As this decade marked by natural catastrophes, digital disruption, and AI-infused everything reaches its midpoint, P&C insurance has reached a critical moment. Carriers are under pressure to adapt faster to intensifying climate risks, shifting customer expectations, and a relentless drive for efficiency. This has spurred an unprecedented acceleration in innovation, particularly through partnerships with insurtechs targeting precise challenges faced by insurers.

For carriers operating with a modern, cloud-based architecture, the ability to quickly enable new insurtech capabilities aligned with their strategic objectives is business-critical. It’s also the motivating factor behind insurtech incubators like the Guidewire Insurtech Vanguards program, which has emerged as essential for educating our carrier community about cutting-edge insurtech value propositions as we scout for new additions to our industry-leading PartnerConnect program. With that in mind, let’s explore four key trends defining this next chapter in our industry and how some of the additions to our program over the past 12 months can help carriers capitalize on them.

Climate Risks: Mitigating Crises, Maximizing Opportunities

Climate volatility is now an operational constant for insurers. Aon’s 2025 Climate Catastrophe Insight report highlights 2024 as the sixth costliest year on record, with insured natural catastrophe losses reaching $145 billion globally. Economic losses surpassed $300 billion for the ninth consecutive year, with 60% uninsured, exacerbating the protection gap.

I’ve posted quite a bit about the protection gap created by climate risks, changing customer needs, the mobility revolution, and cyber threats. It was the focus of our 2024 Insurtech Vanguards InsurPitch competitions in Australia and Ireland, as well as the US.

As the frequency and severity of extreme weather events continue to rise, carriers need proactive, real-time intelligence in risk management. Witness the property risk intelligence provided by Vanguards (and 2024 US InsurPitch winner) Faura, which leverages advanced analytics to help carriers write good property risks in disaster-prone areas while helping policyholders reduce risk. Faura’s solutions reduce loss-cost volatility by up to 20% and narrow the protection gap.

FireBreak meanwhile, addresses the insurability crisis by incentivizing homeowners through proprietary risk mitigation data, directly impacting insurability and reducing premiums. Canadian insurtechs Manifest Climate, EcoClaim, and Belgium-based Eco Repair Score operationalize sustainability and climate resilience.

Claims CX: Making the Moment of Truth Matter More

Claims interactions define customer perceptions, particularly after catastrophic losses. According to the 2025 Property Claims Satisfaction Survey from J.D. Power, 2024 saw repair cycles extend to 32.4 days, the longest in nearly two decades. Meanwhile, satisfaction among claimants who also saw premium increases dropped nearly 14% compared to claimants’ whose rates remained the same.

Recent Vanguard additions in this space are reshaping claims experiences to prioritize speed, empathy, and precision. Feathery.io, for instance, revolutionizes claims data collection through dynamic, AI-powered forms, simplifying customer interactions and expediting claims processing. Meanwhile, Synergetics.ai deploys GenAI-driven avatars, enhancing claims intake through interactive, real-time communication.

For displaced policyholders, Sinistar connects claims teams with a vast network of over 32,000 temporary furnished housing options, streamlining the relocation process and improving customer satisfaction. For injuries, ClarityCare and its AI-powered utilization management platform streamline first-pass review to help process cases 4X faster—reducing follow-ups and increasing trust in injury claims. All while reducing operational expenses by up to 70%.

Additionally, amaise harnesses generative AI to efficiently manage medical records for injury claims for high-net-worth segments, while TalkTerms streamlines the resolution of complex claims disputes, mitigating legal and regulatory challenges.

Operational and Customer Insights: Working Smarter

As operational complexity increases, data availability alone is insufficient without actionable insights. Bain estimates AI-enhanced decision support represents a $100 billion market opportunity for insurers. This is especially true as carriers face data fatigue and rising service-level complexity. Real-time, AI-driven decision support is rapidly becoming the industry’s next leap forward—and so are insurtechs that enable it to happen.

Look at the past year’s crop of new Vanguards like DvSum, which is focused on addressing critical gaps in data management, enabling insurers to govern, monitor, and leverage data more effectively for improved decision-making. Lazarus AI excels in document understanding, extracting structured insights from unstructured formats like PDFs, instantly enhancing underwriting and claims responsiveness.

Dublin, Ireland-based CodeEast further refines data management, accelerating rating, pricing, and underwriting for commercial lines. Sydney, Australia-based myVal uses AI-powered image recognition to improve home contents valuation and insurance outcomes. And Vanguards like Raleigh, NC-based ProNavigator and London, England’s mea Platform simplify information retrieval across dispersed data sources, ensuring underwriters and claims professionals have timely, precise insights.

Underwriting Intelligence: Redefining Risk and Responsiveness

For all the investments in AI and digital transformation in recent years, underwriters still spend too much time gathering, cleaning, and interpreting data—and not nearly enough time making high-quality decisions.

This is especially true in commercial lines, where as much as 60% of underwriting submissions never even get reviewed. AI and advanced analytics play a critical role in both personal and commercial lines underwriting by helping carriers quickly and accurately understand and price risk.

On that score, Zurich, Switzerland-based  K2g AG uses AI-driven risk models and telematics to help carriers streamline risk assessment, adjust pricing strategies in real time, and stay ahead of market shifts with continuous, automated portfolio monitoring.

Pitch Perfect: Fueling a Competitive Edge

Gallagher Re’s analysis of the $4.25 billion invested in the insurtech space over the past year mirror focus on AI capabilities embodied by most of the new members of the Insurtech Vanguards program.

In the year ahead, the Guidewire Insurtech Vanguards incubator program and its global pitch competitions will continue to spotlight these innovations, providing carriers access to transformative technologies as quickly as they arise. Looking ahead, agility in adopting breakthrough technologies remains critical. With the Insurtech Vanguards program, Guidewire empowers insurers to leverage innovation quickly, effectively, and strategically, ensuring competitive strength today and for what’s next.

Learn more about the Insurtech Vanguards program here. Catch up on our latest pitch competition, held for the first time in London, here. And be on the lookout for upcoming competitions in Toronto, Canada and our fourth annual US event during ITC Las Vegas this fall.