Insurance falling behind on fintech

- By Siân Barton
- @InsuranceSian
- 01 Dec 2015
- Indicative reading time: 1 minute

Number of fintech patents from insurance show lack of innovation compared to other financial institutions.

There were 6,652 patents filed globally for insurance fintech in 2015 compared to 50,446 filed in the payments sector.

In the banking sector, which had the second highest number of patents, 21,571 were filed.

A report by patent analysis, IP intelligence, portfolio management and technology transfer specialist Relecura, showed that insurance was behind payments, banks, wealth management and capital markets when it came to fintech patents filed.

The global brands who submitted the most patents were Hitachi, The Hartford, Accenture, State Farm, ITG Software, Zynga Inc, and Digonex Technologies.

For insurance 2,679 patents were filed in the data and analytics area while 1,443 were hoping to innovate how the insurance sector uses the Internet of Things.

The research showed 609 filings for mobile platforms in insurance and 639 looking at security. Crypto-currency was the least attractive for patent developers with just 15 patents. Cloud computing fared better and 556 patents filed.

None of the top patent holders were insurers or brokers. Visa Bank for America hit the top spot with the remainder comprised of banks, websites such as Ebay, and technology providers.

Pace
James York, founder of broker Worry + Peace and supporter of the FinTech Futures campaign commented: "Whilst it's clear innovation pace still needs quickening, a lack of patents does not necessarily tell a story of slackness.

"Rather, might it represent a pragmatic approach that considers the costs of enforcement, our high regulatory barriers and the advantage of getting new ideas to market first?"

Insurance Age has reported regularly that the sector must innovate from within if it is to avoid market disruption.

Most recently, the CEO of tech provider Guidewire, Marcus Ryu, warned that customers see insurance as "behind the rest of e-commerce, tedious, lacking in security and archaic and clunky" when it comes to digital innovation.

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