In the modern insurance landscape, data is not just the name of a beneficiary or a paragraph of the pricing policy. For insurers, data is the lifeblood that feeds every operation. Yet, for an industry bound by complex regulations and drowning in an overwhelming, this fragmented sea of information has become a major roadblock.
How can insurers not only manage this data but also transform it into a competitive advantage?
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Key takeaways
– The core challenge is not a lack of data, but its devastating fragmentation.
– The future of finance is being shaped by integrated, cloud-enabled Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) platforms, positioning finance teams as strategic partners ready to leverage data for growth.
– The EPM market is projected for significant growth, expected to reach $11.23 billion by 2030 (a CAGR of 9.52%). This growth is primarily driven by cloud-first finance strategies, increasing mandates for ESG disclosures, and the adoption of AI/ML for dynamic scenario modelling.
Data, the lifeblood of insurance
Looking left and right, data is the lifeblood of modern corporations. Insurance companies rely heavily on them for claims, risks, package developments, and much more.
Take pricing a product as an example. Insurers need to analyse past events to predict the likelihood and levels of impact of future events. These combine with other potential risks and economic influences to make up a new insurance policy. Additionally, the policy must be transparent, accessible to all customers, and presented in an attractive manner to capture their attention.
On the other hand, when a potential customer seeks to buy an insurance policy, insurers collect all relevant data about the person, such as:
– Demographic information
– Health history
– Finances
– And more
These sets of data are then used for comprehensive assessments to determine the individual’s risk profile, whether they present a higher or lower risk compared to the general pool of other insured individuals. All these elaborate processes are to estimate the likelihood of claims in the future.
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This is just a brief and simplified picture of the insurance business model, but it presents a situation where, everywhere you look, either left or right, there is data.
For a complex and regulatory-bound industry like insurance, manually processing the already overwhelming mountains of data is impossible, especially when those ever-evolving regulations demand that insurers stay on top of their data. This, coupled with:
– The rapid increase in data streams from IoT devices provides a rich source of information for analytical insights
– The need for streamlining and automated workflows, such as underwriting and claims processing
– Growing demands for quantifying climate-related risks
– The rise of embedded insurance partnerships
All scream for a solution to aid insurers in solving the data issues.
Are insurance companies ignoring analytics risks?
We have established that insurers are constantly challenged by mountains of data. However, the key issue with these data sets and how they often hinder insurers’ growth and adaptability is their fragmentation, i.e., information comes from a variety of sources. These often include:
– Spreadsheets
– Customer relationship management system
– etc.
Over time, data continues to expand, but these applications and systems become outdated and rigid and cannot meet modern analysis demands. Without routine updates or robust system integration strategies, data lying in these disparate repositories is quickly forgotten.
For insurers, without timely and accurate information to make informed decisions, they risk operational inefficiency, extensive delays, inability to respond to changing market demands, and countless other detrimental consequences. The lack of data also results in the lack of a common shared view across the business, which then extends to:
– Inconsistent account structures across different business units make it challenging to consolidate financial results and gain a holistic view of the company’s financial health
– Varying definitions of cost centres hinder accurate cost allocation, performance measurement, and budgeting
– Managing data consistently across different legal entities is crucial for regulatory compliance and accurate financial consolidation
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As such, the crucial role of finance teams is once again emphasised as a key enabler in bridging operational and technological gaps. Finance teams today act as strategic partners who ensure insurers leverage the right integrated systems to drive efficiency and competitive advantage.
Digital innovation and cloud-powered technologies are reshaping how finance departments in not only insurance businesses but also across the globe operate. Digital transformation means freeing up finance resources from manual, routine tasks for more dedicated and strategic initiatives.
And to achieve the goal of grasping timely, accurate data from an integrated single source of the truth, finance teams and insurers need a robust Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) solution.
Benefits of EPM platforms in insurance
As for EPM’s market size, it is projected to grow from USD 7.05 billion in 2025 to USD 11.23 billion by 2030, exhibiting a CAGR of 9.52%. This growth is primarily driven by cloud-first finance strategies, increasing mandates for ESG disclosures, and the adoption of AI-driven scenario modelling.
Other noteworthy statistics from the study are that approximately 56% of finance leaders already acknowledge AI’s transformative power for planning and analysis workflows. Additionally, cloud deployments are dominating new EPM projects due to their ability to reduce capital costs and provide monthly feature updates, which on-premise models lack. Rising supply chain inflation, prompting CFOs to invest in tools that offer real-time cost visibility, is also further fuelling demand for EPM solutions.
The path forward is clear — the future of finance is being shaped by cloud-enabled EPM platforms, which are capable of facilitating interdepartmental collaboration and leveraging AI and machine learning.
While finance departments are the primary power users of EPM, its adoption is increasing among line-of-business and department heads. The benefits of EPM can be categorised into clearly distinct factors: financial and operational.
Financial benefits of EPM
– Enhanced budget accuracy: EPM automates data collection across the company into a centralised repository to eliminate silos, manual entry errors, and, more importantly, using the insurers’/ CFOs’ gut feeling to second-guess a result. Real-time data is then fed into crucial financial processes like dynamic budgeting, allowing for better resource allocation based on current performance and market changes.
– Real-time forecasting adjustments: With built-in advanced business intelligence and predictive analytics, EPM facilitates dynamic forecasting. This involves:
+ Driver-based planning: Analysing financial statements to identify factors driving line items, forming the basis for forecasting and scenario planning.
+ Rolling forecasts: Continuously updating planning assumptions, typically over a rolling 12-month period, ensuring future projections are based on current performance.
+ Scenario planning: Exploring “what if” scenarios, informed by driver-based planning and rolling forecasts.
– Streamlined financial closing process: EPM centralises operational and financial data, automating tasks and improving information flow to simplify the financial close. Account reconciliation can become a continuous process, and financial software can flag errors, allowing finance teams to focus on exceptions.
– Identifying profitable products/services: EPM offers insights into product and service performance throughout their life cycle. It can:
+ Run scenarios for new products, integrating market research and costs to assess success potential.
+ Continuously monitor costs and sales data to inform product repositioning.
+ Use financial modelling to forecast the impact of tactics like new sales incentives or pricing changes on profitability.
– Cost management: EPM closely tracks costs and presets thresholds, dashboards, and alerts that highlight cost issues. Its predictive algorithms identify savings and root causes of overruns, enabling rapid data-driven insurance decisions aligned with business objectives.
▶️ Watch now:On-demand Webinar | Budgeting: From Manual to Agile
Operational benefits of EPM
EPM offers several operational benefits. It automates workflows, reduces manual labour and errors, and allows staff to focus on higher-value tasks. It also eliminates operational bottlenecks by integrating financial and operational data, improving planning, analysis, and reporting.
Furthermore, EPM provides real-time performance tracking with dashboards and AI-powered insights, enabling timely decision-making. Finally, EPM tools facilitate benchmarking against industry standards by analysing internal KPIs against external data, helping identify areas for improvement in profitability, efficiency, and more.
Read more:Don’t Buy EPM Software Until You Read This Guide!
Implications of EPM solutions in the insurance industry
Modern EPM solutions today bring more than just financial planning or budgeting. It has evolved into an executive’s “Swiss Army knife”, capable of fuelling strategy, agility, and growth through real-time data analysis across all business functions.
EPM empowers insurers to:
Simplify and automate regulatory reporting
EPM consolidates data from all streams into a unified, single source of the truth in real-time, providing the most updated information for reporting. Many solutions available today go to great lengths to offer intuitive, role-based dashboards and pre-built templates that are already compliant with the latest regulations, like IFRS 17. This lifts the heavy burden off IT, and in turn, empowers finance users to take control of the system according to their needs.
In an increasingly stringent regulatory environment, this capability significantly reduces the burden of compliance, minimises the risk of errors, and frees up valuable resources that can be redirected to core business activities.
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Improve underwriting precision
An effective underwriting process is essential in ensuring the fairness and long-term sustainability of insurance businesses, preventing insurers from unknown risks that could lead to higher costs or claim denials. Traditional underwriting often involves manual and lengthy evaluations using scattered data, which can cause delays and errors.
However, by leveraging predefined underwriting rules, advanced analytics and historical data, EPM solutions empower insurers to conduct more effective risk assessments and make data-driven insurance decisions that align with the insurer’s risk appetite across all submissions.
Read more:Nucleus Reports Infor EPM Improves Financial Productivity by 20 Per Cent
Enhance investment portfolio performance
Market instability, fluctuating interest rates, increased pricing, changing regulations, etc., all contribute to the complexity of the insurance sector. To truly understand its profitability, insurers must look beyond consolidated underwriting profit/loss, operating income, or net income, which requires an integrated solution like EPM that connects account-level data to determine revenue impact, claims handling effectiveness, and expense control and identify risk areas.
A comprehensive understanding of profitability allows insurance firms to quickly assess options and act on changes, cross-sell, provide differentiated service, and adjust pricing, thus enabling proactive operational management.
At TRG International, we offer Infor EPM for insurance, a comprehensive solution designed to address issues revolving around collaboration, mobility, cloud, and big data. With Infor EPM for insurance, not only can you move away from spreadsheets or legacy processes to a more streamlined one, but you can also get to experience firsthand the power of in-context, self-service reporting, real-time data discovery, and dynamic what-if scenario planning, plus more.
To learn more about Infor EPM for insurance and how the solution can help you save more than just time and effort looking for the right piece of information, download our brochure today!
FAQs
What is the main challenge insurers face with their data?
Answer: The core issue is data fragmentation—information is trapped in disparate, often outdated repositories (siloed spreadsheets, CRMs, data warehouses), preventing a timely, accurate, and consolidated view necessary for informed decision-making and efficient operations.
What is an Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) solution?
Answer:EPM platforms are integrated systems designed to consolidate operational and financial data into a unified “single source of the truth.” They automate financial processes like budgeting and closing, facilitate dynamic forecasting, and provide advanced analytics across all business functions.
What factors are driving the adoption and growth of EPM platforms?
Answer: Key drivers include the acceleration of cloud-first finance strategies, the increasing mandate for ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) disclosures, the adoption of AI-driven scenario modelling, and the need for tools that offer real-time cost visibility to manage inflation.
Beyond traditional finance, what are EPM’s key benefits for the insurance industry?
Answer: EPM has evolved into an executive’s “Swiss Army knife” capable of simplifying and automating regulatory reporting (like IFRS 17), improving underwriting precision, and enhancing investment portfolio performance by connecting account-level data to profitability analysis.
