Entries by MapleTech

People, Process, Product

In the November edition of Best’s Review, we happened on a short article by William Borden, in which he excerpted an interview with Sabine VanderLinden, co-founder of Alchemy Crew Ventures. Entitled, “Tech Influencer Says Breadth of Experience Built Trust Within Insurtech Sector”, the article made this telling point about the pursuit technology, particularly AI: Billions […]

What Do You Drive?

We hear people in marketing say, “Content is king.” Maybe. It depends on the context. That’s why we think context is king. That thought was reinforced when we wondered if modern, computerized cars could or should be compared to modern, computerized policy administration systems. The answer is, “It depends.” And it depends on context. Here’s […]

Getting it Out of Our System

We were at a trade show recently and noticed the booths of some companies in the same business we’re in called their offerings a policy administration system (PAS). We call ours a core processing system (CPS). We wondered if that was a distinction without a difference. So, we did a little investigating, with the help […]

LLMs and Echo Chambers

The June edition of Best’s Review ran this article — “Large Language Models Examine Rising U.S. Homeowners Rates“ — which contained this introduction: Best’s Review asked three artificial intelligence-based, large language model programs [this question]: Homeowners rates are rising in many U.S. states. What are the forces driving that increase and what might slow or […]

Targeting Program Growth

With the Target Markets Program Administrators Association (TMPAA) Annual Summit coming up later this October, we thought it might be a good idea to put our finger on the pulse of that market. Some of what we found was surprising. Data from the web suggested the global insurance program administration market, valued at $4.7 billion […]

How Do You Spell Opportunity?

When people ask us why we attend the Target Markets Program Administrators Association (TMPAA) Annual Summit, we tell them two things: First, we tell them we appreciate the support the TMPAA gives to program administrators (PAs) and managing general agents (MGAs) by addressing their challenges and fostering growth in program business and by developing insurance […]

Get What You Pay For

Reports from companies like Celent and Datos Insights (formerly Novarica) indicate Property & Casualty insurers rarely use more than 20 to 40 percent of their policy admin systems’ capabilities before opting to replace them, for a variety of reasons. Here are a few of them, in general terms: They prioritize capabilities like policy issuance, underwriting, […]

Actuaries, Actually

What does the term, actuary, mean? It derives from the Latin word, actus, meaning a legal action or a thing done and from the medieval Latin term, actorius, referring to a registrar or clerk. As the use of the term evolved, it’s now generally accepted to have two meanings: In law, it’s still understood to […]

Chickens and Eggs

We sometimes hear software applications or systems referred to as solutions in search of problems. Up to a certain point, that didn’t seem to be an issue for the insurance industry. Starting around the time of Y2K, insurance technology was focused on automating, simplifying, and eliminating the manual tasks and paper involved in processes like […]

Context is King

The February edition of Best’s Review contained an article called, “‘Build vs. Buy’ in the Digital Age”, that said this, in part: The perennial question of “build vs. buy”—whether to develop proprietary applications or acquire third-party solutions—has been argued among insurance stakeholders for as long as any of us can remember … In 2000, the […]