New ISO Strategic Initiatives Respond to Customer Needs and Marketplace Realities

January 17, 1996 / 2 min read

NEW YORK, Jan. 17, 1996 — Insurance Services Office, Inc. (ISO) today unveiled broad-based strategic initiatives to make the corporation the premier value-added resource for all needed property/casualty information.

Speaking at the organization's annual meeting, Fred R. Marcon, ISO's chairman, president, and chief executive officer, said that in responding to the expressed needs of its customers, ISO will implement four strategic business directions dealing with information services, policy forms, risk-specific services and product delivery.

Addressing ISO's insurer customers, Marcon said, "You want ISO to be the source for all needed property/casualty information, and you expect us to form strategic alliances that make it possible to provide you information that's not now available from ISO."

In the area of information services, Marcon pointed out that ISO must provide information beyond pricing and underwriting data by serving as a "one-stop source for information across lines of insurance, for claims and other operational information" needed "to service niche business, specialty programs and other markets.

"In the future, ISO will move to collect all the aggregate and risk-specific data that you need," he said. "And we will use our technical skills to convert that data into information that enables you to effectively manage your business."

ISO's second strategic business direction involves the "mass-customization" of policy forms and endorsements offering up-to-date coverage structures that address the needs of insurers' customers.

Marcon promised that ISO will continue to develop, file and distribute up-to-date coverage forms and endorsements for each line of insurance within its jurisdiction. "But with our eye toward the future, we will also use our forms-drafting expertise and economies of scale to meet your demands for standardized coverage programs tailored to specific classes of business," he said. "Plain vanilla isn't enough anymore."

With regard to risk-specific services, ISO will continue to provide multi-line surveys and risk-assessment surveys, concentrating on mid-to-large commercial account risks and on high-value homeowners business. And ISO will continue to evaluate communities' fire-suppression capabilities and building-code effectiveness as supplements to other risk-specific services, Marcon said.

By employing cost control, usage-sensitive billing and greater automation, ISO will continue to ensure that its pricing of risk-based products and services is appropriate and fair.

The fourth and final strategic business direction involves the rapidly changing delivery environment for ISO products and services.

"Ultimately, all ISO products and services will be delivered electronically," said Marcon. He said ISO has a flexible strategy to deliver ISO products electronically through software firms most able to provide leading-edge approaches with high-quality performance. "We believe the right course of action is to engage qualified software-development partners, just as we've engaged outside printers to print and distribute ISO paper manuals," he said.

The four strategic business directions "Build on ISO's proud tradition," Marcon said. "A viable ISO, responsive to changing marketplace realities and customer needs, helps insurers, producers, regulators and, ultimately, policyholders."

Release: Immediate

Contacts:
Giuseppe Barone / Erica Helton
MWW Group (for ISO)
201-507-9500
gbarone@mww.com / ehelton@mww.com