If there’s one part of the interface picture that’s an unabashed success, it’s download. And if there’s one person who has made the greatest contribution to the practical reality of download, it’s Bill Tedrick and the company he founded, BWC. When Tedrick sold BWC to IVANS in 1997, about 150 carriers were using BWC software to support their download (and in some cases, upload) processes.
Tedrick left IVANS last year to take some time off, look around, and see what he might do next. I caught up with Bill recently to hear what he had to say about the current state of interface, where things might go next, and what role he expected to play.
JA: Bill, you’ve been involved in agency/company interface almost since the beginning. What was BWC’s product? And then tell us a bit about BWC and IVANS.
BT: At BWC we wanted to make it very easy for companies to provide download and upload to their agents, so we created an out-of-the box product companies could get up and running with — from concept to production — in 90 days, without much impact on internal resources. We were pretty successful at it, and it became virtually the universal industry solution.
In January 1997 we sold BWC to IVANS and became employees, still working out of Cincinnati. It was a natural move for both parties. IVANS was the big player in interface communications and we had most of the business in the tools to make batch interface work. We both served the carrier end of the process. By combining forces we could provide a more complete solution.
At IVANS, we expanded into e-business solutions generally, doing things like “Web-ifying” carrier legacy systems, looking at ways to solve some industry security issues, and along the way bought APT, which had an upload solution that supported company-specific fields and edits. Over time, IVANS rewrote and improved the APT software and now offer it as WebSEMCI.
We also partnered with Applied on Transformation Station, a solid system, though it hasn’t taken off the way it was expected. I’m not sure what the reason is, but it may have to do with the general slowdown in company technology investment over the last four years.
And by the way, I want to mention that ACORD has been consistently helpful to me, first at BWC and then IVANS. They go out of their way to help newcomers understand the standards and connect them up with other, relevant industry players.
After five years at IVANS, I decided I needed some time off, so I left in April last year. I spent the first six months decompressing, with the expectation that I’d begin to look in many different directions, and probably not insurance, for something interesting to do next; but, I found myself continually drawn back to this industry. On the one hand, the project I’d started with BWC really wasn’t complete, that is, interface still wasn’t universal and optimum. And on the other hand, new technologies were appearing, like Web services, which have the potential to approach the problem in a completely new way. Once you’ve thought about something for a long time, it’s hard to get it out of your blood.
JA: In the interim since you left IVANS, a new kind of interface has appeared on the scene, what I’ve called hybrid interface. It’s a way to bridge agency management systems to carrier Web sites, making it easier for agents to take advantage of them while continuing to use their management systems as their workflow hub. AMS, ebix, SIS, and now even Applied have picked up on this opportunity and it seems to be moving forward quickly. What’s your take on hybrid interface?
BT: It makes a great deal of sense. Carriers will continue to build and expand their agency portals. That’s a given. So it makes sense to help agents take advantage of them. I’d expect hybrid interface to become an important element of the interface picture, along with upload, download, Transformation Station, WebSEMCI, and so on.
Some purists in the industry don’t think we should adopt any solution unless it’s consistent with some imagined ideal. I can understand that point of view. I think it’s important and useful to have in mind and work toward the right kind of industry-wide solution. But I also know that these things take time, and, in fact, may never come to be, so it’s also important to adopt practical, perhaps temporary solutions along the way. Hybrid interface is one of those.
JA: What’s next? Where is interface heading? What should carriers, agents, and vendors pay attention to?
BT: It seems pretty obvious to me that the next generation of opportunities lie in what’s been called remote Web services. The simplest way to describe Web services is as a set of global standards and infrastructure based around the Internet that allows software modules to interact with one another — no matter where they’re located on the planet — to create powerful applications and new user environments.
So, for instance, we’ve been trying to use interface to tie agency and carrier systems together, to move data from one to another. In the future, with Web services it will be possible for agency software to contact carrier software, ask to use some functionality or get some data, and that functionality or data won’t have to be contained in the agency system. Rather than duplicating data and software, we’ll use remote Web services to share these resources. It’s a powerful concept, and Microsoft, IBM, ACORD, and others are working hard on the infrastructure to make Web services practical.
JA: I agree that Web services has potential, but its been very slow to take hold given the heady claims of three or four years ago. It’s turned out to be more complicated than first imagined. The security issues have yet to be solved satisfactorily and it’s not yet clear what kind of business model works for these collections of interacting services. Who makes money and how? Further, I’m skeptical that carriers are going to step up to the plate and play. If agency portals work, why should carriers bother creating more work for themselves by also offering remote Web services?
BT: I agree that the dust hasn’t settled yet and carriers are slow to move sometimes. It may be that Web services will be adopted first by insurance players who are least well served by current technology. I’m thinking of MGAs, for instance. They continue to operate in highly manual environments and most of the attention of the industry has been on standard personal and commercial lines. I suspect that there’s a set of services one could provide that are based on Web services and link together carriers, MGAs, and agents, but at the periphery rather than center of the insurance marketplace.
I think its key to realize that for any Web Service solution to be successful you also have to address interface with the carrier or other originating system. I still believe in the out-of-the box model that minimizes the carriers drain on resources while accomplishing the goal.
JA: Sounds like you’re beginning to formulate an idea for a new business.
BT: I think you’re right.
JA: As you get closer to starting up your next enterprise, let’s talk. My guess is that what you come up with will provide some key interface-type solutions now missing. Thanks for visiting today.
BT: I’ve enjoyed it. I’d like to pursue these Web services related issues a bit further.
Bill Tedrick can be reached at btedrick@cinci.rr.com
© Copyright 2003 by Sound Internet Strategy. All rights reserved
“Carriers will continue to build and expand their agency portals. That’s a given. So it makes sense to help agents take advantage of them.”
“I think its key to realize that for any Web Service solution to be successful you also have to address interface with the carrier or other originating system.”