AAIS CEO Ed Kelly opened the April 13 edition of AAIS Pulse newsmagazine with an exciting announcement: AAIS has launched openIDL as a Linux Foundation project. The Linux Foundation is the preeminent nonprofit consortium supporting one-source technologies that drive innovation and transform industries.

In this edition from the AAIS Webinar Series, titled: The Value of Risk Control: Moving Beyond the Basics, Bryon Snethen, Vice President Risk Improvement at EMC Insurance and Jacob Pereira, a Solutions Engineer at Risk Control Technologies identified the purpose and value of risk control to a variety of stakeholders, including agents, insurance companies, policyholders, and society.

During the February 2021 AAIS Pulse newsmagazine, AAIS VP Truman Esmond was joined by Brian Behlendorf, Executive Director of Hyperledger, Brian Hoffman, Vice President State and Bureau Regulatory Affairs, at Travelers, and Arron Lamp, Vice President Enterprise Business Intelligence & Analytics & Operations, at Travelers, to discuss the obstacles and opportunities around leveraging open-source technology.

Accurate risk assessment is key to mitigating exposure and to unlocking underwriting opportunities.

In an AAIS Webinar, FLAMES: The Modern Fire Protection Evaluation Model, AAIS Vice President Phil LeGrone, and AAIS Senior Risk Strategy Lead Matt Hinds-Aldrich, PhD, outlined the new fire model, FLAMES, and the advantages it offers over traditional models for underwriters assessing and managing non-cat fire risk.

For more than a year, COVID-19 has impacted the lives of millions, leaving a path of destruction in its wake. With more than 25 million cases in the US, nearly half a million dead, countless businesses closed and millions of people jobless without financial security, no one has been left unscathed. It has also raised significant issues for the insurance industry, particularly spurred by Business Interruption-related questions and litigation.

In August of 2020, the NAIC adopted five guiding principles for artificial intelligence (AI), based on the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s AI Principles which have been adopted by 42 countries across the globe. These five principles include: Fair and Ethical Accountability, Compliance, transparency, security, safety, and robustness of outputs.

In August 2020, AAIS introduced its new Risk Awareness Service (RAS), a digital resource center tracking catastrophic risk and providing risk information in real time. At the inaugural AAIS Pulse Newsmagazine, AAIS VP Data and Actuarial Services Phil LeGrone described the Risk Awareness Service, its goals, and the value it can provide insurance carriers and the customers they serve. He also welcomed Jeff Waters, a Senior Product Manager at Risk Management Solutions (RMS), the leading modeling firms, to add his perspective on emerging modeling approaches and tools.

In a special edition of the AAIS Webinar Series, CONVR VP Sales and Marketing Phil Alampi presented on the topic of "Artificial Intelligence: Creating Super Underwriters." Mr. Alampi discussed the growing impacts COVID-19 has had on insurers. With more than 75% of carriers seeing increases in business interruption claims, the demand for coverage is expectedly surging. This growing challenge has a positive side, however, for the impacts of COVID-19 have expedited the need for the industry to improve its ability to crunch data better and more efficiently.

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by Carrier Management Magazine on August 19, 2019.

I started my career as the first network administrator at the University of California, Davis. Part of my job was to help build the Bay Area Regional Research network, one of 10 National Science Foundation networks that, in 1986, became what we call the Internet today.