Insurance in theAsia-Pacific region faces its own set of business challenges, andinsurance technology has evolved along a distinctive path. In a newreport, Model Insurer Asia 2011: Case Studies of EffectiveTechnology Use in Insurance, Celent recognizes 18 insurancetechnology initiatives as model insurer components.

These bestpractices in the use of technology span key areas of the productand policyholder lifecycle, including product definition,distribution, underwriting, policy administration, service, claims,and infrastructure. The report also reviews IT best practices andmeasurable business results used in evaluating the model insurercomponents.

"Effective use oftechnology is more important than pursuit of technology for its ownsake," says Wenli Yuan, senior analyst with Celent's Asianfinancial services group and author of the report. "This is thecommon thread among every selected model insurer component, and thedecision each insurer should be proud of."

Inthis report, Celent offers some key best practices in the use oftechnology across various areas of the industry—whether incomponents of the product and policyholder lifecycle or generalareas such as IT infrastructure and management—that a "modelinsurer" would use. These areas are illustrated by case studies ofspecific initiatives and capabilities, selected from the manysubmissions and presented in this report as model insurercomponents.

Model Insurer AsiaComponents2011     

• Apollo Munich Health Insurance:Implementing a workflow-enabled system that supportsstraight-through processing of the whole health product lifecyclewith integration to all back endsystems.  
• Aviva-COFCO Life Insurance:Implementing cloud computing technology to reduce cost and improveflexibility.  
• AXA China Region Insurance:Implementing a Web-based technology solution to enhance salesservices and distribution capability and speed up productrollout.   
• China Pacific Insurance (Group):Implementing a centralized call center system across China tosupport life and P&C businessneeds.       
• China Pacific Life Insurance:Rationalizing, standardizing, and integrating systems to enable acentralized, stable, reliable, and efficient technicalplatform.     
• ClearView Wealth: Implementing aWeb-based technology solution to enable the direct maildistribution channel, via call center follow-up, to underwrite andissue policies without the need for external or manualintervention.       
• Generali China Life Insurance:Implementing an integrated technology platform with a singlesign-on to multiplesystems.     
• ICICI Prudential Life Insurance:Introducing a Web-based system to process selected classes ofhealth claims.  
• IndiaFirst Life Insurance: Investingin simple, cost-efficient, scalable, and proven IT systems toreduce costs and improve time tomarket.    
• Insurance House Group: Implementingan all-in-one solution for the online direct and intermediatedmarkets inAustralia.      
• Nextia Life Insurance Co., Ltd.:Implementing a real-time Web-based policy application systemincluding automatic underwriting and paymentprocessing. 
• PICC Health Insurance: Implementinga social medical insurance connection platform to enhance automatedclaim processing and improve claim riskmanagement.    
• Real Insurance: Implementing socialmedia as a channel to build relationships with customers and usethe results of this interaction to drive newstrategies.  
• Reliance General Insurance:Implementing a motor insurance pre-inspection system using mobiletechnology linked to in-house systems, streamlining theunderwriting of newbusiness.   
• Royal Sundaram Alliance Insurance:Implementing a workflow-enabled policy administration system withexternalized engines to support product configuration and businessrules. 
• Transport Accident Commission:Transforming the claims management process to a new recovery modelwith primary goals to improve return to work rates and durations,better manage common law claims, and improve clientsatisfaction.       
• Wesfarmers General Insurance:Implementing a multiproduct, multichannel model servicing theentire policylifecycle.   
• Five insurersinitiated a project for compulsory automobile liability insuranceto improve service efficiency. They included Tokio Marine &Nichido Fire Insurance; Sompo Japan Insurance; Mitsui SumitomoInsurance; Aioi Nissay Dowa Insurance; and Nipponkoa InsuranceCompany  

 "This year marks the first time Celent has applied ourglobally recognized Model Insurer methodology to honor technologyinitiatives in Asia," said Neil Katkov, senior vice president, Asiafor Celent. "We received a broad range of submissions, so we areconfident the winning initiatives represent the state-of-the-art ininsurance technology in the region."

Nominations formodel insurer components were accepted beginning in June 2010, andthe Celent insurance team selected the 18 winning initiatives basedon the business benefits provided. Each model insurer component isdescribed in a brief write-up within the report, including detaileddescriptions of business drivers, technology environments, andquantitative success metrics.