Technology
Data integrations with hx
‘Data is king,’ ‘data is the new oil’, ‘data-driven decision making,’ ‘the Information Age’. Cliched, maybe, but also true — especially for insurers. From the dawn of modern insurance in smoky 17th century coffee-houses, the distinction between winners and losers has often been how much you know, and how well you leverage that knowledge.
The more sources you draw from, the better the quality of your data, the stronger your pricing becomes — and that’s where you carve out that all-important competitive edge. Your decision-making engine needs to be underpinned by everything from neatly organized, conventional data sets to the more elusive treasures hidden within scattered PDFs, unstructured third-party inputs, internal analytics, and beyond.
There’s just one thing; you need the right platform and the integrations to make that possible.
Data integrations with the hx platform
Before delving into some of our most popular data sources, it’s important to examine how the hx platform enables insurers to integrate seamlessly, and the impact that has on pricing workflows.
Flexible APIs
For many insurers, integrating disparate data sources comes with a heavy technical (or, all too often, painfully manual) overhead. Through leveraging the hx platform’s API-powered data ingestion, insurers can benefit from the greatest diversity and depth of data — in far less time than it takes to copy and paste from one spreadsheet to another!
Unruly data
Even where data is not available via API, the hx platform enables ingestion of data from weird-and-wonderful data sources using open-source flexibility and power — whether it’s scraping websites, ingestion of files from your network or links to databases, you can bring the data to the underwriter at the point when they need it.
Insights throughout the pricing workflow
The hx platform isn’t just about connecting data sources; it’s about surfacing insight where it’s impactful throughout the entire pricing workflow.
Insurers (and underwriters) benefit from the right insight, surfaced at exactly the right moment — whether that’s at the point of pricing, or displayed live on a reporting dashboard.
Eliminating rekeying
The average underwriter spends more than half of their working week simply inputting data into systems. By automating data ingestion and integration, the hx platform significantly reduces the need for manual data entry.
Ultimately, this allows for greater focus on value-added work, while minimizing or eliminating potentially costly errors.
Which data sources could transform your pricing?
Read on for just a small handful of the sources other insurers are using to inform their decision-making.
Integrations to enhance underwriter insight
The first frame through which to view the data integrations available with the hx platform is data for rating. From weather reports to showing the Google StreetView of a commercial property, there are endless ways to bring rich, varied data into the pricing workflow. Popular integrations that are ready out-of-the-box with the hx platform include:
S&P Global Geopolitical Risk — Political Violence Insight
S&P Global Geopolitical Risk service (formerly IHS Markit) provides live feeds on political violence, offering current disturbance data sources & trusted risk scores that are crucial for real-time insurance rating.
This dynamic data helps insurers assess risks associated with political unrest and violence, to enable risk selection and then adjusting their premium and coverage terms accordingly.
The Companies House API lets you retrieve real-time information about limited companies (and other companies that fall within the Companies Act 2006). This source is invaluable for verifying corporate data, ownership details, and financial statements, facilitating a more informed underwriting process.
For UK Liability lines of business looking for a place to start, this is a well-documented free data source.
And more...
Integrations that improve underwriter efficiency
Another key frame through which to view data integrations with the hx platform is efficiency. If you can add high quality data and insight and also speed up your time-to-quote, you can make better decisions and provide better customer service to your brokers.
When one single data point can lead to a wide range of information which may either be used directly in pricing and underwriter judgement, to validate the data provided by the broker or just to be stored for future assessment —
Marine traffic
Access critical data on marine traffic through International Maritime Organization (IMO) numbers. A single IMO number can unlock up to ten different data points, significantly enhancing the efficiency of data collection and analysis for marine insurance.
Two examples of rich property data and scoring data to help you fill out additional risk factors and bring proprietary scoring into your property models. In addition to address cleansing and type-ahead support to improve data quality, one input can provide rich location level details such as distance to water, construction type, fire scoring and more can provide additional insight with minimal additional underwriter overhead.
Integrations that join up your internal ecosystem
Insurance companies are already sitting on a huge set of data sources: from policy administration systems to business planning. It’s typically been a huge overhead to unlock these insights for use by underwriting teams. By using open-source technologies, the hx platform can read from any data source and surface this to users at the point of decision making.
(You don’t need to select from only the data sources above; you don’t even need to work with hyperexponential to add a new data source. With the hx platform, you own your data ecosystem and it’s easy to add something new. Already use a data source in your legacy set-up? Want to introduce a source to inform pricing for a new risk, or add depth to a pre-existing workflow? Effortless API connections mean you can take your pick, and build out those connections with minimal overhead.)
To put that flexibility into context, we are yet to find a data source that insurers cannot connect to via the hx platform.
This is key to carving out your competitive advantage in the market, leveraging your rich internal knowledge to inform a completely bespoke network of datapoints for decision making.
Integrations that enhance collaboration
The hx platform facilitates seamless integration with communication platforms such as Slack, Microsoft Teams, and email systems. Using APIs, insurers can automate notifications, share insights, and collaborate effectively across teams, ensuring that everyone is aligned and informed in real-time.
For example, an underwriter may require feedback on a risk. With just a click, it’s automatically sent to the necessary Teams account, where it can be approved, declined, or further examined. This tightens the workflow significantly.
Integrations on the road to Net Zero
ESG is a hotter topic than ever, which is great news for the planet — and, potentially, for insurers themselves. In a recent KPMG International survey of insurance CEOs, 44 percent said that ESG programs improve their financial performance, up from 40 percent one year ago.
Carbon Emissions Management
The hx platform aids insurers in managing their portfolios from a carbon emissions perspective, offering insights that help in aligning with global efforts to combat climate change. By scoring your individual risks at the point of pricing, you can manage your carbon emissions the same way you manage your CAT and exposure — only selecting risks where they align with your strategic goals.
Integrations for external model insight
External modelling tools enable insurers to assess risks, simulate potential outcomes, and make informed decisions about underwriting, pricing, and portfolio management. One of the leading uses is catastrophe (CAT) models, more relevant than amidst increasing occurrences of extreme weather and other natural disasters.
Catastrophe (CAT) Models
Natural catastrophes are only becoming more frequent, more intense, and even more unpredictable. For insurers, that means the ability to understand and quantify the potential impact of events is more vital than ever before.
The hx platform integrates with leading CAT models, including:
Moody’s RMS catastrophe modelling
As a premier provider of catastrophe risk models, Moody’s RMS delivers comprehensive and sophisticated analyses that empower insurers, financial institutions, and property stakeholders. Their models cover a broad spectrum of perils, from earthquakes and hurricanes to pandemics and cyber attacks, providing in-depth insights into potential risks.
Touchstone’s catastrophe modeling software aims to help (re)insurers “understand their estimated exposure to loss from extreme events today — and in the future.”
These tools provide insurers with advanced simulations and risk assessments for natural disasters, cyber threats, and other catastrophic events, enabling more accurate pricing and risk management.
Cyber CAT
An emerging aspect of CAT for many insurers is cyber risk. Data to evaluate the potential exposure of businesses and individuals to cyber threats, such as data breaches, hacking, and cyber-attacks enables insurers to price risk accurately in this new and rapidly developing area of insurance.
Specifically designed for cyber risk assessment, CyberCube offers detailed insights into potential cyber threats and their impact on insured entities, enabling ‘informed cyber underwriting decisions with an unrivalled ecosystem of data and signals.’
Integrations for future insight
The hx platform captures every data point, insight, and decision in an iterative feedback loop, so decision quality compounds over time — whether you’re assessing and pricing your next submission, recalibrating your rating tools, or adjusting your portfolio strategy.
This means you can capture data you don’t think you need today, associate it with your exposures and evaluate its value over a longer time frame. Quick integration time and ease of model maintenance makes this a light-touch yet deeply impactful exercise.
Ready to build your data ecosystem?
Top global carriers trust hx for underwriting decisions across $75bn+ in annual commercial P&C premium — including Aviva, Antares, and Conduit Re. Carve out your competitive edge with a rich, effortless and flexible ecosystem of data sources.
Book a discussion on how the hx platform could address what’s holding you back, create new opportunities, and deliver better underwriting outcomes.
