Markets/Coverages: Beazley, Paragon Partner on Weather Guard; Praedicat, Experian Collaborate on D&O Models; Armadillo Expands With 100 Agencies

Beazley to enter distribution partnership with Paragon for Weather Guard

Specialty insurer Beazley announced a new, efficient and effective online portal solution for its leading Weather Guard product.

The new robust online portal, created in partnership with Paragon, will provide faster service, with no change to the actual quality of cover, limits or specific weather perils. Weather Guard will continue to be written on Beazley’s admitted paper and Weather Guard claims will still be handled by our award-winning claims team.

Andrew Duxbury, head of contingency at Beazley said the new online portal “will ensure that more brokers are able to easily access Weather Guard using high-quality, cutting-edge technology for speedy, frictionless turnaround times. I’m looking forward to working with Paragon as we continue to build Weather Guard together.”

“WeatherGuard, a product I’ve underwritten for 9 years, plays an important role in protecting North American businesses from weather related losses and Paragon is excited to be helping bring it to an ever-wider audience, via state-of-the-art digital distribution tools,” added Christian Phillips, president of contingency practices at Paragon.

Praedicat and Experian Announce Collaboration on New D&O Models and Insights

Praedicat said it has teamed up with Experian to create CoMeta Pro, a company and portfolio analysis tool for underwriters of Directors & Officers (D&O) insurance cover for U.S. publicly traded companies. CoMeta Pro combines Experian’s data and risk scoring methodologies with Praedicat’s emerging risk and portfolio modeling capabilities to deliver a unique forward-looking solution to the D&O market.

CoMeta Pro integrates into the dashboard of Praedicat’s emerging risk and underwriting software CoMeta, and intuitively presents two simple scores. One reflects Praedicat’s assessment of the potential insured’s exposure
to emerging litigation risk, and the other was developed by Experian’s DataLabs reflecting the company’s expansive firmographic data in the form of Experian’s Predictive D&O Model. Together they parse vast
quantities of data to give underwriters an immediate headline view of the holistic D&O risk of each of roughly 5,000 listed US companies.

Also, between Praedicat’s systemic risk models and Experian’s Entity Recognition Technology, CoMeta Pro’s systemic risk modeling lets users assess systemic risk across portfolios quickly and identify D&O-General Liability clash risk arising from mass litigation events. Users can drill down behind the headline scores to understand each of the individual factors which impact the target company’s litigation risk in detail, alongside the “reason codes” which drive Experian’s risk scores. That granularity makes CoMeta Pro a powerful defensive underwriting tool in a claims environment driven by social inflation, rising concerns about environmental disclosures, and expanding mass tort litigation.

Armadillo Home Solutions Partners with 100th Insurance Agency

Armadillo, a technology-based home services company providing subscription plans that cover the cost and coordination of repairs and replacements for breakdowns of major home systems and appliances, announced they have expanded coverage to partner with 100 independent insurance agencies nationwide.

“Insurance is a natural fit for our product. Our tech-forward solution gives insurance partners ranging from local agencies to large digital brokerages a tool to support their homeowner clients and build out their real estate offering,” said Liv Coffman, Armadillo VP of insurance and partnerships. “Paired with home insurance, our warranty solution covers systems and appliances to ensure that clients have minimal gaps in coverage.”

Historically, home insurance and home warranty have not partnered due to the lack of transparency in traditional warranty products. Armadillo was founded in 2021 by insurance executives Matan Slagter and Lansdon Robbins to provide an innovative solution with robust coverage that insurance agents could stand behind.

“We are the first home warranty company to design our product from the ground up to fit insurance agents and their clients’ needs,” said Matan Slagter, Armadillo CEO. “We’ve found an exciting high-growth niche among innovative insurance partners – particularly in the insurtech space – looking to build a new revenue stream and provide a valuable modern coverage solution to their clients.”

Topics Agencies