Several aspects of this deal stand out. It is the first acquisition by Guidewire, which until now has been a “we build it, we sell it shop.” It augments Guidewire’s capabilities in the hottest part of the technology landscape: Business Intelligence/Analytics. And it reinforces Guidewire’s strategy to capture the community and network effect benefits of [...]

Celent recently held its first UK CIO Agenda Roundtable.   The aim of this event was to bring together senior IT executives from across the UK insurance industry to debate shared topics of interest.  The event was hosted by a CIO’s at their premises, and the prize for hosting was that the CIO got to choose [...]

In conversations with insurers globally we at Celent are hearing of a new approach to analytics. Perhaps not called Big Data but a different approach, one that seeks to leverage data far more quickly and be more tolerant of the errors in the data. There is a move to understanding that all data is useful, [...]

Microinsurance is referred to the type of insurance that aims to the base of the pyramid (BoP) population, generally those ignored by mainstream commercial and social insurance schemes. It emphasizes the importance of understanding the needs, preferences and characteristics of this target group: the low-income household, the working poor and the under-served. Microinsurance has the potential to play [...]

At corporate level we usually conceive and refer to technology focused on the internal use and how to reach to the outside world to provide better products, have more efficient value chains and improve service.  For example insurance portals or technologies that will improve call center performance. This conception has been very useful to the [...]

The use of mobile in insurance is usually related to the self service capabilities insurers can deploy for agents and for upper income groups such as quote, bind, issue, claims and printing, all for which a smartphone is a better device than just a simple mobile. One trend we have recognized is that mobile technology is being used in [...]

With only two sleeps left until the 2012 apocalypse (has it’s own Wikipedia page here) I thought it worth working through an insurance scenario regarding the end of the world as we know it. I won’t go into detail but Friday the 21st of December marks the start of the 13th b’ak’tun or 13.0.0.0.0 (5126 [...]

At Celent, we have the opportunity to sit through several dozen demos a year of core systems. And in most demos, I find myself having sympathy for the ultimate end-user. The first thing that pops into my head is not how powerful the system is (and they often are), but how grateful I am not [...]

Ever since we discovered that the internet could be more than just a document repository or shop-front, we have been investing in smart ways to engage our customers better and improve the user experience.  Self-service via a laptop, tablet or mobile device clearly has huge benefits to both the customer who now has access to [...]

It seems like every time I have set out to discuss some new technology event a new one has popped up. It has been an epic year for news and new gadgets for all of us. This coupled with my discussions with insurers in recent weeks on the subject of Bring Your Own Device and [...]