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Acturis vows to revolutionise personal lines

08 Feb 2012
Author: Emmanuel Kenning, Insurance Age

Acturis is poised to make an attack upon the personal lines market with two key hires.

Describing existing personal lines software systems as "old fashioned and cumbersome", co-CEO of the firm, Theo Duchen, pictured, pledged that Acturis would be in the vanguard of delivering new technology to the brokered sector.

As part of this strategy, the technology provider has appointed ex-chief information officer at Heath Lambert (now Gallagher Heath), Jim Lorimer, as head of personal lines.

He will be supported by Jeff McCracken, formerly at Close Premium Finance, who joins in a business development role as the company looks to change the way that brokered personal lines is traded.

Mr Duchen commented: "Personal lines has long been constrained by the limitations of EDI trading, with insurer products deployed by traditional software houses on each of their customer sites.

"This model limits the control insurers have to make fast changes and is very old fashioned and cumbersome when compared to the newer technologies and approaches available."

Poor value

Mr Duchen claimed that insurers were getting very poor value in respect of their EDI model and costs.

"We feel that future efficiency has many facets which are inconsistent with a traditional EDI trading model," he explained.

"Insurers need to be able to make real-time changes to their products in an aggregated marketplace. Insurers also want to benefit from different quote enrichment methodologies, such as lifestyle data and credit checking."

Mr Duchen concluded: "Telematics also offer insurers far more detailed behavioural rating information to underwrite a vehicle based on real usage. Acturis aims to be at the vanguard of this revolution, using its proven software as a service business model and we are resourcing up our team to deal with this challenge."

David McDonald, co-CEO of Acturis, added: "Jim has an excellent pedigree in personal lines innovation and we welcome him to our team."

"Jeff has many excellent broker relationships, both personal lines and commercial, and he will be an excellent addition to our business development team across the business. Assisted by Jim and Jeff, we look forward to working with forward thinking brokers and insurers to change the way personal lines is traded."

Insurance Age

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