QBE Insurance Group has entered a multi-year commercial agreement with insurtech RiskGenius to apply machine learning to policies sold by the carrier. The goal is to automate underwriting by matching products and customers directly based on coverage needs, according to the company.
QBE North America will be the Australian insurer’s first division to implement RiskGenius’ software, after completing a proof of concept with the startup earlier this year. The outpost expects to upload more than 125,000 policies into RiskGenius platform by June 2018, it says.
"Initially, we will be using the RiskGenius platform to analyze policy and endorsement language as well as to aid our teams in new product development,” said Bob James, group head of transformation for QBE, in a statement.
The move also supports QBE’s ongoing investment strategy—to spend $50 million in early-stage companies developing technologies beneficial to the company. RiskGenius is now QBE Insurance’s first investment under QBE Ventures, its venture capital arm established this year.
“I love the fact that QBE has decided to focus on data and analytics when partnering with Insurtechs,” said Chris Cheatham, CEO of RiskGenius. The two are aligned in our vision for RiskGenius to become a utility for insurance professionals looking to evaluate insurance policy language.”
