Although the Send Underwriting Workbench was born in the London Market, we’ve made significant investments in tailoring the platform to meet the unique needs of our US-based customers. Brad Tabor joined Send last year as our Head of Revenue, North America. He has since been committed to driving new business opportunities, ensuring US carriers recognise the value that our underwriting workbench can bring to their commercial and specialty businesses.
For this month’s Q&A, we spoke to Brad to learn more about the key differences between the US and London Markets, the main pain points facing our US customers, and how the Send Underwriting Workbench has been customised to tackle these challenges.
Firstly, Brad, can you tell us a bit about your background and journey into insurance?
I spent the first ten years of my career in the insurance industry with roles at Liberty Mutual and Marsh, where I established a solid foundation in commercial insurance. After gaining this valuable industry experience, I decided to go to business school and then pivot into consulting. I spent two and a half years at Deloitte, consulting for the insurance industry, helping insurers and brokers refine their operating models and technology strategies. During this time, I found a real passion for technology. Having seen from the outside how insurance businesses were exploring Insurtech, I was keen to move to the other side of the table, working within a technology provider to provide solutions to the market.
Over the last few years, I’ve seen a huge increase in investment into underwriting systems, we’ve moved from entirely paper-based systems to smart AI supporting underwriters.
Now as Send’s Head of Revenue for North America, I get a chance to capitalise on this appetite, and showcase our underwriting workbench to the US market. My focus is on growth, cementing our profile in North America and building a strong and dedicated team to service our customers.
How has the insurance industry changed since you began your career?
The transformation has been massive. We’ve moved from paper-based systems and manual processes to a world where your technology strategy is your strategy.
The pace of change has accelerated dramatically, especially over the last five years. We’ve seen shifts from concerns about server infrastructure to cloud migration, and now the focus is on application stacks, workflow optimisation, and the integration of AI into daily business operations. The impact of AI, in particular, has been unprecedented. Across the years, we’ve seen InsurTech buzzwords, RPA and Blockchain, for example, come and go in fads, but nothing comes close to the impact AI has had on our industry. Now, everyone in the business must have at least some grasp of AI and its uses, benefits and pitfalls. AI is not just the remit of the technology teams, it’s table stakes for everyone.
Alongside these changes, have there been any shifts in the challenges facing underwriters today?
We’re certainly seeing an evolution in the types of problems our customers are coming to us with.
A big concern for many is that their systems are stuck somewhere in the eighties, meaning they’re unable to quickly and easily take advantage of some of the latest innovations. This is more of a problem with large carriers who have built up years of legacy technology, less so the younger, more nimble players who have the benefit of building their systems from scratch.
Underwriters are getting a ton of submissions accompanied by ever more data, and they have to be able to quickly determine which risks to spend time on. I’ve heard plenty of carriers say that they feel they’re overwhelming their underwriters with so much information as they’re not able to distil it down and bring it into one place.
We’re also seeing a shift towards a portfolio underwriting model. Underwriters are moving away from writing risks on an individual basis. The availability of data gives them the ability to understand not only the individual risk, but how this fits into the context of their portfolio. Not all systems are set up to accommodate this portfolio approach, so we have customers who want to explore that and integrate a system that can help them take a broader view of risk at that level. Some carriers are taking that a step further and looking for a solution that will help them better allocate and manage capital across their portfolio. These businesses are looking for a platform that can help them take greater control of their business outcomes.
What are some key differences between the needs of underwriters in the US versus the UK market?
While there are fundamental similarities, the US market has some distinct characteristics. Firstly, the US tends to be ahead in technology adoption, partly due to its more decentralised structure compared to the UK markets. This decentralisation removes the traditional bottlenecks, allowing for faster innovation and implementation of new technologies. Secondly, speed to market is crucial in the US, with a significant advantage going to those who can quickly turn around quotes while maintaining accuracy. One example of a nuance of US vs. UK is that in the US, policy document creation typically falls to the carrier, whereas in the UK, it’s handled by brokers. These nuances require tailored technological solutions.
How is the Send Underwriting Workbench specially adapted to meet the needs of US underwriting customers?
The Send Underwriting Workbench is a purpose-built underwriting platform for the commercial and specialty markets. While born in London, we’ve invested heavily in tailoring our platform to meet the needs of our customers in the US market. We’re very proud of our platform as it commands top quadrant in Celent’s Underwriting Workbench Report for North America.
We’ve focused on integrations with policy admin systems, enhanced data ingestion and extraction capabilities, and document creation, including quotes, binders, and policies. We also have a full API library with ready-to-use data sources like hx, Moody’s, Sixfold, D&B, Lexis Nexis, Hazard Hub, and many others.
Our workbench is designed to be flexible and adapt to new AI technologies, data sources, and evolving business processes. This flexibility is crucial in the fast-paced US market, where many insurers are launching multiple new products every year.
AI is now empowering underwriters to write business smarter, faster and more profitably, but carriers must be able to integrate these technologies into their system or risk being left behind. The Send Underwriting Workbench is built for change, we can help our customers keep pace with the market.
Send’s 2025 Catalyst report suggests that 2025 is going to be a year of action, with insurers taking a more proactive and strategic approach to technology. How has the appetite for and investment in technology in the US changed?
There has been a huge shift in this area. There have traditionally been three core systems in insurance: billing, claims and policy admin systems (PAS). There were no dedicated underwriting systems, instead, carriers had to customise their PAS to accommodate vital underwriting functions. This was expensive, and to a large degree, not fit for purpose.
Underwriting systems are now emerging as the “fourth core” system. Today’s systems are purpose-built, highly adaptable and flexible. Customers don’t necessarily want 100% out-of-the-box technology, they want to be able to tailor elements of their system to meet their individual needs, with features and capabilities specific to their lines of business.
That’s what we can do, the Send Underwriting Workbench has a robust set of out-of-the-box features representing the commonalities across the market, but we can also configure the build to support each customer’s own differentiation and unique capabilities.
Get in touch with Brad on LinkedIn.