Solving pieces of the puzzle through InsurTech – Greg Hendrick, CEO, Vantage Group

In this week’s The Voice of Insurance episode, Greg Hendrick, CEO, Vantage Group, outlines his vision for the organisation, balancing the reinsurance and insurance parts of the business and how M&A plays a crucial part in Vantage Group’s strategy.

The conversation kicks off with Greg speaking about the three specific advantages of Vantage Group; it’s talent, the absence of legacy technology that allows them to be more efficient compared to their peers, and how fostering a curious and creative culture enables the company to be innovative and to create new revenue streams. Greg also gives his view on April and mid-year renewals and what might potentially be some of the dominating themes around that time.

When asked about its differentiation agenda, Greg speaks about how the use of data and data insights is a key aspect of their plan, but that people, relationships and nurturing trust are still at the heart of what they do, “it’s still a business people, it is still relationships.”

The InsurTech Impact

As the conversation turns to technology, Greg comments that InsurTechs have made a huge difference and a lasting impact by helping Insurers to solve particular pieces of the puzzle, especially around predictive modelling or utilising better data around exposures.

Achieving underwriting excellence and discipline is mostly about having sophisticated underwriting tools and predictive analytics that enable Underwriters to process complex structured and unstructured data points, combined with an Underwriter’s implied knowledge, which is the secret sauce to attaining underwriting nirvana. It’s no secret that many Insurers have huge aspirations when it comes to deploying advanced analytics to improve their risk assessment, and as Greg notes, for Vantage Group, it’s not so much about the tools but how they are used.

As Greg points out, the heart of smart underwriting is really about getting comfortable with various data sources and maximising those data insights to facilitate new offerings, enter new markets, and enable Underwriters to make more scientific-based decisions on risk.

In the discussion, Greg mentions that the absence of legacy systems at Vantage Point is a real advantage. Core processing platforms functioning on antiquated technology significantly constrains the ability to automate low-value tasks and collect and analyse data in real-time, which is an absolute must in today’s digital age and turbulent economy.

However, it’s not just about technology doing all the heavy lifting. Greg speaks about having a pool of talent at Vantage Group that embraces technology is just as important as the tech itself: “there is another generation of folks that have come along that are really, really comfortable with technology that don’t see the value in a lot of the manual work that we used to do and want to get it automated and move forward.”

We highly recommend you listen to this informative and insightful episode.

Enjoy the podcast!