When faced with large-scale events such as Hurricane Irene or Windstorm Klaus, it’s imperative to know the accumulated risk exposure that an insurer has in an affected area, from both a customer service perspective and a good business management angle.

In a new report, Location Intelligence Solutions for Insurance: A Solution Spectrum, Celent provides an overview of the components in a GIS capability map and profiles seven vendors that sell core location intelligence solutions. Vendors have been included only if they have at least one client in insurance.

Location intelligence or GIS solutions can support the insurer at various parts of the insurance process. The solution can support the allocation of adjusters or field staff post large-scale event. Alternatitvely, the soluton provides support in the underwriting process. Depending on the appetite for new risk given the aggregate risk for the area, the underwriter can then decide to proceed or not. Making this decision without the support of spatial data would be nigh on impossible.

“Several large insurers have already made some investment in this area of location intelligence,” says Catherine Stagg-Macey, Senior Vice President with Celent’s Insurance Group and author of the report. “We expect to see them extending this solution into new areas of the business process.”

She goes on to note that the GIS vendor offerings for the insurance sector continue to improve, and with some vendors offering Saas delivery models, insurers new to this space will be able to test and trial the benefits without significant capital investment.

This 36-page report contains 2 figures and 22 tables.