Protection gap fuels opportunities for risk modelling firms

Insurers are currently presented with huge opportunities for growth in the Asia market, and AIR Worldwide is working to support them by continuing its expansion in the region, said Ashish Jain, vice president and managing director of AIR Worldwide.

“There is a large gap between insured and insurable exposures in certain countries and insurance penetration is as low as 5 to 8 percent,” he said.

“We are talking about billions of dollars of untapped premium for the insurer. There is a great deal of effort required for the industry to gather all the information and work to reduce this so-called protection gap.”

AIR Worldwide has four offices in the region, in Singapore, India, Japan, and China. AIR currently provides catastrophe modelling solutions for many areas (territories/countries) in Asia-Pacific, including Japan, China, India, the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, Singapore, Brunei, Australia, and New Zealand.

“Asia is certainly an important part of our global strategy as there is significant need and growth in the use of sophisticated modelling solutions like AIR’s,” said Jain.

“AIR is committed to bringing new and scientifically advanced models for this region, and in 2016 alone we have released more than 10 new and updated models for Asia, including models for earthquake, tsunami, typhoon wind, flood, and storm surge risk.”

Following on from a successful 2016, AIR’s scientists and engineers will continue to focus on bringing the most reliable models to the market, next year focusing on delivering state-of-the-art solutions for markets including Japan and Australia, said Jain.

“Flood continues to be a critical area of model development and we project forthcoming releases for flood risk modelling solutions covering India and South East Asia. We also continue to focus on emerging risks and are looking ahead to launches of models for cyber and supply chain risks.”