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Hello! The next release of the ‘Inspire Insurtech’ series where we interview inspiring insurtechs to find out who they are, what they do, what we can expect from them in the future, and more is here!
For this feature, we have Codafication with Managing Director, Dan Sandaver. Enjoy!
We are “Data Traffickers”…
Our technology is a conduit between legacy software, the cloud and data science.
We provide our clients with a secure platform with flexible abstraction layer, that can design and power enterprise eco-systems. We connect best in class applications, while providing complete lift and shift capability.
Coupled with our own highly flexible software modules (tailored for the insurance industry) our tools value-add to any distribution function, supply chain management, project management, cost containment, financial modelling or back-office digitisation.
Unity is our flagship platform; it integrates, innovates and automates.
Awesome pitch!
The company was spun off from a successful insurance property repair company based in Brisbane that has been operating for over 10 years.
We saw the ability to build tools to automate supply chains and the distributed work forces of the future. As we built more and more products, we realised that our modular approach to software development could add benefit to other parts of the insurance value chain, and other industries with similar challenges.
My personal journey was a project manager previously in software development, before getting into the insurance repair industry. I’ve since however come full circle back into software development having gained a deeper understanding of the insurance industry which has allowed me to create Codafication.
Impressive!
We started our journey focused on building business line applications for the insurance repair industry but realised over time that our tech-DNA defined us to be a different proposition all together. The true value proposition of our company is in our Platform as a Service which allows teams to rapidly deploy solutions across a fragmented software landscape while transacting valuable data and insights.
Great insight!
We believe we are building the next evolution of Platform as a Service technology which will support anyone from enterprise to start up. Without revealing too much, we’re super excited about the direction and strategy were undertaking and believe our tech-DNA will be a game changer for digital transformation teams or software developers around the world.
Additionally, we just finished the Stone & Chalk accelerator for Insurtech which was a great experience. We met new clients and colleagues and built some great relationships through this unique approach to trade vendor and buyer networking.
We’re preparing now for global expansion into new markets, with new channel partners which is extremely exciting.
Exciting! We can’t wait to hear more on these developments!
We try to support two endeavours each year, one domestically and one abroad.
Domestically its HeartKids, an organisation helping to support children and their families affected by congenital childhood heart disease. Internationally, its Umoja house in Africa supporting disadvantaged children through education and community support.
Both charities are close to me and are great endeavours that are highly focused on the people they benefit not the organisation.
We also give back by providing a diverse, culturally aware, and inclusive workplace, for people of all walks of life.
Good job! That’s a noble cause!
Speed, scaling and the ever-changing technological landscape.
What any tech company is building now must have relevance in years to come, and balancing that with the speed at which tech evolves is an interesting challenge.
It’s interesting as well, as more and more the dominant infrastructure providers are becoming the dictating factor in relation to innovation, and the gap is closing on unique technologies in an open-source landscape.
We cannot agree more!
I had the chance to sit on the Insurtech Australia panel recently, discussing Insurtech in the Autonomous Future topic this month. It was great to share the hot seat with interesting people with many perspectives on the subject.
My thoughts on this topic are that we’ve already seen levels of automation in our society from print press, to manufacturing machinery, to e-commerce on the internet as just a few examples.
We’ve all been comfortable with buying products online since mid-90’s, having them delivered to our door, and have experienced the automation of data with predictive marketing and service offerings with “click here” to buy functions.
The next evolution will be a more seamless process as the data is becoming more and more connected in our digital footprint. Automation has been evolving constantly before us, however I don’t think society would automate ourselves into economic oblivion or irrelevance, but more empower creative teams to solve complex problems and provide better customer experiences.
Insurtech in an autonomous future – if you provide augmentation, transact data and innovative applications to solve complexity. I think it’s a brave new world for the vendors in this space.
That’s a great thought! We love the panel from that talk!
Australia is an extremely innovative nation, especially with Insurtech vendors. I’m excited to see some of the success stories including our own unfold in the global market.
Thank you!
A few members from the Codafication team
Interested in receiving the latest updates from Insurtech Australia? Sign up for our newsletter and join the Insurtech Australia Community Group on LinkedIn.
Mercurien to launch Australia’s first telematics-enabled motor fleet insurance
June 20, 2018
Insurtech underwriting agency Mercurien Insurance Pty Ltd (AFSL 408284) today announced that it will offer telematics-enabled, motor fleet insurance to the Australian market, with the offering to be backed by Zurich Australian Insurance Limited (Zurich).
Mercurien’s insurance offering will build on its proprietary BetterDriverTM telematics technology, and use the insights that BetterDriverTM delivers around fleet safety, risk and taxation outcomes to help insurance brokers deliver value to their clients.
“BetterDriverTM is a best-in-class telematics offer developed for Australian conditions and it assists organisations and drivers in managing risk,” said Mercurien CEO and Co-Founder, Michael Graham.
“BetterDriverTM measures the quality of driving across multiple parameters including braking, cornering, acceleration, speeding, length and time of journey and specific geo- locations. The outcome we seek is fewer injuries, fewer crashes, lower costs, less downtime, reduced fuel usage, and enhanced asset utilisation. We are very excited to now be able to combine the insights from BetterDriverTM with an insurance offering, backed by leading motor fleet insurer Zurich.”
Andrew Murrie, COO and Co-Founder of Mercurien said: “Australian fleet operators are constantly on the lookout for better ways to manage their fleets and with our simple, cloud- based solution they can assess their operations, from driver behaviour to tax credits, in near real-time. This enables them to assess and manage risks as they emerge which results in a lower cost, lower risk fleet.”
“We designed BetterDriverTM with the fleet manager and operator in mind. We saw the issues with Fringe Benefits Tax, the opportunities for Fuel Tax Rebates and we applied for and hold Class Rulings with the ATO for Fringe Benefits Tax Logbooks and Fuel Tax Credit rebates ensuring users comply with the relevant Act. The result is a lower cost, lower risk fleet.”
Giles Crowley, Head of Commercial Insurance, Zurich General Insurance Australia & New Zealand, said: “As a leading motor fleet insurer we’ve seen first-hand the benefits of telematics in terms of driver safety, fleet maintenance and efficiency. We look forward to working with Mercurien and believe their offering will complement our broader motor proposition.”
Steven Ord, Chief Distribution Officer, Zurich General Insurance Australia & New Zealand, said: “We are always on the hunt for agencies that can help bring innovative solutions to our broker partners and their customers. We are looking forward to working with Mercurien to explore the potential of their offering.”
According to Michael Graham the future of motor insurance is data driven from sensors in smart devices, smartphones and embedded in vehicles themselves. “The ability to measure and manage data for risk and safety will become paramount,” he said.
“The Workplace Safety and Duty of Care regimes are tightening everywhere and we think that there is a great opportunity for insurers to work with data to create the future of insurance. Working with the team at Zurich showed us that they were the right partner – and vice versa.”
Zurich Mercurien Motor Fleet Insurance will be available from Friday 22 June 2018.
For further information contact:
Michael Graham
CEO and Co-Founder, Mercurien
Andrew Murrie
COO and Co-Founder, Mercurien
Josh Clements
Head of Communications, Zurich
About Mercurien
0414 507 450 info@mercurien.com
0402 534 814 info@mercurien.com
0401 406 305 joshua.clements@zurich.com.au
Mercurien is an innovator in mobility telematics for driver risk management and motor insurance. Mercurien Insurance Pty Ltd (ABN 68 150 845 177 AFSL number 480284) holds a delegated authority as intermediary for Zurich Australian Insurance Limited
Further information is available at www.mercurien.com
Mercurien is a member of Insurtech Australia.
If you’re interested in the Insurtech community in Australia, we can keep you up to date with the latest news and activity from our members.
Effective from 1 May 2018, Simon O’Dell will be the CEO of Insurtech Australia. O’Dell was one of the founding team of IA and has been instrumental in building Insurtech Australia over its first 6 months as Chief Operating Officer. With over 12 years experience in the insurance industry as a broker, founder of his own Insurtech and a number of roles in the corporate insurance sector, O’Dell is in a prime position to lead Insurtech Australia and represent the needs and views of both its members and partners. Please join us in welcoming Simon O’Dell to his new position.
A message from the CEO:
It is BAU at Insurtech Australia. Our hardworking team is pleased to retain Brenton’s brilliance in an advisory capacity. We continue to build a sustainable foundation from which we roll out value-creating initiatives for our members and our partners.
Our key metrics of success are equal to that of our members’ as individual insurtechs and as an ecosystem. The level of interdependence between key stakeholders is key and we’re happy to report that Sydney ranks 4th, globally, behind only Helsinki, Silicon Valley and Tel Aviv on the ecosystem performance metric of ‘Local Connectedness’, as rated by Startup Genome (2018). Local Connectedness is ‘an assessment of the local community, including sense of community, relationships, and collisions between founders, investors, and experts. Our community is working together; it is a great time to be in insurtech.
-Simon O’Dell, CEO & Co-founder of Insurtech Australia
A message from the departing CEO and soon to be IA Chairperson:
Insurtech Australia could not be left in better hands; Simon’s enthusiasm for the insurance sector is evidently clear and contagious, and his professionalism in all his dealings speaks for itself. As for me, I am proudly moving into an advisory capacity in a new role as Chairperson. This will enable me to support Simon and the IA team and continue to build Insurtech Australia together with our members and partners. I will also continue to be the Australian representative for the global Insurtech Alliance that we co-founded in January this year.
I’d like to thank all of our members, founding and general partners and our team of volunteers from across the sector for helping us to launch Insurtech Australia and helping us achieve our vision to make Australia a world leading market for Insurtech. Without all your support this would not have been possible.
-Brenton Charnley, Chairperson of Insurtech Australia, GITA Representative
If you’re interested in the Insurtech community in Australia, we can keep you up to date with the latest news and activity from our members.
Hello! The next release of Insurtech Australia’s ‘Inspire Insurtech’ series has arrived! For this feature we have the award winning insurtech, INSTANDA, and Asia Pacific Distributor, Jon Moody!
INSTANDA is a management tool that empowers the insurance market to build and launch any insurance product, in any country within unprecedented timescales. We have all types of insurance products being built on the platform by our clients each week globally. INSTANDA can be configured very easily, with the skill set of using Microsoft Excel and Word. This allows our clients to respond to customer needs and optimise experiences in minutes all whilst benefiting from a commercial model completely aligned to the success of policy sales.
INSTANDA is entirely configurable from the ground up – question sets, ratings, documents, contracts and even APIs can all be built by business users. We don’t have a one-size-fits-all model. No templates. No limits. Allowing our clients to work the way they want to.
The platform is hosted in Microsoft Azure, which allows INSTANDA to benefit from global scale at a level of quality and resilience that even the largest corporate data centres cannot match. This allows us to provide customers with a genuinely elastic, web-scale insurance system.
Wow!
INSTANDA was an innovation from F2X group (which is currently the parent company of INSTANDA) and founded by Tim Hardcastle (INSTANDA CEO), and COO Derek Hill (COO) when they were founders at F2X group.
Both Tim and Derek had personal experience of the technology challenges facing insurance companies through their experience at a FTSE250 Insurance company, Addressing the challenges of deploying product innovation to the market at speed whilst also remaining cost effective became the cornerstone for the initial INSTANDA platform. In addition to this, due to Tim and Derek’s significant experience outside of the insurance sector, the platform has also benefited by leveraging operating models outside of insurance in the initial design of the Azure hosting model.
INSTANDA Asia Pacific arose due to the ongoing global growth in the use of the INSTANDA platform. (Jon [INSTANDA Asia Pacific distributor] moved back to Australia after 15 years in the UK working alongside large insurance companies, investment banks and other financial services firms.
We’re glad to have you here in Australia!
INSTANDA has seen a 500% increase in the number of live clients on the INSTANDA platform, from four to twenty eight (UK and international). Even more dramatic is the number of products being transacted by those clients, up 7500% from eight to sixty: a rise driven both by new client wins and by in-account growth. The most prolific INSTANDA client (in the UK) currently has fifteen distinct products hosted on the platform. Operational cost reductions offered by the platform lead to savings of 25% – 50% and are allowing the world’s best-known carriers to move from product concept, to binding online, in a matter of weeks. Also, FTE has tripled since inception with offices in UK, Australia, Canada & US.
Impressive!
The INSTANDA pipeline globally remains strong, despite limited investment in marketing. As an example, INSTANDA has five of the world’s top twenty insurers either on the books or at proposal stage.
We have been recognised in the industry for winning the Insurtech Honours of the year 2017 (Insider Honours) / Excellence in Insurtech 2017 (2017 FINNIE Awards).
Also, INSTANDA recently delivered a new digital broker platform with ease of trading as its key point of focus, within an unprecedented timeframe for Zurich Insurance UK. This project led them to win the E-trading Initiative of the Year (Insurance Times) & Product innovation award in 2017.
Looks like there’s a lot to look forward to!
Being based up in sunny QLD (after all those years in the UK weather!), we recognised that whilst the market in Australia would appear to be centred around Sydney and Melbourne, QLD has a thriving insurtech / start-up community. Given the great success that has been experienced by Insurtech Australia, INSTANDA Asia Pacific are actively participating in establishing and fostering the QLD based insurtech community. This will help to ensure that the great teams working and innovating up here in the sunshine state are able to share some of our sunshine with our poor southern cousins.
We’re excited to work with you in building QLD’s insurtech community!
As a newcomer to the Australian market (whilst backed by significant UK experience) with a significant claim around speed and cost to market, it remains challenging to navigate the procurement process for larger organisations. We are often pitching to organisations who find it hard to accept our claim of brand new products deployed in days / weeks, especially when they have previously invested so heavily, both in terms of time and cost to bring new products to the market. This then leads to the dreaded slow no whereby significant energy is expended with an organisation who may not yet be ready for the change INSTANDA can support. The flexibility of INSTANDA allows our clients to have a fail fast mentality aligned with the dynamic nature of the market – it would be great if that approach could sometimes also be applied to the corporate purchasing process too!
Keep at it!
We believe there will continue to be a place for intermediaries as either complexity of risk or customer service remain key challenges across the insurance value chain. INSTANDA is well placed in this regard whether this is by allowing insurers to rapidly deploy products to their broker network or having MGAs package up specialised / bespoke products to niche markets whilst also ensuring a great end customer experience.
The pace of change in the insurance market is only going to increase as it catches up to and leapfrogs other sectors like banking due to the significant investment being made in insurtech. Operating in an eco-system whereby you are able to innovate alongside changing customer expectations will aid in ensuring the traditional insurance company or intermediary remains relevant in the future.
Thank you!
A few members from the INSTANDA team
Interested in receiving the latest updates from Insurtech Australia? Sign up for our newsletter and join the Insurtech Australia Community Group on LinkedIn.