The new performance management reports are for: written premium growth, new business funnel, average policy size, lines per account and policies by process stage, the company noted.

Underwriting Workbench also now integrates with predictive analytics solutions to better facilitate risk scoring and ensure precision pricing, and with geo-mapping systems that enable risk management tools, such as catastrophe overlays and risk class accumulation, to be more easily applied.

"Automating the underwriting process on a modern technology platform is emerging as a strategic mandate for insurance companies who want to expand their market reach, achieve greater control over their business, and get new and revised products to market at exponentially faster speeds," said Ross Orrett, president and CEO of Camilion.

Designed to capitalize on a service-oriented architecture, Camilion's Authority Suite is open, scalable, and conforms to key technology and insurance industry standards, the company said.

Providing a breadth of capabilities from product development and underwriting to straight-through processing, Authority Suite is powered by Camilion's flagship "ProductAuthority," an insurance product configurator that allows insurers to more easily and cost-effectively integrate product data and rules into their operational systems, including policy administration systems.

According to Camilion, product data and rules are stored in the central repository of Authority, where they can be exposed as Web services to all back-end systems that need to be product-aware.

"This not only eliminates the hard-coding of product data and rules into multiple systems, but results in systems with unprecedented agility, allowing insurers to implement or change products in days," the company asserted.

Pricing for an implementation of Camilion's Authority Suite starts at $500,000, the company said. Product Templates, which are sold separately, start at $150,000. Further details are available at www.camilion.com.

o Riskclick, a provider of underwriting software for p-c insurers, announced the release of "Riskclick Underwriting Process Manager," a "rules- and referral-driven underwriting application with advanced agent and broker servicing features."

The new software is populated with insurance content to run both personal and commercial lines of business across all underwriting transactions--new business, endorsements and renewals, said New York-based Riskclick.

"Our application empowers insurance companies to implement an underwriting environment that maximizes profitability," said Jim DeSocio, CEO of Riskclick.

"Our solution ensures that every submission, endorsement and renewal, regardless of how it's delivered, will run through an insurer's underwriting rules as often as required," he added. "Exceptions will be referred to the correct resource. The results will lower expense and loss ratios, provide cutting-edge service for agents and brokers, and help realize a higher retention rate and profitable growth."

According to Riskclick, the software can be applied to a range of lines of business and risk complexities, "from a highly automated, low-touch process for smaller risks or simple renewals, to an open, flexible exception-based underwriting environment for larger and more complex risks."

The company added that better management of the underwriting process through use of the product eliminates re-keying and manual paperwork, improves resource utilization, and decreases operational costs, thereby increasing profits while expanding distribution.

"Carriers can reduce leakage, cost-effectively process more policies with existing head count, access electronic customer files more quickly, provide better customer service, improve retention and streamline their compliance effort," said Riskclick.

The software runs on Microsoft .NET 2.0, SQL Server 2005, and Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Team Server, the company noted.

Pricing starts at $100,000, said Mr. DeSocio. Further information is available at www.riskclick.com.

o ISO announced it has enhanced its Automobile-Property Loss Underwriting Service (A-PLUS) system with Claim Standardization Codes that "eliminate the need for underwriters to review loss history reports manually."

According to Jersey City, N.J.-based Insurance Services Office, the Claim Standardization Codes will help carriers automate and improve underwriting risk evaluation and rating. The codes are available for A-PLUS property and auto loss history reports delivered through the ISO Passport deliver system to network-to-network and batch users.

The codes "will enable users' systems to interpret information in underwriting loss history reports more easily and apply business rules to automate underwriting business decisions," said Steven Craig, A-PLUS general manager. He added that they "will eliminate the need for company systems to interrogate each field in the data stream, saving processing time and streamlining the workflow."

The A-PLUS system will create a Claim Standardization Code for each claim in an applicant's or location's claim history, said ISO. The codes will summarize information about claim features, such as policy type, loss type, age of claim, loss amount and other factors.

Pricing information was not provided. Details are available at www.iso.com.

o Guidewire Software Inc., a provider of technology products for p-c insurers, offers Guidewire PolicyCenter 2.0, a comprehensive policy administration system for all p-c lines.

This is a Web-based system "optimized to make it easier for agents to do business with insurance carriers, enhance underwriting accuracy and efficiency, and adapt flexibly to changing product and business requirements," said San Mateo, Calif.-based Guidewire.

The system enables p-c insurers to increase operating margins by attacking the key sources of underwriting error, productivity loss and agent/policyholder frustration, the company noted.

PolicyCenter targets specific areas of dissatisfaction with legacy systems, including arcane user interfaces, lack of workflow and lack of flexibility.

Guidewire said the system streamlines the application submission process, helps optimize risk selection and provides intuitive interfaces. It is a J2EE (Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition) application.

No pricing information was provided. Details are available at www.guidewire.com.