Prima Solutions, an insurance software solution provider, andACORD, the nonprofit insurance standards organization, announcedthat Prima is contributing its insurance information model toACORD.

ACORD accepts intellectual property contributions from membercompanies on behalf of the industry and integrates them through thestandards development process to enhance and expand ACORDstandards. Prima's contribution will provide a jump start toACORD's information model effort.

Prima's information model is the result of years of research anddevelopment from their insurance and object technology specialists.The information model is part of Prima Solutions' InsuranceBusiness Component Suite (Prima IBCS) and represents anenterprise-wide data semantic of insurance information.

Gregory A. Maciag, president & CEO, ACORD, states, "Thiscontribution will accelerate the development of the ACORDInformation Model, which is a major facet of the ACORD StandardsFramework. The information model represents standards data from allaspects of the insurance industry including property, casualty,surety, life, annuities, health, reinsurance, and large commercial.Prima's contribution to this development is enormouslyvaluable."

Through this contribution, ACORD will develop its framework andthe Prima information model will enable ACORD to reach its goal ofmore consistent and traceable standards throughout the developmentprocess, across all business lines and all geographicboundaries.

"Prima believes that both technology and industry-specificstandards are essential if clients are to solve their collaborationand integration problems and accelerate their businessstrategies--whether they are to run, grow or transform theirbusinesses," says Hugues Delannoy, president and CEO of Prima. "Aspowered in part by our contribution, the development of new andenhanced open standards by ACORD provides game-changingopportunities for the insurance industry."

Prima will work closely with ACORD and its various committees tointegrate the reference model content into the existing ACORDstandards. ACORD will issue implementation guides and other toolsto assist the insurance industry in the adoption, expansion andcustomization of the information model.