ecosystem surrounding insurance is transforming The necessity to keep pace with rapidly evolving customer expectations and tastes How to find a place within a potential customer’s preferred ecosystem Generational differences and the fundamentals of change management The places in the insurance value chain where AI is already being employed How technology has and will continue to change distribution Other titles we momentarily considered for this episode: It Comes from a Place of Passion How Can the Experience Be Redefined? The Customer Has a Preferred Ecosystem in Place Please read the best-efforts transcript below: Michael Waitze 0:08Okay, let’s start. Hi, this is Michael Waitze. And welcome back to the Asia InsurTech Podcast. Today we are joined by Anjana Rao, the Chief Strategy Officer of IndiaFirst Life. That’s the greatest reaction ever. Anjana, it’s great to have you on the show. How are you doing today? Anjana Rao 0:29I’m doing good. Michael, thank you for having me here. I feel privileged to be a part of this podcast. Michael Waitze 0:36The pleasure is all mine. And you know that. Look, before we get into the main part of the conversation, we like to ask our guests what they think one of the biggest trends is, or some of the biggest trends are emerging trends are in insurance and InsurTech. Because you’re in India, we’ll ask you about India, but by extension for the rest of the world, where do you think we’re going? What’s the biggest trend? Anjana Rao 0:56The whole, I would say the entire, the entire ecosystem in which an insurance company operates is transforming. It’s transforming at a pace you know, because not just the companies are transforming even the customers are transforming the other way they are interacting or experiencing the evolution of 5g 6g. Now we are talking about and they are all open ly embracing and adopting the technology at a rate faster than the enterprise’s skins. So the whole attempt is to match up with the customer expectation. And that is driving this transformation, where it’s forcing the carrier’s not just to get everybody to move on and match up with the catch up with the customers experiences customers evolving taste, because of digital adoption, and how the experience can be redefined. You know, that’s the whole. That’s the whole mantra. That’s what I feel. And that’s where we all are working as to how do we, how do we beat innovation in products, be the innovation in outreach, be the innovation in the way we service be the innovation in the touchpoints, everything is seeing evolution. That’s like going back to your, you know, drawing board and rewriting the story. Michael Waitze 2:20There’s so much to uncover here. And before we do that, too, can we get a little bit of your background so we can understand how you got to here. And then I want to go back and address a couple of things you talked about, about the transforming customers and all that other stuff, too, because it’s fascinating to me. Go ahead, please. Anjana Rao 2:34Sure. So I have spent more than 20, 21 years now, with insurance. So I have seen all the facets of insurances what I can say, I have been a part of, I started my career as an end user, IT manager for insurance companies, then I got into setting up the it, you know, applications and infrastructure for startup insurance companies. And then I moved into transformation consulting. And now I’m here. Yeah. So this has been my evolution. So I’ve seen I’ve seen I’ve been with the insurance carriers. I’ve been with the consulting firms. I have been life and non life. You know, in India, we have, you know, a different setup and slightly different licenses that work. So, yes, I think I’m pretty bold. Michael Waitze 3:25When I first started at Morgan Stanley, and I’m going to date myself here deeply in 1987, we had a department that we called management information systems actually called it MIS. And it was not a cool place to be. But then we changed it in the middle of my career. So ended up being we called it so information technology, it still wasn’t super cool. But I would say this in the past 10 years, I feel like that’s completely flipped. And that now if you’re involved in like the development, the implementation, the application, the innovation around technology, like that’s the cool kids table now, do you know thing? I feel like it’s changed a lot. Do you feel the same way? Of course, Anjana Rao 4:02yes. And you’ll feel less privileged if you don’t have these tags associated with right. Michael Waitze 4:07Whereas like, if you’re the person over there who like doesn’t understand technology, now you’re the person on the outs, whereas before you were the person, like if you did understand, you’re like, oh, I don’t want to talk to those people, because I don’t know what they’re talking about. And now they’re the cool people, which is what you are Yeah. Is that fair? Anjana Rao 4:26Thank you. But now again, I’m an I would say now, it is not just limited to the realms of an IP Correct. Departments are all common. everybody here, everybody upskilling everybody trying to understand how do I layer intelligence to the existing operations that already so that my customer experience can be revamped? Michael Waitze 4:51Yeah, I feel like we could have a whole conversation on how I don’t even want to use the pandemic as a cut off point. But sometime around five years ago, people say If I’m not involved in the digital transformation and the digitalization of my company in any industry, then I’m gonna get left behind. And I want to talk about this idea that you’ve raised because no one said it actually, to me in the same way that you have, that enterprises are rushing, not rushing, but are speeding up their innovation, to try to keep up with their own customers who are coming to them and saying something and maybe something like, I can do it in an E commerce space, how come? I can’t do it here? Can you talk a little bit about this feeling of inside of an institutional business saying, how do we keep up with the demands of our clients, and now that they have passed us in this digital transformation journey, we need to catch up to them? You talk about that a little bit, please. Anjana Rao 5:44So essentially, pandemic was one of the primary reasons, I would say for digital acceleration within the enterprises, because the customers had caught up a bit earlier. So now, the question the question with the insurance, let me let me talk about the insurances. You know, okay, fine. When there is, there is a customer who has a preferred Ecosystm already in place, he transacts, you know, at least one or two RC spends, you know, in a day or in a week or in a month, couple of hours are being spent in that ecosystem, which is a digital ecosystem, which the customer has already built for all the day to day activities, which he or she carries out. Now, how are you going to find a place within that Ecosystm has gone are the days, this is what I feel, Michael, I feel I’m in no longer, you know, you can tell the customer look, I have a website www, you know, you go to my website, you know, and what I have self service options for you. Or you see, I have a bot, but you have to come to my site and access that bot, you know, no, the customer would prefer to be, you know, to have all those options available where he is. So in an ecosystem where he or she is participating in the challenge for the insurers or, you know, is okay, how do I make myself available where my customer Michael Waitze 7:10is, right? So but this is key, right? Because you use the word Ecosystm. And you’re right, I don’t want to go to www.my favorite insurance company.com. I just don’t want to go there, because I’m already interacting in an ecosystem. But here’s where it gets really complicated. And I’m curious about your view on this. Not every customer is in the same ecosystem, mine could be completely different from yours, even if I’m your brother. So how do you manage around that complexity? And then maybe first talk about that complexity, but then how do you manage around it and get yourself to be part of not all but most of the ecosystems where your customers are already interacting? Yeah. Anjana Rao 7:46Yeah. So I will say, you know, let’s look at you know, something as simple as WhatsApp. Okay. Okay. So everybody had a chat bot before the pandemic, post pandemic, everybody has, you know, all their policy servicing options on WhatsApp? Sure, you know, document submission. So everybody wanted a contactless process, right? So be document acceptance, customer submitting the documents, everything started happening through WhatsApp, and WhatsApp was there since ever? Right? Right. Right. It was there for Alaska? Well, you know, the, we saw a big shift happening, because that’s when a customer is. So I mean, these are the popular mediums, which one needs to identify and enable, you know, the options to the customer even to buy, even to, you know, to serve servicing, even to you know, acquire more information. Michael Waitze 8:40Can I ask you this, though, because I run into this as well. And let’s just use tick tock as an example, because I don’t interact with it. But I can’t deny that it’s there that it’s growing and that it’s significant. But I feel like every three to five years, there’s a new platform. And again, I want to differentiate between platforms and ecosystems, because an ecosystem is something that I myself build around me, I use this and this and this in conjunction, and I want you to be able to give me access to your things where I am, I don’t want to have to go to you. You know, because in three years from now, Tik Tok might be nothing. Facebook is going away, let’s say, Sure, everybody’s on WhatsApp, but like, how do you keep up with just what the thing is you have to build for next? You know what I mean? Because you’re I feel like it’s an unending race in a way. Anjana Rao 9:26So so the way I look at it, see, tick tock is already kind of nine if I’m not wrong in India. Yeah. So now, but yes, it’s a very powerful platform. So bytedance Tick tock, these other mediums, which so many companies are using, not just for entertainment, but to influence to influence folks. I mean, there are so many, they’re being used as a content platform, right. So I’m sure you know, there’s going to be an evolution in the content platform in some form or the other for sure. Now, how are you going to tap which one is the right one? You Look at your your existing customer base and you look at the new customers, the young Gen, which is evolving, they know all their influences, they know the top 10 influencers, it knows, top 100 influencers and those influencers have their own platforms, you know, every prominent platform has an influence so so that is how you so you need to unlearn and try to figure out where these this young Gen, you know, you call it alpha equals millennials, you call it whatever, whatever they were even even for even something as basic as Roblox. There are kids who are spending two and a half hours daily over there, you know, so does that become a medium for us to focus upon? I really don’t know. But yeah, Michael Waitze 10:46yeah, I mean, Roblox is a really interesting thing. And I would bet I would bet at some level. Because, you know, Roblox is like, it’s not part of my father’s insurance company, as we used to say, right, and it’s probably not part of your parent’s insurance company, either. But the point is like, it’s there. And it’s a massive platform as well. I mean, Discord could be a distribution mechanism for insurance, right? In the old days used to it didn’t. You had way more time to react? I feel like everything that was kind of instantaneous. It’s like, what’s your Twitch strategy? What’s your Roblox strategy? What’s your Metaverse strategy? But all these things? Are you constantly thinking about this too? Do you know what I mean? Anjana Rao 11:24Yes, my dad was strategy is something which is a distant dream. But yes, I’m and we’re trying to figure. So this is again, very personal. So what are the use cases which are relevant? As an insurer? What are the relevant use cases? So something which is like very one can scratch the surface is how can I in this world, which is a hybrid world where folks don’t even come to the, you know, they don’t come to know what an enterprise which organization they have joined? You know, typically the the physical framework, so can they get an immersive experience? Michael Waitze 12:00Yeah, this is so key. Sorry, this is key to me. Go ahead. Anjana Rao 12:04Yeah. So I mean, can we can we render them the immersive experience, every time we are inducting? Somebody, every time we are? You know, every time we are doing some leadership connect with the employees, which happens, you know, it could be it could be those conversations with the performers. It could be you know, any of the any of the leadership connects, you know, can we provide an immersive experience using these evolving technologies for the employees, that is my immediate use use case, which I can think of, and you asked me about metaphors, that it will evolve. And maybe there will be journeys for metaphors that will be journeys, you know, Customer Self Service journeys, which may come up for Metaverse, there will be you know, so I mean, I’m not getting into that space. But yes, it’s a very exciting place to be right now, if I think of, but it will, it has to wait for it to evolve. The regulations also need to evolve, you know, like in India, you need clarity as to how do you transact with because, you know, if you have to be there, then how are you going to transact in that particular universe is something you need to have lots of clarity on? Michael Waitze 13:14So you mentioned something as well, that’s very important. As the business evolves, right, and you mentioned, employees, how do you take new employees, incorporate them with the more traditional employees, and get everybody on board internally to understand that this new digital world is fast paced and moving and try to eliminate any kind of tension that may exist between, as you said, the younger generation and existing generation to understand how important this digital transformation is? Anjana Rao 13:47Because obviously, you’re touching the fundamentals of change management, right? So you have to coexist with a generation, which has certain biases towards change. And then there is a generation who who would like to challenge every new thing that you accept them, right. So and that also becomes a very important ingredient when you are rolling out an initiative, whether that initiative is going to fetch you the value further back, you know, unless it’s not accepted and adopted. So the way we plan our rollouts also involves making sure that these guys, everybody, everybody who’s there in the value chain, understand why so the end purpose, the end, why if we understand that this is the end objective, which we are going to meet, and this is going to be the impact on everyone’s life, right? So if we start with that, why and the impact it is going to create on each one, you know, and that is how at least we have a framework where we start off and this is how this initiative is going to impact a particular end user. And this is going to be the x y See benefit in the life of that individual? Now, when we roll it out, we start measuring. So there is a baseline which happens, and now you start measuring. Okay, fine. If there isn’t an adoption, is that adoption really leading to an impact on the matrices which we had identified? will get impacted because of this change? If yes, you know, then the numbers then the monster that look, you know, but yeah, it’s not easy. It’s not easy. It requires lots of planning, you don’t plan just for rolling out an initiative, you plan, how to make an adoption, the adoption strategy gets laid out. And then keeping in mind, the stakeholders, you know, what kind of levers do you need to press? Yeah, I mean, so there’s lots of, there’s lots of deliberation, which happens when we are rolling it out so that we understand that each and every individual who’s involved in the value chain adopts to the new thing. Michael Waitze 15:56I want to get back to this Ecosystm Because I just remembered something right. And Ecosystm itself is, is made up of multiple players and also multiple participants. Yep. And do you use any of them, whether it’s an E commerce company, a payments company, whatever it is, as a reference point, it’s a moving target for sure. But to use those experiences, reference points for things that you’re trying to build, or that the insurance industry itself is trying to build as well, to ensure that your new your existing customers or your new customers are familiar enough with what they need to do, because it looks like something that they’re already using at scale. Does that make sense? Anjana Rao 16:31Yes, yes, because there’s a there’s every time you every time a customer is using an ecosystem, as you rightly said, like if it if you talk of a health system, there are, again, multiple providers within that ecosystem, and they are all working, you know, towards a desired goal. And what is happening in this process is the customer now knows a better way to interact a better way to you know, his reputation is on the TAT, his experience expectations or is on the delivery, now, he is going to expect the same stuff for insurance, he wouldn’t want an insurance cover, which is so complicated and so comprehensive, that he has to leave the Ecosystm to be somewhere, fill that entire form. So he would prefer this something like a continuous underwriting, he would prefer something which is small, simple. And that’s where I see the change and the demand changing for insurance to have small sachet products, easy to underwrite or do continuous underwriting because he’s a part of the health ecosystem and healthy ecosystem, he is there for an objective, the objective is to improvise and reach the end state which is of fit and fine human being. And for that, if he is sweating, why can’t my why can’t my premium rates vary based on my health vitals, so I joined it gives baseline at a certain so there are I would say there are experiments happening in the industry where we are trying to link it with the health vitals of an individual. So that continuous underwriting can say enabled with IoT is is something which the industry is steering towards us what I feel Michael Waitze 18:14Can you take a little bit deeper into this idea of continuous underwriting for people that may not understand it because it’s a very interesting concept. Yeah. Anjana Rao 18:22So again, okay, let me let me as an individual who is trying too hard to talk or losing weight, you know, I’m like, Okay, I baseline myself like, this is where you are, this is these are your vitals. Now if you improvise, you engage into let’s say, you subscribe for a healthy for me or whatever, some health plan, you’re working on a daily basis and if if my insurance carrier tells me like, you know, until you reach this level, and you know, the rate of which I have given to without charged you will become half of it, you reach this level, and the rate at which are charged for you becomes zero, if you are at that level for at least some continuous period. And that’s a wow for me, but how do you track it right you track it grows IoT devices, there are so many choices available, you know, which So, which which are providing the proxies, which are providing the inputs to the insurers, which can provide inputs to the insurers, if they are keen to you know, take these as an input, apply them to the underwriting and keep telling Anna, you’re improvising basis, your improvement on this Ecosystm This is your rate revives rate. If Michael Waitze 19:35I want this so badly, I want to be able to wear an aura ring or a Fitbit or an Apple Watch. And I want to feed that information. I don’t care right about the privacy. I’m willing to give that up to my insurance company, because there’s a 57 year old who runs four times a week and who lifts weights and weighs what I weighed when I was in high school. And who’s lost like almost 30 pounds in the last year. I 15 kilos Yeah. 50 kinkiness I want to be compensated for that. It’s hard work, but I want to be compensated for that. Because my heart’s in better shape. I’m not the normal risk for a 57 year old person. So if that’s what continuous underwriting is, I want to be involved. And frankly, I’ll share a story with you. When my dad was in his 40s, he was smoking like two packs of cigarettes a day. And this is a true story. And there was a bet in his office. Okay, we’re all stopping smoking today. And whoever starts smoking first, almost, let’s say like, $1,000, I can’t remember the exact number. My dad didn’t have a granny couldn’t afford to lose. He hasn’t smoked since. Now, the bet ended a long time ago. Right? But the point is that, like, if I’m wearing that aura ring, and I’m thinking my premiums gonna go up, but even more importantly, I just want to maintain my health, and this is helping me do it, I should get some kind of benefit from the insurance company cuz my risk profile goes down, right? Anjana Rao 20:53Precisely. So be relevant, be relevant to the customer. You know, so this is going to ask. So this is a very challenging time, again, for the insurer, because this is going to push the insurers to think differently. Yeah, the way they’ve been designing products, the way they have been writing the risk, the way, the way we have been conducting a personal Michael Waitze 21:13study. I agree. And look, this IoT, what’s the right word? The ubiquity of these devices, though, hasn’t been around really until the last few years, let’s say, right, because even an Apple Watch, or a Fitbit didn’t have like the necessary granularity to be able to feed data into an insurance company that was new. So how we can’t expect insurance companies or any company to react instantaneously to this. But there’s other technology out there as well. Right? So once you get all this information, and look, there’s been so much noise, I don’t know if it’s the right term around artificial intelligence for the past 50 years, frankly, in my life. But now I feel like we’re kind of at a tipping point and tell me if I’m wrong there. But how do you incorporate that type of processing power and intelligence into the IoT devices? And then back into the insurance companies using artificial intelligence? How does that work? Anjana Rao 22:04Interesting, I mean, see quite a few, quite a few folks already are doing it right. When you see the lots of examples around us, where we, we see for all claims processing, okay, the drones, the drones doing, you know, the gauging the predicting the the gauging the site, the claim site, and they providing inputs to the claims to the claim settler, the claim settler, then doing instantaneous settlement of claims, you know, this is one area where there’s quite a lot of ingestion of data happening, processing of data happening real time with the IoT. And then, you know, there’s another, there’s a change of hand happening between claim settler and the insurance carrier and the claim being settled similarly, so for claims settlement, you see lots of lots of examples around you know, but when it comes to a new customer acquisition, or when it comes to life insurance, even for motor there are devices, which are now inbuilt, which tracks the driver behavior and, you know, accordingly, you can have different rates for, you know, so it induces a desired behavior as to how well you’re driving directly correlates to your premium right. Now, when it comes to life insurance, or health insurance, that’s where these IoT scan, you know, transform the way things are being done the way the insurance products are being conceived and conceptualized. And that’s where lots of play of sandbox will come into picture, there’s lots of play off, you know, what we talked spoke about variables ation, of premium linked to the health vitals will come into picture. Imagine there are good set of customers, I mean, I think it will also enable us to cover lots of customers, who we don’t who are attached, maybe they have some critical illness, maybe somebody as simple as diabetes, you know, either there’s a rate up or straight away, you know, they are rejected. So IoT is going to help us enable, you know, writing prior devising products for, you know, these entities as well, Michael Waitze 24:08because I have a background in processing real time data when I sat on a trading desk, right, I think of, and this is something that would change the way we traded, if we could take real time data off of feed, put it into our analysis tools, we could make decisions faster. And then we could react in the market much faster. And the same thing is happening. I feel like in the IoT space, particularly when it comes to health, but imagine a health goal of let’s say, losing 10 kilos, like that was part of my goal. And if I can maintain that, because, you know, if I step on a scale because I was at one and a half kilos, and I’m 66 and a half, but if I stepped on at 71 and a half, so I hit my goal just for one day, well, I don’t really I don’t really deserve like some kind of reward. But if I maintain that for three months, is there a way to then feed that data in real time into my insurer and then get maybe even just like a parametric it’s not even a claim but a payout it says You did it, you maintained it, we’re lowering your premium and here’s the first like rebate or credit back to you for doing that, do you envision a world where that happens as well? Anjana Rao 25:09Yes, I think that is closer to reality, because I know some players are already into it. And I know that a couple of players who are wanting a sandbox, you know, experiment to be done. So that this particular concept, which is a concept can be you know, then because the the ability of the devices, see where the concerns, comments, you know, how accurate is information, right? Because it’s all game of Risk riding right. So, how accurate is the information and the actuaries or underwriters also want to gauge you know, I mean, like, what is the range of risks, you know, which I, so, there is a learning curve, which is, which is involved, but yes, decision making will get, will, will, will be the decision making will happen based on the data, which you see, and then maybe underwriter initially will say, Okay, fine, I’ll go with the decision or I override this decision, but eventually it will be displaced, the decision making will be by the board, if I can call it a board. And that’s how it will be. Yeah. And we again, it will also have a window for the individual to interact with the board, then in there as to why I have got this rating. Right. And he or she will get an explanation. Yeah, can find Michael Waitze 26:28out actually, why what is the biggest challenge you think to distribution? In a market? I mean, even in Southeast Asia, this is true, where the where the penetration of insurance is still relatively low, and how does technology help you solve that problem? Anjana Rao 26:45That’s a lovely topic. So, essentially, the main theme change has happened, Michael, how I look at it, five years back, not even five to six years back, we were trying to do away with the paper based processes and equip all our sales folks with a tablet which has, which has an electronic form, then it moves to a smart electronic form, and then it moves to something which is as far as you it has all the validations So, you don’t need a layer of branch underwriters because because that form and that tablet together that entire, so, I think that form has now evolved into something like a enterprise sales system, yeah, which is so smart, you know, it has acier it has OCR, it has that OCR is coupled with AI, it can capture documents, you know, it can read documents, capture information, compare it with whatever is being written in the form and then tell you whether the date of birth matches it doesn’t match you know, whether there is an accuracy of the record, so, that all the work with a branch underwriter, erstwhile used to do is now already relegated to the Smart Form or to this enterprise app, which is working just on a mere tablet right. So, and this tablet now, you know, so, sounds cliche, but it is serving like a branch forever relatively new, you know, insurer or a new insurer who sets up a business in India, he or she may not require as many branches as you know, someone who opened up the offices or the business early 2000s You know, one can do with 2025 branches and all the all the feet on street access your branch, because you can serve as a customer to this to this smart device, you can acquire customers, you can build the intelligence of hyper personalization within these devices those were so, you know, our like depending upon the profile of the customer, what is it that needs to be paid to this customer and as what should be the content, everything is there you providing us an air cover to the feet on Street Challenge was a few years back was also connectivity. So, in India, you will see most of the most of these devices would have online and offline feature we Indians will say like whether it works in an offline mode, because that was an imperative for us, but now, I think we have overcome that challenge with the outreach of the of the mobile network in India and the way we are using you know, the mobile penetration is there. It is humongous and hence now the dependency and offline mode is gone away. I would say I mean instant instant issuance or instant processing of data is what folks are working upon. Because you have you have the data with you the customer data, you can you have enough and more intelligence applied at the point of sale for life insurance. You know point of sale issuance has always been a challenge. But now that could be a possibility with with technology is what I feel. And that is where instant issuance is not limited just for non life or health. Even life insurers now can attempt for instant issuance of policies at the point of sale. And that’s what technology has equipped or provided the insurance but Michael Waitze 30:27I’m gonna end with that I love it’s an honor for me to be able to talk to someone like you just so thoughtful about not just the not just the business itself, but how the technology fits in there. I love this idea of the feet on the ground functioning as the branch and being enabled with this technology before was online and offline. Now it’s mostly online because the offline issues have been solved. So interesting to talk to you. Anjana Rao, the Chief Strategy Officer, IndiaFirst Life. That was awesome. Thank you so much for doing that today. I really appreciate your time. Anjana Rao 30:59Thank you, Michael. Thank you. Pleasure. The post EP 203 – Anjana Rao – Chief Strategy Officer at IndiaFirst Life – How Do I Make Myself Available Where My Customer Is? appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast spoke with Arvind Swami, a director of Financial Services APAC at Red Hat, about the importance of data and the many opportunities advanced data analytics unlock. While data analytics is not a new topic, especially for the insurance industry, the way leading organizations are using it has shifted to enable hyper personalization in response to a dramatic change in customer expectation over the past years.  Arvind talks through how organizations can use data to identify the customer DNA and create hyper-personalized products and services. He covers the challenges involved including compliance, regulation, data privacy and security and explains how to handle the data so it can be used to generate true insights. Arvind believes the large amounts of data traditional insurers have collected over the years gives them a strong competitive advantage over newly launched InsurTechs. The question is, how do you use the data? If you would like to learn more about Red Hat, visit https://www.redhat.com/ or get in touch with their team here. Make sure to check out Red Hat’s Analyst Papers which provide more insights on data analytics as well as cloud computing. The post EP 202 – Arvind Swami – Director at Red Hat – From Siloed Data to Hyper-Personalization appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The biggest news in InsurTech in February? The Asia InsurTech Podcast published its 200th episode! A lot has changed since Michael Waitze and Theresa Blissing started the Asia InsurTech Podcast in May 2019. The InsurTech landscape has matured and many Asian InsurTechs have become global players. InsurTech funding, however, has declined by 50% in 2022 according to a report from CB Insights.  The AIP News Roundup team invited David Gritz, a co-founder of InsurTech NY, to discuss the current state of InsurTech funding and its impact on the insurance industry in the US and globally. What are some of the reasons for the decline in InsurTech funding and what can we expect for 2023?  If you are in New York in March, make sure to join the 4th annual InsurTech Spring Conference held on March 29-30, 2023. Find out more here. The post AIP News RoundUp – EP 63 – Theresa Blissing, David Gritz and Michael Waitze – The Tourists in InsurTech Are Gone appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

Asia InsurTech Podcast enjoyed having Evan Tanotogono, a co-Founder and the CEO of Rey back on the show. Some of the topics Evan covered included: The integration of curative and preventive health care with its financing Changing people’s habits and starting with hydration Behavioral economics and the power of rewards Optimizing clinical pathways The importance of primary care and where tele-health fits in Member centricity versus policy centricity Please read the best efforts transcript below: Michael Waitze 0:10Hi, this is Michael Waitze. And welcome back the Asia InsurTech Podcast. Today we are joined by Evan Tanotogono, a co founder and the CEO at Rey. Evan was one of our earliest guests on the Asia InsurTech podcast. And actually the last time you were on the show was in November 2021, it was a completely different world, then. It’s great to have you back on the show. How are you doing, by the way? Evan Tanotogono 0:34I’m doing great. So yeah, I’ve been on the show for a couple of times. And last time, I promised to come back to you again, you know, back then I started re as new breed of InsurTech. And then we just launched seven months ago, in July 2022, for the individual memberships, and for the group, which we call array for pieces, which are slash one month old. So yeah, a lot of learnings that I’m happy to share today to you, and to all the listeners. Michael Waitze 1:04So awesome. Let’s catch up a little bit. I mean, tell me where do you want to start? Where do you want to start? Evan Tanotogono 1:08One One exciting thing that I want to share to you today, Mike is, you know, I started looking at again, you know, how, and you know, what problems to be solved in Indonesia? And, and I think, you know, when when I look into our health and life protection, in general, it’s way larger than just the pain point of insurance. You know, it’s it’s, you know, covering the major health problems that we have in Indonesia, because at the end of the day, what we want is healthier Indonesians, right and productive Indonesian. So I started looking at at this facts and you know, we have three top issues, right, and it’s all correlated, we want to know the right. First is that, I see that Indonesians have very high health risks. And you know, the the healthcare spending per capita is really high right now. And it’s moving very, very fast. If I’m not mistaken, it’s like 10 to 12% CAGR. So it’s really, really a frightening rate of increasing healthcare spending. And mostly is driven by, you know, people are being distant with their health care to health care advocacy is pretty low, people have high profile leads to chronic disease as well. So that’s the first one, right, so people have very high health care risks to, you know, when they are having this health risk, they are financially impacted as well, they are financially vulnerable. Because, again, this goes into the penetration of health life insurance, where people are not protected. And again, I said as well that 100 100 20 million people in Indonesia don’t have access to an optimal protections. And lastly, which is very interesting, for me, combining the two facts together, people have very high health risks, and they’re financially vulnerable. The third one is, even though they are being protected their peers today, you know, talking about both insurers and public insurance scheme as well. They are not running sustainably, right. So this is really, really frightening for me, because again, like, we know that there are some risks, and people are being impacted financially, and they’re trying to get some protections, but even the parties that are protecting them is not running sustainable, and are struggling to make profit. Michael Waitze 3:24So can we can we break this down into those three components? And just dig a little bit deeper? What is it about, like, what’s changed? Or what’s developing over time? That’s make that’s giving Indonesian? So Thai health risks, right? Evan Tanotogono 3:36Yeah, I can name a couple of points. Right. The first one is that, you know, people are being distant or far with their healthcare. And there are a couple of reasons for that, right. One is on the habit itself, in which basically, when when people are are sick, they’re trying to, you know, access their health care, not not in a good way, right. So sometimes they just hear what the friend say, or just, you know, like doing something or I just take this take that I buy medicine on our own and, you know, basically, all these things that’s not making the efficacy of healthcare really high, right? And then sometimes when they are sick already, or they go to the doctor’s, they got antibiotics, for example, right? And then their adherence to take the medication is actually low. And then the next time they are sick again, if there is different illness, etc, then they feel they already know Oh, yeah, it’s antibiotics. You know, I just take antibiotics on my own, I just purchase it and done right. So that’s the first factor that I’m seeing, you know, healthcare efficacy is is is not really there. And then too, we also see that Indonesians as usual, have not very high awareness towards this chronic disease right and wellness. So as a result, you know, you see that the stats, you know, diabetics, hypertension people are are increasing in Indonesia is access Michael Waitze 4:57to health care driven a little bit by Just the structure of Indonesia as a country itself, right multiple model, even multiple 18,017 and a half 1000 islands? Does it get harder to get health care? As you get out of the main cities? And is there anything that you can learn? Like, is there a telehealth issue that needs to get solved? Or is it just that you need to have representatives in all these places to be able to give people better access to health care? And also better information for it as well? Yeah. Evan Tanotogono 5:25Yeah, I feel, you know, it’s a combination of all of the issues, right, because again, like, geographies is one of the big factor there, like people are living far, far away. While telemedicine will help, telehealth will help people in getting their Euro consultation getting their medications. And, you know, having the right offline setup is also quite important. And, you know, how do we connect both is also also quite important. So you know, like, people don’t need to go and walk to the to the offline facilities, they can go to the telemedicine company, get having some access there. And then whenever needed, can be triaged to an offline facilities get their treatments there. And also the connection with the financing as well. So I think that’s, that’s one of the things that Ray starts from, and we really want to make this integration between, you know, the payer financing facilities that that people will have with their health care, Michael Waitze 6:26right? Because there’s a little bit of a, what’s the right word? There’s a little bit of a vicious circle here, right? In other words, if I’m a little bit concerned about access to health care, but even if I’m not feeling well, if I feel like I’m going to be financially vulnerable, as well, but also if the payers you said, whether it’s the insurers or the public, public providers of insurance as well, aren’t making a profit or aren’t profitable, their incentive as well to provide the proper insurance coverage for these people that are that are unhealthy. Isn’t there either? So how do you solve that problem on the flip side of the profitability of the insurers or the payers, to then be able to provide the proper health care to the people that are at risk? Evan Tanotogono 7:06Right, so yeah, that’s a good point, right. And this is where actually we we kind of going together. And in Ray, we we start having, you know, we expand our approach, not only just coming as a health insurer tech on its own, and we have all this emphasis, but it’s all about the integration. So, you know, basically, what we have in race is actually three pillars, right? to healthcare, first one curative health care in which bringing people to their health condition in the most efficient way possible, in the most efficient clinical pathways, and etc. And then we have the second pillar, which is the preventive health care. So if you’re not sick, then obviously we don’t want you to be sick. And there are some features that you can use. If you’re not sick, right. And then there’s the third pillar, which is the financing now insurance is the backbone of it, to make it you know, predictable to make it more certain in terms of how much membership fees unit to unit to pay. But there are other things inside of the of the financings as well. So you know, by combining these three pillars, and they’re working together, not just bundled, but integrating, right, so what it means is that, we tell you that a mike there is this membership, that covers all you need in your life, in terms of your health protection, right, there are features, if you’re getting sick, there’s somebody to take care of you, there are features to you know, give you unlimited access to the primary care give you medications, if you need to go to offline, then it’s very, very seamless, it’s very convenient, you just go there, somebody takes care of the payment already, don’t worry. And if you are not sick, right, there are features that you can use the you know, like the nutrition, diet, plan, the activities, etc. And again, everything is financed. But again, you know, all of the things that curative and preventive are, they’re working in unison to optimize the risk covered by the financing part. So that’s the that’s the integration that I’m talking about. And I believe that when we create something like this, it’s not only bringing, you know, the convenience for the people, but also, you know, it’s bringing efficacy on the health care, because you can give personalized care wherever they are, you can optimize the long term risks as well. And then you know, the payer here is also involved in one platform. So we built this since day one and giving benefits for everyone. Michael Waitze 9:37At the at the end of last year, is that true? Not the beginning of 2022. I kind of gave in and I bought myself this thing. Yeah, because I really wanted to track my heart rate, my sleep and other sort of health related data. And I’m indifferent to whether it’s a Fitbit and ordering an Apple Watch. Like I really don’t care. But everybody doesn’t I have access to this. But I do feel like if I do go to get medical care, and I have some of this data, even if it’s just like a constant tracking of my heart rate that there’s some interesting information here. How do you get these 120 million people? Which is almost half of the population in Indonesia, right? Maybe a little bit less. But how do you get enough data for them personally, because it all starts with prevent preventive, right? In other words, insurance costs gonna be way lower if everybody’s just healthier. And that starts with preventive better diet, you said better exercise, all this type of stuff. And I feel like having this data with me, just me personally, helps me do things. I’m like, oh, no, why did that happen? Oh, I get it because I ate that thing, or because I didn’t do that exercise, because I didn’t sleep enough. But how do we get enough data for everybody else that maybe doesn’t have access to that type of technology, so that they can get the preventive health care at the beginning, before they need to get to curative and then actually need to actually access to health care so that they can use the insurance? Evan Tanotogono 10:59Right? So I have an interesting story to share with you on that. Right. So yeah, in Ray writer, we realized that not everyone will have wearables, even though we can connect with any brand of wearables of your choice. And you know, we start realizing that Okay, what if this guy’s ad, by the way, our members going from very easy to very rest of Indonesia, and we understand, okay, some people might not have this verbal. So we have also a feature called diary. So dire is basically something that, you know, we just want to change the mindset and the habit of people, right, so the first day I read that we created is the hydration diary, in which basically, you go there, and then you set a reminder for your drinks, because that’s also one of the biggest factors of driving someone’s health, right? Other than walking and activities, you know, drinking is something that that’s gonna make an impact. So that we have those features. And it’s based on your honesty, right? You go there and then set the reminder and you drink water, you click on a nice glass of water, and then you get points. And then you exchanged we had something. One day, my friend talked to me and said, Okay, are you sure you’re gonna make this features because people will abuse it? Right? It’s based on people honesty, and then there are rewards, etc. So I’ll try to abuse it. So I said to him, Michael Waitze 12:22hold your thought. You know, my grandfather once said to me, when you’re when you’re lying to other people, you’re not actually lying to them, you’re lying to yourself. And it’s so obvious when you go because you used to, I used to go to the doctor when I worked at Goldman Sachs, right. And unfortunately, when you work in the financial services industry, like Goldman or Morgan, every night, you’re out drinking with your clients. And I’m talking like, almost every night, right? It’s bad for you, and no one should be proud of us. But you go to the doctor for your annual checkup, and the doctor would say, how much would you say you drink every week and you just be like, one or two glasses of wine, and the doctor would look at you and just be like, That’s a complete lie. And it’s obvious from your like, physical physicality. That it can’t be true. Your eyes are bloodshot, you know what I mean? Like you don’t look well. So it comes out anyway. So how can you encourage people because it’s a good finish your story but then just ended with like, how can you encourage people not to lie to themselves and to not to lie to their physical care people? Yeah, sorry. Go ahead. Right. Evan Tanotogono 13:20Yeah, so the funny story about this, I think, in sync with what you what you told us is, you know, like this guy, my friend tried to abuse the system, right? So I said, Okay, go try it. Right. So so he downloaded he becomes a member. He starts paying at okay, let me do this feature. You know, like first day, he told me it’s easy, I’m just gonna click it nine times in a day and then I gotta get the coins. I said, Okay, sure. So he tried and then you know, like the third or the fourth or fifth class he forgot to click it and he was like, oh, no, I forgot Okay, tomorrow I’ll try again right and then like the next day he try again and then and then he forget about it again. His kid maybe in like one or two weeks maybe he he just you know successful for one time. Yeah, and then and then along the way what happened was this guy he said that Okay, wait, wait, did I do this right? Might as well I drink waters while waiting so Michael Waitze 14:19it’s so stupid right? Like yeah, instead of clicking the thing want to do the thing? Evan Tanotogono 14:25Yeah, like the real thing right so that what happens is that okay, you in order for for this guy to remember he take water and an actual sugar drink and so then he come to me and I say, oh, yeah, I ended up drinking waters now every day so I was like, see? So that’s how the you know this habit can actually you know, build the book and and we can we can give incentive to people Yes, maybe people would be a little bit corrupt in the beginning Oh, there’s rewards out as a store but where people try it chips a habit and when it becomes a habit like you wash your hands with hands sanitizer right now wear masks, it’s very hard for you to get rid of right. So I think that’s really something that we start getting traction as well. And a lot of people ask me, will, will actually use this because we see some insurers having, you know, an app with all this activity is nobody use it. But you know, what, what we have in Ray was, was amazing. So I think like, we are seven months old, after, after we launch, we got, I think 70 plus million steps, we got, I think, like, how many 1000s of liters of water that people locked in, and we start seeing impact as well. If I might to go, you know, into the impact side, right, we are seeing impact because people who are engaged with this, you know, wellness activities, they are twice as, as persisting as as those who don’t. So, you know, definitely something that that’s better for the payer side as well. Because, you know, when people engage with us wellness activities, they are more aware of their health, they’re actually, you know, improving their health and lifestyle, but at the same time, you know, they’re, they’re more likely to pay more and more in the platform. Michael Waitze 16:09So one of the things you said, and you kind of pass over it really quickly was if they do this activity, or if they even pretend the activity, they get the coins, what does that mean? Get the coins? Evan Tanotogono 16:20So we give a reward, right? It’s, it’s behavioral economics. So when you do something that, that I want you to do, we give you a reward. Right? And, you know, like, I had some debates with some colleagues back then, um, you know, because some people feel that, okay, this needs to be intrinsically coming from you, and you want to be healthy. But you know, Indonesia, you know, the market is, okay, maybe I need to give a little bit of push, right. And, again, because some some of the solutions or startups or software out there, they become really, really pure and being really intrinsic is because, you know, you just get that feature on its own right for us. Because it’s an integration, again, with all the healthcare and the payer side. Together. We know what economics we want to try, right? So that we feel that okay, we can share some economics to this people. They got some incentive, and from that coins they can, they can use for anything that they want, they can exchange with electricity bills, they can get iPhone, if you walk long enough, right? You can’t get an iPhone. To be honest, Michael Waitze 17:28I would walk from Bangkok to Jakarta to get an iPhone, I’m sure, I’d like to get a new one. But do you do you also find that when people start getting rewards, but also when people start getting healthier, that they start encouraging not just their family members, but their friends to also become healthier? Right? Is there a community aspect to this to where it’s like, I don’t have to proselytize other people, but they see me getting healthier and just think I could do that too. Evan Tanotogono 17:54Hypothetically, yes. I think now, it’s very early for us to say so. But that’s definitely the direction that we want to go together. Especially, you know, because I think, you know, again, there’s some community factor as well, in that, you know, if you stop doing so, for example, if you go to gym with some of your friends, and you stop doing it, right, and your friends will push you out, like, come on, like, let’s go, we did this together and cetera. Michael Waitze 18:22Yeah, I mean, to be fair, the only reason why I joined a gym 20 something years ago, it’s at 330 something years ago, because all my buddies were doing it before we went out to dinner, they’re like, let’s go to the gym first. And I started going to the gym when I was 24, almost 25 years old. And now I just go all the time. You also said something else. You know, it’s true that everybody can’t have access to a wearable. But the and we can talk about that in a moment. But let’s say you do have access to it. You said you meaning Ray itself as a platform connects to all the wearables. So how does that work? Like does it if I have an Apple Watch, how do I connect it to the platform? And then what is the what’s the feedback loop that happens there? Evan Tanotogono 19:01So first in array, for instance, right? So for example, right? You have, you have a device, and then you connect to the Google Fit. So we work with Google Fit today. So that you, you can give authority to Google Fit to share the data to rate. So that’s how it works. And then yeah, and then we got your data from from Google feet. What we utilize right now is taps and water but we are expanding it towards distress sleep and etc. And then we have this module to actually calculate how much healthier you versus onto pupil right? And that converts into the economies of the coin. Michael Waitze 19:40I would love to see a situation where insurers and even public insurers, and I’m just picking a random device right or giving everybody like an aura ring. I know it gets a little bit expensive, but at $329 or whatever it is for the cheapest one it just feels like that could be a great investment for companies to give out. I know people who’ve tried this before there was this big fight of like giving up Fitbit. Or like, you know, if you worked at a fancy company that maybe they gave you an Apple Watch, if you read some incentives, is there any reason to do that? Or is there any data on whether that actually works? You can say no, like, I don’t know the answer to that question. I’m just curious. Evan Tanotogono 20:16Yeah, I think right now, like $300, for four ring are wearables still probably too expensive, right? Especially because like race is making a product for middle class, middle and upper class. So lower fluid class. So basically, we are still talking about, in average, 150 to $200 per year. So I think, like $300, for a wearable still too expensive. Michael Waitze 20:41Look, you talked a lot about the health side of this and the data side of this, but what about the financial side of this, right? In other words, if we want to make insurers more profitable, or least profitable, right, meaning the loss ratios are low, or the claims ratio is a load, maybe you can explain the difference between a claim ratio, a loss ratio and a combined ratio. For people that may not know, most of our listeners probably will. But how do you affect that as well? Evan Tanotogono 21:06Right. So yeah, claim ratio is something that’s, you know, like, the lower Cape ratio, the more profitable the periods. Right? So you know, it’s, it’s still early in the game seven months old, but you may take a guess on how much claim ratio do I have right now, with right, Michael Waitze 21:21before we do that, is the claim ratio, the loss ratio? Is that just the number of the percentage of the claim that I get versus the the premium that I’m paying? Because that’s what the loss ratio is? Right? Evan Tanotogono 21:32Yeah. So So basically, it’s the, it’s the claim that that the payers need to pay versus the premium that the insurer state, and at that’s normalized, basically. So what should Michael Waitze 21:43it normally be 5060 70% is like a normal loss ratio, what should a claim ratio be? Evan Tanotogono 21:50Well, I think in Indonesia, you know, it could be as high as 8085 easily, right? And I mean, with free, we start off patient first strike. So outpatient became the first Euro forefront. And, you know, it’s it’s never been done before by insurance, because they feel that inpatient should be first right. Outpatient is more frequent. They don’t want to deal with that a lot of frauds and etc. Yeah, so they feel that, okay, Ray, like good luck. You’re doing outpatient first, you’re gonna be destroyed. Right. But yeah, I think that’s where we come differently. And, and, you know, I think differently, to be honest, right? Or outpatient is the most frequent, the most thing that people need is the most interaction. That’s the layer where you get most of the data, you kept most of the interaction, you see most of the behaviors. And I think they’re still there are things that we have to work on. Yes, like me, like healthcare, fraud detection, which we have, but you know, even we start with our patient first, right now, our claim ratio is below 20%. Michael Waitze 22:52What else up? How’s that even possible? Evan Tanotogono 22:56So there are two factors, right. One is the is the proper clinical pathways, so we optimize the clinical pathways, and two, is the fraud detector. Right? So I’ll go on, right. So clinical pathways is basically you know, when a member wants to pursue their health care, what was the most efficient way possible that balances between you getting healthy in the fastest way, convenient way possible, but at the same time, the causes is controlled. Right? Now in Indonesia, to be honest, there are a lot of cases where you know, people have limited knowledge on the health care and they you know, sometimes go to a specialist A, but meanwhile, you’re wrong, right? Then you need to go to specialist P. And then as a patient, you already spend like, three, four hours going to one doctor, and then it was not effective. And then you go to the second doctor for the payer, then definitely extra cost, right. So we re basically we we start with having a teleconsultation. But you know, this is where our teleconsultation is different. is, you know, we give it unlimited, right? So we have unlimited doctor from the platform, you can go check with your doctor, we don’t limit the session, 15 minutes or so, like the longest we had was people talking to our doctor for 13 hours. 13 hours, right? Because, outcast. Yeah, he just he just wants to understand, right? You know, like, can I eat this? Can I eat that and etc. But, you know, from my point of view, what we wanted to do is we want to build the habit of a unit to be close and you need to make friends with your doctor, doctors. And you know, when when people talk to their doctors, this is where you know, the process starts and the doctor sees right, okay, this is Evan, I know the history and I can make a personalized diagnosis. The doctor knows who I am, and giving me you know, recommendations to go to the right, doctors in the offline if needed, and some times is not needed. Most of the time, you know, the doctors can just give me prescription and take this pills for three days. And, and let’s see, right. And in most telehealth companies, it stops right there. But with us, you know, it’s a continuous care or, you know, the two days the doctor can reach out back to me and say, I give you this medication, how does it feel for you? And etc. So, you know, when when we have a proper primary care like that, that’s, that’s driving a lot of things, right. So that diverts people from going to the offline because they already feel convenient with all the process, even when they go into the offline, they go into the right doctors. And there is no you know, Miss medications and etc. So you know, all these things, right? I think people in the market, players start looking at the this integration between your telehealth and insurance, but I can tell you one thing, you know, why it’s not possible today. And while they are there, the claim ratio is a bit high still, is because, you know, the interest is not is not aligned, right. So we see that some insurance, okay, they have an app in the app, they have, you know, telehealth teleconsultations. But, you know, at the end of the day work, this help provide the company in this case, Valley how this is want to get as much as revenue from from the payers, right, so they charge the surfaces to the payers. And, you know, the payers have have no control of what it is right. So then what happens, we see some cases that, you know, the telephone consultation, not properly done not based on data, giving more prescription than it should because you know, to maximize the revenue, sometimes not giving triage properly to the offline because, you know, they will reduce revenue, if the guy’s going to the offline rather than finishing it with a lot of prescriptions. And at the end of the day, you know, the, the members are still not taking care of taken care of properly, and they go to offline still, right. So they say, Okay, I am not comfortable with this, even though is provided for free in my app, but it’s not personalized for me, I’m not happy with this, I will still go to the offline. So that is going to be double cost, right? So the profile chart, the healthcare charge to ensure that the member goes and then claim again to the insurance. And that’s why you’re in the market, we start seeing people asking, Okay, I’m, I’m using this telehealth services, I’m putting it in my app, but my claim ratio is not going down. It’s going up. That’s, that’s because that’s what happened. Michael Waitze 27:26So it sounds to me like there’s, there’s a big ecosystem play here, right? And let’s just, let’s just use three big categories and tell me where I’m wrong. It’s individuals or people that need health care, right? It’s the insurers and the health care providers. And they’re all kind of together, but they feel sort of misaligned to me. Right? How do you create this ecosystem where everybody’s interests are aligned, where the health care providers are getting paid enough? The insurers loss ratio, or the combined ratio where their claim ratio is low enough where they can be profitable enough. And people still remain both healthy and you remove their financial vulnerability. Like this is the big trick, right is how do you get all of these things aligned inside that ecosystem? Right, and you said something that’s super interesting, because you keep using this word over and over again. And I think it’s purposeful on your part. You keep saying members, yeah, right. So you haven’t said like customers, you haven’t said like users, you haven’t done that at all? You keep saying our members. So just explain this to me, these members pay a subscription, where it’s just every month they pay, I’m gonna use the thought 2000 3000 baht, whatever it is, or whatever the equivalent number is in Indonesia? Or are they still paying upfront? You know, every time they have to renew their insurance, they have to pay the whatever that number is? And is there some benefit for this subscription type model? So that part of that subscription can then go to enhance the revenue that each one of these Ecosystm members get and remove some of the financial vulnerability for the people that are members? How does that work? Evan Tanotogono 29:12Yeah, I think you summarized that correctly. Like, so why we call this members is because, you know, our philosophy, Unlike typical insurance, right? When you see the database of insurance, usually they are policy centric, or case centric, right? So you start seeing a unique ID like policy ID and then they start from there. For us, we are implementing 360 degrees member centric, right? So it’s individual centric, it’s Michael or it’s Evan. And, you know, this people might have different faiths in his or her lifetime right. So I can for example, first going, you know, as an employee, my company purchase rate for me, and then you know, and then later So on, I leave the company, and then I decided to purchase Ray for myself as an individual. And then I will get married, and then I will bring my my spouse into the membership, I will add more protections along the way. So this is, you know, the first philosophy of why we are different. And, you know, we start seeing that, you know, this creates a lot of impact by seeing this way. We haven’t talked about fraud detection yet. But this also relates with this, when you start seeing individual as who they are, you start seeing the medical patterns, you start seeing the electronic health records, you start seeing activities, and their personalized health risk towards the pool. So this is where we start from. Now, you’re right, that, you know, when when we create this into a subscription, we become like a new layer that you know, orchestrates between the peers, the healthcare and the members. And I think, you know, that’s, that’s why, you know, I spoke with you, probably 15 months ago, and we just launched several months ago. So those are the time where we actually create this system, right. So everybody needs to come to the same table, and get out of their comfort zone. And you know, people from the healthcare claims adjudication, the insurance, people from the broker side, and we are as a technology platform, and we start with a blank paper, how do we do this? Right. And I think that’s, that’s really the key, because, you know, we have the right team to understand pain points from each. And we also have the right partners, supporting us and committing with us to solve this problem together. Michael Waitze 31:37Yeah, I mean, it’s a great conversation to have. And the reason why I’m thinking about this is because I’m in the process of renewing my own insurance. Right? So this is a real thing that I’m thinking about. It’s like, do I pay boom, all that at once? Or should I just pay a little bit month to month, just like I would do for anything else that I subscribe to, right? So it’s so much easier for people. And I’m not, I’m not as financially challenged as the rest of the world. But even if I’m not, for me to be able to plan, do my financial planning, like a financial planner would say to me, don’t spend $100,000 In January, right, spend eight and a half $1,000 Every month, or whatever it is, right? So that’s what I would want to do. That’s what I would want to do for my insurance as well. And you’re right, if everybody’s aligned, it just becomes a lot easier that way. You said we haven’t spoken yet about fraud detection and fraud control and fraud protection. So talk to me a little bit about that, and, and how we’ve become so good at this. Evan Tanotogono 32:32Right. So again, this is where our philosophy is a bit different than typical insurance. And I feel that this philosophy alone contributes on your how we deal with fraud, etc. So we don’t believe in fraud. We believe in fraudsters, right? So no, there is no fraud on its own, it’s somebody bad making it right. So, yeah, so that’s why, you know, when we start looking from policy I see or, you know, claim case ID we start moving towards, you know, a member centric database and interaction we start seeing all that right, typically ensures, you know, when when they review a claim, they know, it’s a fraud by the time the case is submitted, or it’s post mortem, oh, we’ve just got fraud, right? For us, it’s pretty much different because again, we start with with the one that has most interaction, which is the outpatient, we give the primary care for free unlimited, which is something that you know, typically insurers will say oh, if I do that, it’s a cost for me and I need to think about the cost and blah, blah, but you know, like this is all the interactions we got the details, etc. So our philosophy is that okay, find the bad guys, how do we do that? You know, imagine you’re an airport right? And you have a series of X ray machines there but what actually catch people you know, from bringing bad stuff into the into the aircraft is not the X ray machine on its own right, right. It’s is basically you know, a lot of things happening and the guards there will start looking at how you interact with each of the steps if you’re innocent people you will just walk through very fast and if if you are bringing something that you start parsing you start sweating and that’s where the guy will say, Okay, come over here I’ll do random checks on you and most likely when they do random checks, they find something So believe it or not, you know, when you when you track all this interactions and behaviors, you know, we have everything working in unison from from the doctor chair, we have the you know, care team chats, we have the KYC and etc in in play, then you start seeing even something very, very simple like linguistics. That’s that’s something that we learn along the way is that okay, if people are trying to do fruits, the way they interact the first time to wait, they try to explore what benefits they have on the app, what they’re looking for in the app the way they try to explore the world. The polls, the way they try to talk and speak with the doctors is different than than the innocent people. So that’s what we are start, you know, looking at. And again, because there are some costs that we are taking in and we reshape it into one membership, etc. The interests and appears don’t need to worry about this, right, they just see the end results. This is the protection that I’m giving as as the backbone of this membership, and I’m getting, you know, of free of fraud. Right. So that’s, that’s what we do we identify that people from the good people. And the idea is we do a personalized surface as well, on the clips. If you’re with insurance today, insurance, most likely will think of everybody as as bad guys. Right? But they scrutinize all your claims, where the documents etc. But for us, if we know that you’re a good, innocent guy, then why should we make your life difficult? We just spent 510 minutes on you and you know, everything is done. But if you are your potential fraudsters with very bad scores, then then we know who to scrutinize. And, you know, we had some cases, right when I think like couple months back when we having like 1500 members or so I can pinpoint in that these, these two people did this guy, they will fraud us, right? So it’s pretty important. So I know that if this guy will look fraud us I don’t know when I don’t know how but cable. And that happened, right? So they go into the hospitals. And we we test our hypothesis, we start doing the checks, and we find out that something’s something were fishy. And then we were you know, we were happy, not because we we have a fraudster. But but we can identify before it happens. Michael Waitze 36:41So I want to I want to be a supporter of behavioral science, I really do. And that’s kind of what you’re saying. It’s behavioral science at scale. It’s gathering all this data and watching the way people behave. And you’re right. The guy or the gal at the airport is kind of looking around, and I’m exaggerating, right to make a point. But the guy and gals looking around trying to see if anybody’s watching them, checking their pockets or doing kind of shifty things, is probably going to try to sneak a knife onto the plane. Right? And even if the even if the radar, whatever it is, doesn’t catch it. Right? The X rays doesn’t catch it. Okay, fair enough. That’s not the only interdiction point. And I’m saying this because it’s so close to home to me, not only was I not only was Am I trying to renew my insurance, which is a separate context. But somebody tried to scam me this year. And I think for the first time in my life, not on the insurance side and something else. I’m very concerned about my fitness, right. So this gets back to why I have the watch. And while I’m thinking about the aura ring and stuff like that, so somebody has this thing where they watch people on LinkedIn or on YouTube that are watching things that are related to fitness, I want to be fit. And actually in the last year between January 6 2022, and today, I’ve lost about 15 kilos. Well, yeah, and that gets me just wrapped back down to my regular weight, the pandemic ate too much drink too much. That’s why I’m thinking about all this stuff anyway, but that’s a side issue. But somebody saw that it was like, Okay, I’m gonna try to scam this guy for fitness. And the more the he spoke, the more obvious it became that this was not legit. Right? And it would there were certain behavioral patterns that I saw. And again, I’m not a computer, I don’t have a big data set and all this stuff, but you could kind of feel it. But I’m a real believer in this behavioral science. Because the more went on, the longer went on the more obvious it was this is a scam. And again, you can you can feel it when it happens. And sure there are edge conditions where people that have behaved this way may just be like super enthusiastic about something. And yeah, you may be wrong. And that’s okay, because that can get fixed. But I’d rather fix that than have way too many frauds and then try to fix that after it happens. does. Does that make sense? Evan Tanotogono 38:47Yep. Yep. I hope you you’re still seeing how the integration, you know, comes into play, right? Because you know, when the payer is integrating with the healthcare and the healthcare has a lot of interactions, we shouldn’t think just, you know, typically, people think that, Oh, that’s a cost. That’s a cost. That’s a cost, right? There’s a lot more richness to the interactions, and we start seeing more behavior, start seeing more data, we start seeing more patterns and long time. You know, risk can be feasible as well, you know, it’s still early in the game. But I think that’s that’s where we are going towards as well. Michael Waitze 39:22Yeah. And I think you made a really good point. You’re not trying to you’re just trying to catch the fraudsters, right. And if you can identify those individuals that are trying to do it, you actually benefit everybody else, because my premium should go down if if the fraud gets removed, right, or at least it gets a minimum. I want to do this. If there’s anything else you want to talk about today. That’s great. You’ve launched seven months ago. So that’s good. There’s some data there. But now instead of coming back 15 months later, I’m going to leave it to you to remind me six months from now to find out how member growth is going how your fraud protection is going. Is your claim ratio still saying stable or maybe rising a little bit as you get more members coming? then, and then what’s changed? And what new stuff is getting built over time? Is there anything else you want to bring up? Or should we just wait until the next time we chat up to you? Evan Tanotogono 40:07Well, yeah, I think I think for today, I’ve shared enough. But yeah, I would like to use your platform and thank you so much. I really appreciate her doing the Isha InsurTech podcast. But yeah, I would love to, you know, use this platform as a learning for the industry as well. And for people who are who are trying to change the world, right? Because I realized it’s, you know, it’s a big problem. It takes more than array and, you know, it’s it should inform everybody in the healthcare side, in the AI machine learning insurance side, the way they see risk, you know, I think people should be able to refresh their minds some belief might not be relevant today. So yeah, I would love to update you and all the listeners as well, how we learn certainly can make a better world together. Michael Waitze 40:54Yeah, let’s do that. I mean, we talked about ecosystems before, we want to be an integral part of that ecosystem so we can help people share knowledge and share new ideas. Evan Tanotogono, a co founder and the CEO of Ray, thank you again, so much for doing this today. Evan Tanotogono 41:05Thanks for having me. The post EP 201 – Evan Tanotogono – co-Founder and CEO at Rey – We Want Healthier Indonesians appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.

The Asia InsurTech Podcast is celebrating its 200th episode!  We took the opportunity to check in with some of our industry friends to understand how InsurTech in Asia has developed over the years and what new trends are emerging.  We spoke with Alvin Kwock, co-founder of OneDegree in Hong Kong, Cindy Kua, co-founder and CEO of Sunday in Thailand, Harshet Lunani, the founder of Qoala in Indonesia, Kazy Hata, the founder and CEO of Justincase Group in Japan, Rob Schimek, the CEO of bolttech in Singapore, Skye Theodorou, the co-founder and CEO of Upcover in Australia and Roopa Malhotra, the Head of Customer and Digital at Zurich Asia Pacific.  We would like to thank our supporters over the years and are looking forward to the next 200 episodes on how technology is reshaping the insurance industry in Asia. The post AIP 200th Anniversary Episode appeared first on Asia InsurTech Podcast.