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EY and Guardtime announce the world’s first blockchain platform for the marine insurance sector. The platform launches in collaboration with Møller- Maersk, MS Amlin, Willis Towers Watson, XL Catlin, ACORD and Microsoft after a 20-week Proof of Concept.
The blockchain platform – built on Microsoft’s Azure global cloud technology – is positioned to deliver significant value to the insurance industry and is planned to be implemented from 2018 onwards. The first of its kind platform’s initial phase rollout will involve deploying the benefits of blockchain for end-to-end use across an entire marine industry.
The blockchain platform connects clients, brokers, insurers and third parties to distributed common ledgers that capture data about identities, risk and exposures and integrates this information with insurance contracts. The platform’s capabilities include the ability to create and maintain asset data from multiple parties; to link data to policy contracts; to receive and act upon information that results in a pricing or a business process change; to connect client assets, transactions and payments; and to capture and validate up-to-date First Notification or Loss data.
Shaun Crawford, EY Global Insurance Leader, says:
“Blockchain’s potential to transform the insurance ecosystem has always been clear. What we have done is to move from potential to reality. Our solution is the first to deliver blockchain’s transparency, security and standardization to marine insurance and is ready for commercial use. We look forward to deploying this technology across the insurance industry and are exploring how these findings will be applied to other specialty insurance markets and wider market initiatives later.”
The blockchain platform is well-suited to the marine insurance providing solutions to a sector with a complex international ecosystem involving multiple parties, long paper chains and duplication, high transaction volumes and significant levels of reconciliation – all potentially preventing transparency, compliance and accurate exposure management. The blockchain platform connects disparate data and processes to address the issues associated with reconciliation and error applicability, and the platform is relevant beyond the marine industry.
Lars Henneberg, A.P. Møller-Maersk A/S Head of Risk and Insurance:
“It is a priority for us to leverage technology to streamline and automate our interaction with the insurance market. Insurance transactions are currently far too tedious and frictional. The distance between risk and capital is simply too far. The blockchain technology has the potential to facilitate the desired development which is long overdue.”
Thanks to this blockchain platform, insurers are now able to optimize their capital through greater transparency and less need for manual data entry or reconciliation, lower administration costs – all contributing to a more efficient insurance industry.
Mike Gault, Guardtime Chief Executive Officer, says:
“The KSI blockchain stack is a proven technology for securing the physical, software and information supply chains that enterprises rely on for the integrity of their businesses. We are thrilled to be partnering with EY to expand the number of real-world customer problems solved with our technology. Guardtime’s technology and EY’s deep domain knowledge represents a formidable combination for customers looking to solve hard problems with blockchain technology.”
Blockchain set to transform the insurance sector
Blockchain enables a secure way of capturing and sharing data among chosen participants in real time with an immutable audit train. This can drive the following benefits: real-time decision- making, error-free data, process fulfillment, central dataset, faster financial transactions, and innovation of new services without cost challenges and auditability of controls. These disruptive technologies set to transform the insurance sector.
