This publish is a part of a collection sponsored by AgentSync.
Having your head “within the clouds” may not be fascinating, however storing your information “within the cloud” actually has its advantages. As extra individuals and firms transfer to cloud storage for his or her private {and professional} information, the gold normal is cloud-native software program that’s constructed with flexibility and safety in thoughts. Learn on to be taught the fundamentals of cloud-native software program and its rising reputation throughout the insurance coverage trade.
What’s cloud-native software program?
iCloud, Google Cloud, Dropbox, simply to call a number of: We’re all accustomed to cloud storage in our day by day lives, if for no different motive than it’s the place our images and music dwell so we will entry them from our telephones, tablets, and computer systems with out carrying round a tough drive.
However what does it imply for a software program to really be “cloud-native?” Identical to it sounds, cloud-native refers to a software program software that was constructed particularly to perform in a cloud (distributed and web-based) surroundings, reasonably than dwelling on a bodily drive or server.
Versus older functions that developed to include cloud parts, cloud-native software program originates in its cloud-based type. For instance, you’ll be able to’t obtain a model of “QuickBooks On-line” to your pc regardless of how a lot you wish to, as a result of it solely exists within the cloud. Typically, tech merchandise which might be offered as Software program-as-a-Service (SaaS) – and require an ongoing subscription reasonably than a one-time buy – are cloud-native. AgentSync is not any exception.
Certainly one of cloud-native software program’s defining components is its potential to be deployed rapidly, and obtain ongoing updates and enhancements that may be launched in real-time, with out requiring down-time or negatively impacting the software program’s different features.
Key options of cloud-native software program embrace:
Microservices structure: You may consider cloud-native software program as a set of “microservices” or “microapplications.” Google Cloud defines this as “particular person, loosely coupled parts” that means that as an alternative of 1 giant program, the best way we used to think about a bit of software program, cloud-native software program is constructed by plenty of individually functioning components that type the entire.
Containerization: Due to this microservices structure, cloud-native software program can profit from its builders’ potential to work on small items at a time, upgrading or fixing particular features, with out impacting the software program as an entire. This is called containerization.
Steady integration: On account of the way it’s constructed, cloud-native software program can accommodate ongoing enhancements, bug fixes, and new integrations that aren’t doable with legacy applied sciences. It’s the distinction between having to take your automobile into the store for a brand new tire and having the ability to patch a fast gap whereas on the run. The latter, like cloud-native infrastructure, causes much less disruption and little or no downtime in comparison with needing to close down a complete system to carry out upgrades or fixes.
API-first method: Since cloud-native software program is inherently constructed on a basis of microservices that combine, utilizing APIs to attach one software program to a different is a given.
Safety and compliance: The most important cloud computing suppliers, who deliver alongside top-of-the-line information safety and compliance practices, energy most cloud-native software program. Large names like Amazon Internet Providers (AWS), Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure provide their enterprise prospects assurance that the info they host for various cloud-native functions is protected and safe. For a lot of insurance coverage companies, the peace of thoughts that an organization as strong as Amazon is dealing with their information safety is extra comforting than the thought of being liable for it in-house.
The rise of cloud-native functions in insurance coverage
As increasingly software program strikes to cloud-based infrastructure, so does the know-how that powers the insurance coverage trade. Despite the fact that cloud-native insurance coverage software program has been available for the reason that early 2000s, insurance coverage companies haven’t all been fast to retire their legacy techniques and undertake cloud-native infrastructure.
This appears to be altering, and altering extra quickly, as we method the primary quarter-century mark. In response to a 2022 report by McKinsey & Firm, insurers mission a 32 % annual progress of their use of cloud companies by 2025. With numerous room for progress in its total use of cloud companies, the insurance coverage trade can be close to the highest of the checklist of industries that may reap the best financial rewards.
Examples of cloud-native software program in insurance coverage
Almost each, if not each, kind of services or products an insurance coverage enterprise makes use of day by day will be discovered as a cloud-native software. That doesn’t imply most insurance coverage carriers, companies, or MGAs have adopted cloud-native variations of their day-to-day software program, however the selection to take action exists over a big portion of the integral insurance coverage features.
Among the commonest examples of cloud-native software program in insurance coverage embrace:
- Company administration techniques
- Claims administration techniques
- Coverage administration techniques
- Comparative ranking software program
- Buyer relationship administration techniques
- E-mail advertising platforms
- Insurance coverage compliance administration techniques
Advantages of cloud-native software program for insurance coverage professionals and companies
Probably the most important advantages of cloud-native insurance coverage know-how is its potential to combine with different functions by way of APIs, thus enabling firms to automate once-manual duties and processes.
Different advantages that insurance coverage companies and the professionals working at them get pleasure from embrace:
Scalability: Cloud-native software program can assist one, 100, or 1 million customers (assuming it’s constructed on stable infrastructure). This permits firms that spend money on cloud-native know-how merchandise to broaden and contract rapidly, with out interruption to their day by day operations. There’s no ready on buying a brand new software program license or putting in the product. It’s often so simple as the admin consumer inviting somebody to affix an present platform.
Or, then again, deactivating a consumer instantaneously, when wanted. That is notably relevant within the insurance coverage trade, the place firms have seasonal fluctuations and must rapidly onboard new producers or adjusters to fulfill their calls for.
Flexibility: One of many greatest benefits of cloud-native software program for insurance coverage professionals and their employers is the flexibleness it provides individuals to work from wherever. An insurance coverage agent or claims adjuster can theoretically log into the system they use to carry out their work from wherever with web entry. The identical can’t be stated for legacy techniques that require a consumer to be linked to a hard-wired community or pull information from an on-premises server.
Enhanced buyer expertise: This profit bleeds over into one for insurance coverage customers too, nevertheless it most positively advantages insurance coverage companies and professionals once they can present a greater buyer expertise. Only one approach cloud-native software program can do that is by being extra dependable for individuals whose job it’s to interface with prospects. An insurance coverage customer support consultant or licensed agent gained’t lose entry to a buyer’s coverage data due to a neighborhood energy outage or server crash.
Cloud-native software program is constructed with redundancy in thoughts, and with sources unfold out over many factors to permit for a level of operational malfunction with out inflicting a significant snafu. Attempt that with a legacy system that depends completely on the ability and web working in a single particular constructing always.
Diminished prices and useful resource use: What seems like a greater use of an insurance coverage group’s cash: paying for a number of workers members to take care of legacy know-how and on-prem servers, or paying the identical variety of workers to promote insurance policies and repair prospects? The reply needs to be apparent. Shifting to cloud-native insurtech can liberate workers’s time and the corporate’s cash to spend money on issues that’ll actually transfer the needle on income and buyer satisfaction – not simply assist preserve the established order.
Innovation and aggressive benefit: With most new tech improvements taking place on this planet of cloud-native software program, insurance coverage organizations which might be outfitted to embrace cloud know-how might be finest positioned to make the most of new developments. Innovation can snowball as an organization that’s already carried out a main cloud-based know-how can extra simply undertake others as they turn into out there (to not point out, they will combine the brand new ones into the present ones for even better effectivity features). Past the flexibility to leverage new know-how because it comes out, these companies will even achieve a aggressive benefit within the battle for youthful insurance coverage expertise by offering a tech-forward worker expertise.
Advantages of cloud-native software program for insurance coverage customers
Insurance coverage companies aren’t the one ones benefiting from cloud-native know-how. Customers (and that’s actually each one in all us!) get to reap the advantages, too. From higher customer support, faster claims processing, and the flexibility to get immediate insurance coverage quotes from a number of insurers, all of us see the benefits of fashionable cloud-based software program in our on a regular basis insurance coverage interactions.
Challenges of cloud-native insurance coverage know-how
No innovation is with out its challenges and potential downsides. For cloud-native software program, many of those aren’t inherent flaws within the know-how itself. Quite, the challenges come largely from organizational and cultural preferences that permeate such a longstanding trade.
Legacy system alternative or integration: It may be no small problem for a company to revamp the best way it does issues. Shifting from legacy know-how to cloud-native insurance coverage infrastructure will be time-consuming, pricey, and embrace numerous complications. And, if a company doesn’t transfer all of its techniques to cloud-native software program, it’s left with the problem of integrating the brand new ones into the outdated (which weren’t constructed with seamless integration in thoughts).
Adoption and buy-in: Folks don’t all the time love change, even when the end result guarantees to be an enormous enchancment. It may be laborious on a company, particularly one within the insurance coverage trade that’s been round for over 100 years, to make an enormous technological leap ahead. If management’s buy-in isn’t the problem, it may nonetheless be a hurdle to get customers to undertake a brand new approach of doing issues.
Ability gaps and coaching wants: For the perfect adoption charges, and the perfect return on funding, it’s important that insurance coverage companies shifting in direction of cloud-native software program present the assist their customers might want to reap the advantages of the brand new know-how.
Preliminary prices: Despite the fact that cloud-native software program will be extraordinarily cost-saving in the long term, there’s all the time a value to buy and implement it. Sensible insurance coverage companies will weigh the long-term prices and advantages and often see that the preliminary price might be recouped many instances over. However for some firms, the worth of shifting in direction of a totally cloud-based tech stack simply appears too excessive to beat.
Safety and compliance: You thought this was a profit, proper? It’s, nevertheless it may also be a problem. Not all cloud-native applied sciences are created equal. Some prioritize safety and compliance and a few…not a lot. Fortunately, there’re trade requirements that rapidly inform you if a software program firm goes to take safety considerations off your plate, or add to them. Learn extra in regards to the SOC II and why it’s necessary.
Regardless of these challenges, the long run is completely going to be extra cloud-native than not. Organizations that make the transfer in direction of a cloud-native tech stack will begin getting the advantages sooner and be extra ready to innovate when the chance arises.
Go cloud-native together with your insurance coverage compliance
When you’re considering that these advantages, like scalability, flexibility, safety, and consumer expertise could be nice additions to your license compliance administration processes, we’ve received nice information! AgentSync is a cloud-native answer that makes managing your complete compliance lifecycle for producers, brokers, broker-dealers, and adjusters fast and straightforward.
Contact us right this moment to learn the way AgentSync may help your group, or examine how we’ve already helped insurance coverage carriers, companies, and MGAs remodel their compliance practices.