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Bringing together the best technology and innovation for insurance and risk management together from around the world. Podcast hosted by Matthew Grant.
Episodes
4 days ago
4 days ago
In this episode, Robin Merttens speaks with Sasha Haco, CEO and Co-founder of Unitary, about how AI is being applied in practical, high-impact ways across insurance operations.
Sasha’s route into the industry is far from typical. With a background in astrophysics and no prior experience in insurance, she set out to build something tangible using AI, focusing on real-world problems rather than theoretical ones.
What began as a mission to make the internet safer has evolved into a fast-growing platform that automates some of the most manual and time-consuming processes in insurance. From bordereaux handling to claims and policy administration, the focus is on removing repetitive work without requiring insurers to overhaul their existing systems.
Drawing on her experience building Unitary from the ground up, Sasha shares a clear and practical perspective on where AI is delivering value today, how insurers can get started quickly and what it takes to stand out in an increasingly competitive market.
At the heart of the discussion is a simple idea: meaningful progress often starts with tackling the most overlooked and operationally painful tasks.
In this conversation, Sasha shares:
- Why coming from outside insurance can unlock new ways of solving entrenched problems
- How virtual agents can replicate human workflows across legacy systems without integration
- Where insurers are seeing the fastest returns from automation today
- Why speed to ROI is becoming a defining factor in AI adoption
- How trust and customer outcomes are emerging as key competitive advantages
- What it takes to build and scale in a crowded AI landscape
- Why the biggest barrier to automation is often mindset, not technology
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Robin Merttens on LinkedIn.
Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning.
Sunday Mar 29, 2026
Sunday Mar 29, 2026
In this episode, Matthew Grant and Robin Merttens hit the 400-episode mark and ask a slightly uncomfortable question: after all these conversations, are we still human or just very convincing AI?
What follows is a sharp, unscripted reflection on how the industry has evolved from early insurtech scepticism to today’s surge of enthusiasm around generative AI. But beneath the milestone moment is a more interesting story, how insurance has shifted from resisting technology to almost over-embracing it, and what happens next when the tools are no longer the problem.
Drawing on years at the centre of the market’s innovation community, Matthew and Robin explore the move from experimentation to execution, why “grown-up AI” is now the real challenge and where genuine commercial value is starting to emerge.
In this conversation, Matthew and Robin share:
- Why the industry has gone from fighting technology to actively chasing it
- What “grown-up AI” really means and why governance and orchestration now matter more than new tools
- How underwriters and brokers are finally seeing immediate value from AI in their day-to-day work
- The risk of being overwhelmed by point solutions and what happens without a coherent strategy
- The two very different playbooks for building AI businesses and which one is gaining traction
- Why revenue is arriving faster for startups and how that is reshaping investment dynamics
- What is fuelling the current boom in MGAs and why now feels like a defining moment
- The contrasting rise of younger founders and experienced operators launching their own ventures
- Why much of the market is still writing familiar risks and what that says about true innovation
- Whether insurers are losing their appetite for harder, more unusual risks
- How community, curiosity and shared learning continue to underpin real progress in insurance
- And why, despite everything, face-to-face conversations still matter more than ever
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant or Robin Merttens on LinkedIn.
Sunday Mar 22, 2026
Sunday Mar 22, 2026
In this episode, Robin Merttens is joined by Martha Dreiling, Co-founder and President of Reserv, to explore how AI is actually transforming claims, and why the biggest breakthroughs are happening in places most people overlook.
With a background spanning FinTech, InsurTech and risk analytics, Martha brings a practical perspective on how data and technology can improve decision-making, not just automate existing processes. At Reserv, she’s helping build a claims model that combines operational efficiency with quality, while challenging long-standing assumptions about how claims should be handled and paid for.
In this conversation, Martha shares:
- Why the most valuable AI in claims is “boring but brilliant”, not flashy
- How continuous monitoring is quietly improving claims outcomes at scale
- Why efficiency alone is no longer enough, and what it takes to deliver quality alongside it
- How claims data is becoming a critical input into underwriting and pricing decisions
- The challenge of legacy systems and why data fragmentation still holds the industry back
- What real AI adoption looks like, and why execution is starting to outpace strategy
- How AI is exposing misaligned incentives in traditional time-and-expense TPA models
- Why insurers need to rethink how they pay for claims services in an AI-driven world
- The shift from technology transformation to human and workflow transformation
- How reducing administrative burden can refocus claims handlers on empathy and judgement
- Why better claims operations ultimately matter for affordability and customer outcomes
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Robin Merttens on LinkedIn.
Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning.
Sunday Mar 15, 2026
Sunday Mar 15, 2026
In this episode, Matthew Grant is joined by Richard Louden, Partner (Indirect Tax Financial Services) at KPMG, and Candy Staples, Director (Innovation Reliefs and Incentives), to explore a topic that many insurance and InsurTech businesses underestimate until it becomes expensive: tax.
While tax is often viewed as a back-office concern for finance teams, it can have a significant strategic impact on how insurance businesses operate, scale and ultimately exit. From the complexities of VAT and Insurance Premium Tax (IPT) to the opportunities created by R&D tax incentives and the Patent Box regime, the conversation highlights both the risks of getting tax wrong and the upside of approaching it proactively.
Richard brings more than two decades of experience advising insurers and intermediaries on indirect tax. He explains why VAT behaves differently in insurance compared with most industries, and why misunderstandings around exemptions, commissions and international services regularly create costly problems for growing businesses.
Candy focuses on the more positive side of the equation: how innovation incentives can help companies recover the cost of developing new technology. For InsurTech firms investing heavily in product development, these incentives can represent a meaningful source of funding and cash flow if captured correctly.
At the heart of the discussion is a simple message: tax is not just about compliance. Managed properly, it can influence profitability, operational efficiency and investment decisions across the insurance value chain.
In this conversation, Richard and Candy share:
- Why VAT behaves differently in insurance and why exempt supplies can quietly increase operating costs
- The common misconception that commission structures automatically determine VAT treatment
- How the reverse charge mechanism on overseas services often creates unexpected liabilities
- Why start-ups have a strategic advantage when designing tax processes from day one
- How R&D tax credits can return meaningful cash to companies investing in innovation
- Why capturing technical challenges and development work early is critical for successful claims
- How the Patent Box regime can reduce corporation tax on profits linked to patented technology
- Why tax incentives should be considered alongside broader decisions about where companies locate teams, IP and development hubs
KPMG are also hosting post-ITI drinks in London with Insurtech UK to navigate the headwinds of today's economic and regulatory challenges facing insurers and insurtechs alike over cocktails, food and conversation. Click here to register your interest: https://insurtechuk.org/events/0319-one-last-stop-from-headwinds-to-happy-hour/
Additionally KPMG Actuarial have released a white paper on Smarter Pricing, Smarter Insurance. How integrated data, AI and governance transform underwriting and growth. Download to read here: https://m.marketing.kpmg.uk/webApp/Smarter_pricing_Smarter_insurance_whitepaper
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn.
Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning.
Sunday Mar 08, 2026
Sunday Mar 08, 2026
In this episode, Robin Merttens moderates a panel with Tessa Wardle of QBE, Emily Stanford of Gallagher and Jonathan Spry of Envelop Risk, recorded live at the InsTech London event Some lead, others follow: Smart underwriting and broking strategies for 2026.
As algorithmic underwriting and portfolio solutions reshape the London Market, insurers, brokers and reinsurers are rethinking how risk is placed, followed and managed at scale. Facilities are multiplying, digital trading models are emerging and data is becoming the foundation of increasingly automated underwriting decisions.
Drawing on perspectives from underwriting, broking and reinsurance, the panel explores what portfolio underwriting really looks like in practice today. They discuss how facilities are evolving, why broker strategies are changing and what it takes to run sustainable portfolio capacity in a market that is becoming more digital and more data-driven.
At the centre of the discussion is a growing tension between ambition and infrastructure. The market wants faster placement, smarter capital allocation and more algorithmic decision-making, yet many firms are still wrestling with fragmented data, legacy systems and inconsistent standards.
In this conversation, Tessa, Emily and Jonathan share:
- Why portfolio solutions have become one of the fastest-growing models in the London Market
- How brokers are evolving their placement strategies as facilities and pre-placed capacity expand
- Why selecting the right portfolio leader is critical for long-term facility performance
- How improving data quality is becoming a prerequisite for digital trading and algorithmic underwriting
- Why incentives across brokers, carriers and reinsurers matter when it comes to better data
- How AI is reshaping risk, creating new liability exposures and changing how insurers analyse emerging threats
- Why capital providers are increasingly demanding greater transparency and portfolio insight
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Robin Merttens on LinkedIn.
Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning.
Sunday Mar 01, 2026
Sunday Mar 01, 2026
In this episode, Matthew Grant sits down with Nicola Turner and Alex Ley, co-founders of Scrub AI, to explore one of the most pressing strategic questions facing insurers today: Build vs Buy in the age of generative AI.
Five years into building an AI-driven data cleansing platform for carriers and brokers, Nicola and Alex have seen the market shift from scepticism to urgency. Boardrooms are now asking how AI is being embedded into underwriting workflows, and whether those capabilities should be developed internally or sourced from specialists.
Drawing on their experience building deterministic AI models for exposure data and catastrophe modelling, they offer a grounded perspective on what works, what breaks and where the real risks sit.
At the heart of the discussion is a simple truth: getting to 80% is easy. Getting the final 20% right is where strategy, domain expertise and long-term thinking matter most.
In this conversation, Nicola and Alex share:
- Why Build vs Buy has intensified as generative AI moves from experimentation to executive priority
- How investor pressure and board-level scrutiny are shaping AI strategy inside large carriers
- Why generative AI can accelerate development but does not remove the complexity of insurance data
- The danger of plausible but wrong outputs in exposure management and catastrophe modelling
- Why deterministic AI still plays a critical role in delivering consistent, renewal-ready data
- How inconsistent data cleaning can distort underwriting decisions and renewal pricing
- The hidden cost of technical debt when insurers attempt to build internally
- Why maintaining and iterating ai tools is often harder than building the first version
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn.
Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning.
Sunday Feb 22, 2026
Sunday Feb 22, 2026
In this episode, Robin Merttens sits down with Frank Perkins, CEO and Co-founder of inari, to explore what it really takes to build and scale a modern MGA in 2026.
From founding an insurance business himself to leading a technology company serving specialist MGAs across Europe, Frank brings a rare dual perspective. He understands both the pressure of getting premium through the door and the responsibility of building systems that underwriters actually want to use.
As private equity capital accelerates into the sector and niche, digital-first MGAs proliferate across continental Europe, the conversation turns to speed, integration and the quiet evolution of the underwriting workbench.
In this conversation, Frank shares:
- Why technology literacy is now firmly in the hands of business users, not just IT departments
- How the rise of highly specialised MGAs is reshaping what underwriting platforms need to deliver
- Why “rip and replace” transformation programmes are giving way to orchestration and coexistence
- How AI is materially accelerating integrations and onboarding, cutting rollout times from months to days
- The difference between generic AI tooling and insurance-specific intelligence
- Why speed of execution is becoming a defining competitive advantage
- What a tightening market cycle will mean for operational efficiency
- Why continental Europe may offer the next major growth wave for MGAs
- How culture and domain expertise can matter as much as code in a crowded market
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Robin Merttens on LinkedIn.
Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning.
Sunday Feb 15, 2026
Sunday Feb 15, 2026
In this episode, we bring you a live panel from InsTech’s May event at CodeNode, exploring how automation is reshaping claims in the Lloyd’s and London market — and why the belief that specialty is too complex to automate no longer stands.
Moderated by Matthew Grant, CEO of InsTech, the panel features Simon White, Chief Claims Officer at Apollo, Aidan O’Neill, Founder and CEO of DOCOsoft, and Zoe Woods, Claims Improvement Manager at Lloyd’s.
Specialty claims have long been viewed as too bespoke, too nuanced and too reliant on human judgement for automation to play a meaningful role. But as underwriting becomes algorithmic and distribution turns digital, claims can no longer lag behind.
This conversation moves beyond theory to evidence. Automation is already embedded in live workflows across the market. The firms adopting early are seeing measurable operational gains.
In this conversation, they share:
- Why the myth that specialty claims cannot be automated is finally breaking down
- How Apollo processed more than 23,000 claims through automated checks, cutting handling times to under a working day
- What happens when you ask claims handlers to map every task they repeat on each file
- Why automation should augment decision-making rather than create black boxes
- How structured data and integrated dashboards unlock meaningful AI use cases
- What Lloyd’s is doing to balance innovation with oversight in a syndicated market
- Why modular, plug-and-play services are replacing large-scale transformation programmes
- What specialty can learn from automation in motor and property lines
- Why starting small with repeatable processes creates fast, tangible wins
- How claims is shifting from cost centre to strategic differentiator
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn.
Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning.
Sunday Feb 08, 2026
Sunday Feb 08, 2026
What actually makes automated and enhanced underwriting work in practice?
In this episode, three early movers in automated underwriting share hard-earned lessons from building digital underwriting propositions that have survived real market cycles. Rather than theory or hype, this conversation digs into where technology genuinely creates advantage, where it does not, and how underwriting judgement remains central even in highly algorithmic models.
Drawing on experience across cyber, US property and digital facilities, the panel explores why complexity, not commoditisation, is often where automation delivers the greatest edge. From AI-driven cyber underwriting to high-cat surplus lines property and digitally distributed specialty products, each speaker explains how they chose their focus and what they learned along the way.
Key themes include the role of data discipline in sustaining AI-led underwriting, why platform design matters more than speed to market, and how underwriters’ roles are shifting from generalists to specialists embedded in algorithmic decision making. The discussion also tackles unstructured data, submission quality and why “no data, no deal” may become a defining principle of future underwriting models.
What you’ll learn in this episode:
- Why complex risks can be better suited to automated and augmented underwriting than simple, commoditised ones
- How AI and machine learning are being applied in live underwriting decisions, not just analytics
- The importance of volume, homogeneity and risk differentiation when building algorithmic models
- Lessons from re-platforming early digital products and avoiding long-term technical debt
- How generative AI is changing data cleaning, exposure management and submission handling
- What enhanced underwriting means for underwriter skills, careers and decision making
Featuring perspectives from Marek Shafer of Vave, Tom Squires of AEGIS London and Jonathan Spry of Envelop Risk, moderated by Matthew Grant of InsTech.
You can also watch the video version of this panel here.
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn.
Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning.
Sunday Feb 01, 2026
Sunday Feb 01, 2026
What happens when AI meets the backbone of the insurance industry - policy administration systems? In this episode, Liselotte Munk, CEO of Fadata, joins Robin Merttens to unpack how artificial intelligence is reshaping the software layer of insurance.
With candid insights into Fadata’s AI strategy, Liselotte reveals how the company is using AI to accelerate software development and reduce implementation costs while improving quality. She tackles the big question: will AI make policy admin systems obsolete? Her answer offers a pragmatic view on cost, complexity, compliance and collaboration.
In this conversation, Liselotte shares:
- How AI is already streamlining configuration, documentation and testing in core systems
- Why the true opportunity lies in faster implementations and reduced transformation costs
- How the role of developers is shifting, and what this means for insurance talent
- Why insurers should invest in AI to enhance - not replace - their core platforms
- What the smartest insurers are doing now to future-proof operations in an AI-first world
If you like what you’re hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Robin Merttens on LinkedIn.
Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning.