Exclusive: Insurtechs Terra and Gradient AI partner to strengthen workers' compensation product

(The Insurer) - Insurtech Terra has entered into a strategic partnership with predictive analytics underwriting solutions provider Gradient AI to strengthen its cloud-native platform for workers' compensation carriers with new AI capabilities.

The partnership is meant to bolster Terra’s existing AI capabilities with Gradient’s advanced risk modeling by embedding predictive insights to deliver a more efficient claims lifecycle.

The integrated platform combines Terra’s native automation tools, such as optical character recognition-driven form processing and AI-powered claim note summarization, with Gradient AI’s predictive analytics to enable adjusters to prioritize cases faster, identify high-risk claims earlier and improve outcomes for injured workers.

Terra CEO and co-founder James Benham said the shortage of data available to smaller workers' compensation carriers means many have been pushed out into other business lines, as larger insurers with bundled offerings are also folding workers' comp into their packages.

“Claims adjusters today are buried in paperwork and struggling to keep up with caseloads," Benham said.

"With Gradient AI, Terra empowers adjusters to quickly identify the most critical claims and act decisively. This partnership enhances our mission to bring intelligence, speed and clarity to every step of the claims process."

In an effort to make the product more accessible to smaller carriers, Benham said Terra does not charge any implementation fees and holds off on licensing fees until the tool goes live.

Gradient AI uses claims data to offer predictive underwriting solutions to improve loss ratios.

"The data advantage the big guys have is they see a lot of exposure, a lot of losses," said Stan Smith, founder and CEO of Gradient AI.

Gradient AI has built up its repository through companies that use its technology opting in to contribute their anonymized claims and loss information to a "data pool". In return, they receive access to market insights, he said.

"(The bigger carriers) do have a competitive advantage, unless there's a partnership like ours, where I have data from a lot of these companies, tens of millions of claims and policies, (and) I can help these small companies have a data advantage."

Benham and Smith said the partnership comes at a time when workers' compensation insurance is going through a significant change as it's faced "with outdated systems, complex workflows, and increasing pressure to do more with less".

As such, they said insurers, third party administrators and service providers need smart tools that reduce manual work and deliver actionable insights that the partnership hopes to achieve.