The insurance industry is at an inflection point—legacy processes are still widespread, yet AI and automation are enabling smarter, more efficient workflows. But how do insurers cut through the noise and apply technology in a way that truly transforms their operations? In this episode, Matthew Grant sits down with Nigel Walsh, newly appointed at ServiceNow, to discuss how AI, digital agents and workflow automation are reshaping insurance. With 500 insurers already using ServiceNow, Nigel shares ...
Mar 16, 2025•34 min•Ep. 347
The automotive industry is undergoing a transformation—electrification, changing ownership models and evolving customer expectations are reshaping the market. But how does insurance fit into this shift? In this episode, Robin Merttens speaks with Nimeshh Patel, CEO of Wrisk, about how the company is helping major automotive brands embed insurance seamlessly into the car-buying journey. With a customer-first digital experience, Wrisk enables instant, hassle-free insurance at the point of sale, el...
Mar 09, 2025•23 min•Ep. 346
Agentic AI - the buzzword of 2025. But what is it and how can it help claims? The insurance industry has long struggled with manual, time-consuming claims processes that create bottlenecks and put pressure on adjusters. Now, Agentic AI is emerging as a solution: automating administrative tasks and enabling claims teams to work faster and more efficiently. In this episode, Matthew Grant speaks with Robin Roberson, co-founder of Agentech, about how digital agents are reshaping claims handling. By ...
Mar 02, 2025•35 min•Ep. 345
Traditional underwriting is evolving, and AI-powered platforms are leading the charge. In this episode, Robin Merttens speaks with Will Ross, CEO and Co-founder of Federato, about how their RiskOps platform is helping insurers make smarter, faster underwriting decisions. Federato enables underwriters to triage submissions, prioritise in-appetite risks and streamline workflows using AI-driven insights. Will shares how his background in wildfire modelling led to the creation of Federato, how under...
Feb 23, 2025•30 min•Ep. 344
AI-driven automation is transforming how insurers process data, streamline workflows and improve decision-making. In this episode, Robin Merttens speaks with Graeme Asquith, UK Managing Director at mea Platform, about how AI-powered document ingestion is changing the game for underwriting and claims. With advanced machine learning models trained on millions of insurance documents, mea platform enables insurers to extract key information instantly—reducing manual processing, improving accuracy an...
Feb 16, 2025•27 min•Ep. 343
From manual data entry to slow underwriting decisions, inefficiencies in broker management have long been a challenge for the commercial insurance industry. But what if brokers could streamline data collection, enhance risk assessment and seamlessly connect with underwriters in real time? In this episode, Robin Merttens speaks with Alex Cardona, CEO and Co-founder of Recorder, a company building the next generation of broker management software. After a successful exit from Codat, a financial da...
Feb 09, 2025•26 min•Ep. 342
Satellite imagery is revolutionising the way insurers assess risk, track disasters and provide coverage. In this episode, Matthew Grant speaks with Berend de Jong, Global Insurance & Finance Lead at Planet Labs, about how high-resolution satellite imagery and geospatial data are reshaping the insurance industry. With a fleet of over 200 satellites capturing daily images of the Earth's surface, Planet Labs enables insurers to enhance flood and wildfire risk modeling, parametric insurance solu...
Feb 02, 2025•25 min•Ep. 341
How is generative AI changing the way insurers work—and think? In this episode, Matthew Grant sits down with Bob Pick, EVP Chief Information Officer at Tokio Marine North American Services and Group Deputy Chief Information Technology Officer for Tokio Marine Group, to explore the real-world impact of generative AI in the insurance industry. From streamlining underwriting decisions to detecting fraud and automating operational processes, Bob explains how Tokio Marine is using AI to address both ...
Jan 26, 2025•40 min•Ep. 340
How is technology redefining supply chain insurance and resilience in a changing world? Parsyl is combining innovation, data and ambition to transform the way essential supply chains are insured. Robin Merttens speaks with Alex Haar, Co-founder and Chief Product Officer at Parsyl, about the company’s impressive growth, their $20M Series C funding and the advanced technologies powering their solutions. From leveraging AI and IoT to expanding into non-perishable cargo, Parsyl is building a future ...
Jan 19, 2025•23 min•Ep. 339
In this episode, Matthew Grant sits down with Adrian Coupland from Earnix to explore the findings of its latest industry report, An Industry at a Crossroads . They discuss how insurers are adapting to modern challenges, from navigating compliance to leveraging real-time analytics. With a focus on modernisation and competition, Adrian shares insights into how technology and data are reshaping the insurance landscape, empowering businesses to move faster and make smarter decisions. This conversati...
Jan 12, 2025•24 min•Ep. 338
In this special first episode of 2025, Zoja takes the hosting seat to ease us back into work and life post-New Year with a reflective and forward-looking conversation. Here’s what you can expect: 2024 Highlights: A look back at InsTech's key themes, including the growing buzz around catastrophe modeling and exposure management. Zoja shares insights from the year’s most popular webinars, including: Know Your Models: An Underwriter’s Guide to Flood Modelling (in collaboration with Fathom). JBA Ris...
Jan 05, 2025•5 min•Ep. 337
Matthew and Robin meet again for our final Partners’ Chat of the year to touch on the highlights of 2024 and dive into key themes shaping the insurance and technology industries. From augmented underwriting to agentic AI, they explore the trends, challenges and opportunities that defined the year—and offer insights on what’s coming in 2025. While Matthew emphasises the growing significance of secondary perils like severe convective storms (SCS), Robin reflects on how "boring but brilliant" innov...
Dec 29, 2024•38 min•Ep. 336
How can technology and culture drive successful insurance transformation? Aventum is blending innovation and ambition to transform its insurance operations into a tech-enabled powerhouse. Robin Merttens speaks with Hasani Jess, CTO at Aventum Group, about the company's growth, their approach to technology, and the cultural foundation enabling change. With over 650 employees and a tech team of more than 100, Aventum is building solutions to empower brokers, underwriters, and operational teams ali...
Dec 22, 2024•25 min•Ep. 335
You may have heard that Floodbase and Amwins partnered earlier this year, and are combining satellite data and parametric insurance to tackle flood risk, a peril often underinsured or uninsured altogether. Matthew Grant speaks with Emmalina, who leads Public Sector Partnerships at Floodbase, and Alex, Executive Vice President for Alternative Risk at Amwins, about their work insuring golf courses, municipalities and more. The discussion highlights how advancements in satellite technology and data...
Dec 15, 2024•28 min•Ep. 334
How can insurers, brokers, and risk managers better understand and adapt to the growing impacts of climate change on catastrophe risks? Reask is tackling this challenge by leveraging climate science and technology to enhance traditional catastrophe modeling and provide actionable insights for the insurance industry. Matthew Grant speaks with Jamie, Reask’s CEO, and Ian, Principle Quantitative Engineer, to discuss how their innovative models integrate global climate signals and provide more accur...
Dec 08, 2024•29 min•Ep. 333
This week on the InsTech Podcast, Robin Merttens speaks with Martin Olley, Head of North America and APAC for AdvantageGo, and Laurence Trigwell, Head of Strategy and Chief Revenue Officer at Insurants, about how technology is transforming the commercial insurance and reinsurance landscape. Martin and Laurence explore how their respective platforms are addressing key challenges in the industry, from intelligent document processing to streamlining underwriting and policy administration. They disc...
Dec 01, 2024•23 min•Ep. 332
From our highly successful webinar last month sponsored by Fathom, we bring to you everything you need to know about models in a bitesize podcast. Flood models play a critical role in helping insurers, brokers and risk managers assess flood risk, but their inherent uncertainties make effective use challenging. Matthew Grant leads a discussion with Dr. Oliver Wing, Chief Scientific Officer at Fathom, along with Caroline Fox from Guy Carpenter, Stefan Wunderlich from Swiss Re Corporate Solutions a...
Nov 24, 2024•36 min•Ep. 331
Jonathan Gonzalez, CEO & Co-founder of Raincoat, takes the reins as guest host to explore one of the most pressing challenges in insurance: the disaster insurance gap. Jonathan speaks with Carolyn Kousky from the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), about the rising economic losses from climate disasters and the need for more inclusive and innovative insurance solutions. Carolyn discusses her extensive research on climate risk management and disaster recovery, while also introducing her nonprof...
Nov 17, 2024•27 min•Ep. 330
How can parametric insurance transform risk management in an unpredictable world? Munich Re, a leader in reinsurance, is paving the way for innovative parametric solutions addressing weather-related and natural catastrophe risks. Robin Merttens is joined by René Mück, Global Head of Parametric NatCat, and Marcel-Steffen Reif, Global Head of Weather Agricultural Risks, to explore how Munich Re’s data-driven insurance products help corporates, public sector entities and industries navigate complex...
Nov 10, 2024•22 min•Ep. 329
How can impartial valuations drive transparency and trust in insurance? Kroll’s platform provides property valuations through data-driven insights that benefit insurers, brokers and property owners alike. Matthew Grant sits down with Kiran Aulakh, Kroll's VP of Fixed Asset Advisory, to explore how Kroll’s platform combines technology and real-time data to assess underinsurance and overinsurance risks across vast property portfolios. Kiran shares her insights on the value of green valuations, and...
Nov 03, 2024•32 min•Ep. 328
How do you shed light on ‘dark shipping activity’? S&P Global Market Intelligence aims to support insurers throughout the entire insurance value chain by providing critical data and insights. Matthew Grant is joined by George Devereese, who monitors and tracks shipping around the world to screen them against various forms of liabilities. This data is passed onto markets such as the insurance world, to build a better and fuller picture for the insurance contract. A key aspect of this process ...
Oct 27, 2024•24 min•Ep. 327
Ben Turner joked that he’d “be a rich man for every pound [he] had somebody asking” what Salesforce has to offer the insurance world. Robin Merttens is joined this week by Ben Turner and Tom Swire at Salesforce, who touch on their journey to joining the company, the trouble with legacy systems and the exciting prospects for the future including an agency management system to be launched in 2025. If you enjoyed this conversation and would like to hear more, our October evening event hosted in col...
Oct 20, 2024•23 min•Ep. 326
Determined to write delegated business better, Ben Laidlaw joined Nick Tye and Jacqui Ferrier to found Carbon Underwriting. Carbon Underwriting is a Lloyd’s Syndicate MGU that provides shareable underwriting conclusions on its Graphene administration system. The company has matured since its conception in 2018, and Ben discusses navigating ‘Decile 10’ to gaining approval for Carbon’s second syndicate earlier this year, which will exclusively underwrite US business. Key talking points: The story ...
Oct 13, 2024•23 min•Ep. 325
Fadata’s CEO, Liselotte Munk, returns to the InsTech podcast with Robin Merttens to discuss the company’s recent developments, including its expansion to APAC and South America. Discover in this episode the intricacies of running a policy admin system provider, where Liselotte thinks the market is heading to next and the challenges with entering new regions. Key talking points include: The market’s maturity and the problems this may pose. Running a business when policy admin system changes are r...
Oct 06, 2024•20 min•Ep. 324
According to Mike Hobday, CEO of Insurants, the company is “a bit like being the Google Translator of the commercial insurance market”. Insurants is developed by Antworks in collaboration with Marsh McLennan to help commercial insurance companies manage and process their documents. This week, Matthew caught up with Mike, who previously having spent 12 years at IBM, witnessed early AI automation with the likes of Watson, through which he fell in love with document processing. At Insurants, Mike i...
Sep 29, 2024•26 min•Ep. 323
This week we are combining youthful enthusiasm with sage wisdom on the podcast, as Robin Merttens speaks to InsurX’s CEO, Gilbert Harrap and Chairman, Michael Watson. InsurX is a platform that enables insurers and brokers to undertake portfolio underwriting, automated contract binding, algorithmic underwriting and instant risk matching. Touching on the importance of driving digitisation in the London Market, Michael also shares highlights from his distinguished career, with a focus on his succes...
Sep 22, 2024•22 min•Ep. 322
According to Yann Barbarroux, Co-founder and CEO of Otonomi, “every year is like starting a new company”. It has been a year since we last caught up with Otonomi, and Matthew reconnects with Yann to discuss how parametric insurance helps mitigate supply chain risks, particularly in situations where traditional insurance falls short. Key topics include: Addressing pain points in maritime freight and global trade Developing and refining parametric insurance products Real-world case studies demonst...
Sep 15, 2024•38 min•Ep. 321
At InsTech, we love featuring founders who took matters into their own hands to solve the problems they encountered. This episode shines a spotlight on one such entrepreneur who did just that. In the insurance industry, manually cleaning data remains a costly and time-consuming challenge. To explore this issue, Matthew Grant sits down with Nicola Turner, CEO and Co-founder of Scrub AI. Scrub AI is a platform that automates repetitive data cleaning tasks—a solution born from Nicola's own experien...
Sep 08, 2024•34 min•Ep. 320
Next month, Martin Reith will mark 40 years in the London Market. As he approaches this significant milestone, we sat down with him to discuss his journey into the industry, his most notable achievements, his decision to become Chairman of Artificial Labs, and his thoughts on the challenges of modernising the London Market. We also explored his strong advocacy for algorithms and the advice he has for the next generation of industry leaders. Key talking points: Starting 40 years ago Founding Asco...
Sep 01, 2024•31 min•Ep. 319
What does it take to build a company like Guidewire or attract investor interest? This week, Matthew Grant talks with Marcus Ryu, Co-founder and Chairman of Guidewire, and Partner at Battery Ventures. Marcus, one of Guidewire's five founders, shares his experiences from starting the company in 2002 and the lessons he learned along the way. In this episode, Marcus discusses his shift from leading Guidewire to investing through a multi-stage technology investment firm. The conversation covers topi...
Aug 25, 2024•32 min•Ep. 318
