Dear Ladies and Gentleman,
One day we told that the incorporation of Harbage to EMB would print a different rhythm to the project “Usage Based Insurance“. The recently released documents “Competitive Edge“, “Tips for Identifying Niche Markets for personal, commercial coverages” and “Learn how to prepare for usage based insurance roll-out” are a clear example of this activity. It doesn’t appear that the patent infringement lawsuits have diminished the interest of U.S. insurance companies, and in any case, have encouraged recourse to consultants in order to define the projects.
U.S. Patents.
We have already said that Progressive had denounced Liberty. Now Hughes Telematics Inc has threatened several insurance and technology companies, among which was Xirgo, who is the current provider of Progressive. This one has seen his project threatened and has initiated legal procedures for the revocation of Hughes patents, based on several prior patents, including his own.
Mark Nowotarski has published an interesting study on the application and granting of patents related to U.S. Insurance.
Progressive.
It remains to be very difficult to get information on the evolution of Snapshot project, but we can get an idea looking at page 8 of the presentation to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners along with the Progressive last report to shareholders that reflects an increase of 600,000 policies in the last 12 months. I guess that over 20% of these policies correspond to MyRate. Snapshot approach will have an explosive effect because it eliminates all the disadvantages of the MyRate project.
He was one of the pioneers of PAYD in Europe, the project Safeline has 20,000 car customers and also has a product for motorcycles. Keep in mind that Austria has only 8 million inhabitants. No trouble yourself to find out who is behind its supplier Dolphin. Octo! Of course!
More News.
I recommend the Roger Lanctot chronicle about the recent event in Chicago.
The Electronics Department at the University of Alcala de Henares in Spain, published the broad outlines of a project PAYD. I have followed their work for over 10 years and they own several patents and always bring new ideas. Certainly would be a great collaborator if given the opportunity to participate in a commercial project.
According to the experience in California, it seems clear that it needs something more than just the mileage information to structure an UBI offer.
News on IVOX, SKYMETER, ISO, TOWERGATE, NAVTEQ, EUROFOT, INSURETHEBOX.
These proposals of V.W. and the E.U. can give us an idea of the amount of information that can be taken into account when assessing risk in a car.
As always, I have upgraded my ”Pay As You Drive Directory” and my News Bulletin.
If somebody wants that their address is erased of my distribution list, please return me this message with the word “DELETE”.
Yours sincerely.
Salvador Minguijón Pérez.
Interim Management.
+ 34 649 49 17 70
+ 34 976 59 58 71
Email: s.minguijon@salvador-minguijon.es
Web: http://www.salvador-minguijon.es
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[...] We also see promotional activity by Hughes Telematics Inc (HTI), which holds a patent for the use of OBD interface that is involved in several disputes. [...]
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