The combination cyber insurance/technology hybrid companies that have recently emerged may eventually expand beyond cyber to other lines, say some experts, but not everyone agrees.
“Sure, why not?” said Robert Parisi, New York-based managing director and cyber product leader for Marsh LLC. “You could make the logical assumption that if they can evaluate cyber risk, they could learn about other types of risk and play their model and their technology.
There’s nothing that would prohibit that,” although “it would require a lot of work and a lot of assumptions.” “I think they’d be foolish to stick just to cyber,” said Anthony Dagostino, New York-based global cyber and technology practice lead for Lockton Cos. LLC.
“The cyber insurance market is only so large,” and this segment is “doing some really interesting things with data” that can be applied to other lines, including property and directors and officers liability insurance, he said.
“It will happen, but slowly,” said Sidd Gavirneni, co-founder and CEO of San Francisco-based insurtech Zeguro Insurance Services LLC. “There’s not enough data yet to underwrite cyber insurance, and combining it with other insurance policies just makes it riskier.”
Mark Synnott, Chicago-based global cyber practices leader for Willis Re, the reinsurance unit of Willis Towers Watson PLC, said, however, that insurers are attracted to the companies because of their cyber expertise, and it is hard to see these operations moving into insurers’ “traditional turf.”
