Majority of insurers to invest in insurtech by 2018

Nearly two-thirds of the world’s biggest insurers have invested in insurtech and plan to continue investing in technology start-ups over the next two years, according to research from Gartner.

The research showed that over 60 per cent of major global insurers have invested in insurtech, and it is estimated that 80 per cent of P&C insurers worldwide will team up with or acquire insurtechs by 2018.

Priority

The research suggested that whilst digitisation is a top priority for the majority of insurance CIOs, most of them are continuing to struggle with progressing their digital strategies.

According to Gartner Managing Vice President Juergen Weiss, insurers are still not knowledgeable enough about insurtech and the benefits that it offers.

“Gartner has seen growing interest among insurance business and IT leaders in collaborating with insurtechs or making them part of their overall innovation policies, but the research has also found that most insurance CIOs are not familiar with these companies or their value propositions,” he said.

Benefit

According to separate research from Gartner, the number of technology start-ups has doubled around the world over the last three years, with the most common technology areas that businesses focus on being digital customer engagement, mobile insurance management and analytics.

Weiss stated that collaborating with insurtechs will help to benefit insurers but warned that not all start-ups will survive.

“Not all of them will survive… Insurance CIOs will need to develop a fail-fast approach and an exit plan that secures intellectual property and critical resources,” he said.