Kiwi company Performance Lab Technologies, which specializes in behavior-changing technology, is joining forces with Vivametrica, an activity-based health scoring and insurance underwriting company, to create a new platform called EngageRate. This endeavor is aimed at engaging life insurance policy holders with their health by offering personalized artificial intelligence coaching and activity tracking. It also helps insurance companies track and validate their underwriting services.
Why it matters
Activity data has become increasingly valuable to both insurers and consumers. The companies said that the new platform was designed to help insurers more accurately understand their clients and for members to become more engaged with their health.
“Vivametrica uses activity data to more efficiently underwrite for various insurance programs,” Mark Agnew, CEO at EngageRate, told MobiHealthNews. “They have been able to demonstrate that activity data is 20 percent more accurate than traditional underwriting and predicting someone's longevity and mortality.”
When a policy holder downloads the platform they are able to track their activity and get personalized coaching tips from an AI avatar.
“[EngageRate is] completely agnostic to the source. We could do it simply off someone’s smartphone but it will be better if they have an Apple Watch, Fitbit, Garmin, or [Sony device]. We are also creating a user experience for the policy holders of the insurance company,” Mark Agnew, CEO at EngageRate, told MobiHealthNews. “Policy holders of these insurance companies will be given an app for counting their steps and telling them how many activity minutes they are doing. It will also create a personalized plan for them by taking them through a certain set of questions. What are your goals? It isn’t to perform in a triathlon but it is simply to walk more than you are walk more than you are walking … [so] how do you make a move towards the 10,000 step goal, or 180 minutes of excersise a week goal?”
The system can be used with life, disability or healthcare insurance. But for the time being the company is focusing its attention on partnering with life insurers.
Agnew said that the insights could also help adjust and lower members premiums if they start to have a more healthful lifestyle. It could also help someone prove that they are “insurable” by different plans and act as an alternative to getting a mini-physical or filling out scores of paper work, according to Agnew.
The trend
Life insurance companies have become more interested in the wearable activity tracker space. Just last week Cardiogram, a smartwatch app that uses a deep neural network technology to detect hypertension and sleep apnea, announced that it, life insurer Amica Life and life and disability payer Greenhouse Life Insurance Company will now offer people $1,000 in accidental death insurance for free. As part of the deal, the insurers get a chance to look at users data.
Additionally, a 2015 Accenture survey found that two-thirds of insurance companies, across various specialities, expected wearable technologies to have a significant impact on the insurance industry. Thirty-one percent of responders said their companies were already using wearables and 73 percent said that offering members wearables was a top priority.
On the record
“Vivametrica VScore delivers activity-based underwriting that is faster, more accurate and more cost effective than traditional underwriting approaches,” Christy Lane, co-CEO of Vivametrica, said in a statement. “We’ve conducted many studies – including those with Munich Re and SCOR – to prove that our mortality and morbidity risk scoring tools are truly game-changing for the insurance industry. Our research has shown that other than age, physical activity is the strongest predictor of mortality and up to 10 times more impact on mortality risk than smoking. In fact, we can say with scientific confidence that when it comes to measuring and managing mortality risk, sitting really is the new smoking.”
