Previously, Mr. Zou served as the chief financial officer of Sinosafe Insurance and general manager of finance and accounting at Taikang Life Insurance, both headquartered in China. He has also taught accounting and financial management at the School of Economics and Management, Tsinghua University in Beijing.

"China's insurance marketplace is not yet mature, but it's continuing to grow. As the marketplace grows, Chinese insurers will want more risk-modeling," said Mr. Zou.

Commenting on the firm's move into the new marketplace, ISO observed that China's rising demand for insurance and the country's vulnerability to natural catastrophes make it a promising new market for risk-modeling firms.

Mr. Zou said that Boston-based AIR Worldwide has been working on developing a Chinese earthquake model that will become available this year.

"Earthquakes in the past have been major natural perils in China, with tremendous economic losses. But many Chinese insurers and reinsurers are still not using sophisticated catastrophe models to assess their exposures," he said.

Risk Management Solutions Inc., the largest catastrophe model provider in the United States and a competitor of AIR Worldwide, is also preparing to offer its own earthquake model for China. In targeting that country's marketplace, the Newark, Calif.-based firm already offers a Hong Kong typhoon model and is in the development phase for a Chinese earthquake model, RMS spokesman John Abraham said.