LEXINGTON, MA -- 07/10/07 --
FirstBest Systems(TM), developer of advanced
Underwriting Management Systems(TM) that enable commercial insurance
carriers to profit from better underwriting, today announced the formation
of an Underwriting Knowledge Center. Led by insurance industry experts with
a significant amount of insurance expertise, the new group will offer
customers deep, focused insurance industry knowledge and best practices to
enhance the core business process of underwriting.
FirstBest Systems is a new software company formed to address the need in
the commercial insurance industry for a web-based solution, specifically
designed to address today's underwriting challenges. With the formation of
the Underwriting Knowledge Center, FirstBest now offers a complete business
solution combining state-of-the-art software and industry best practices,
to help carriers achieve profitable growth and greater customer intimacy
with agents.
The FirstBest Underwriting Knowledge Center will be led by Robert R. Lukas,
Vice President, Underwriting Sciences. With more than 30 years of insurance
industry and IT experience, Lukas is an expert on establishing effective IT
governance models for property and casualty (P&C) enterprises and
exploiting technology to create revenue-generating opportunities. Lukas is
the former CIO of the Hartford's Property/Casualty Company. He founded and
directed the Hartford Technology Services Company, a Hartford subsidiary
that provides technology services to the Hartford and other corporations.
He also served as president of CLA Corp., a Hartford subsidiary that
marketed insurance software and technology services to other insurance
carriers.
The Underwriting Knowledge Center team also includes:
-- Kelly Lynch, FirstBest Senior Director, Underwriting Sciences,
Chartered Property Casualty Underwriter (CPCU). Lynch brings more than 15
years of insurance industry experience to FirstBest, including underwriter
for Kemper National Insurance Company, loss control engineer for highly
protected risk (HPR) property accounts with Industrial Risk Insurers,
manager of facultative and treaty business for Swiss Re America's
Engineered Risk Department (ERD), and manager of Quanta U.S. Holdings'
program division, where she had operational and underwriting oversight over
more than $175 million of direct written premiums written by Managing
General Agents on behalf of Quanta.
-- Paul Cummings, FirstBest Vice President, Engineering. Previously, as
vice president of worldwide software development for the S1 Corporation, he
led the creation of S1's Enterprise Insurance product line and managed
development of other Web-based financial services products.
-- Leonard C.G. (Geoff) Smith, CPCU, FirstBest Strategic Advisory Board.
With over 35 years of insurance industry experience, Smith was most
recently executive vice president, CIO and board member of ePolicy. After a
30-year career at Hartford Financial Services Group, he retired as
president, Commercial Affinity Operations, one of three Hartford North
American Property/Casualty operating companies. His career there spanned
commercial P&C underwriting and sales leadership.
-- William F. (Bill) Cutting, CPCU, FirstBest Business Analyst,
Underwriting Sciences. Cutting brings 25 years' experience in underwriting
management and sales to FirstBest. Previous roles have included production
specialist with Lexington Insurance, a leading P&C insurer; underwriter
consultant with Kemper Insurance Companies; director of underwriting for
RTW; portfolio underwriter for Liberty Mutual Insurance Co.; senior
underwriter with American International Group (AIG); and pricing analyst
with The Hartford Insurance Group.
"Carriers today are looking for a way to unlock the rich knowledge and best
practices they have in their best underwriters to improve the consistency
of underwriting," said John Belizaire, CEO of FirstBest Systems. "We have
created a solution that includes a next-generation product and deep
industry expertise to help solve that problem."
About FirstBest Systems
Founded in 2006, FirstBest Systems delivers advanced Underwriting
Management Systems (UMS) that enable commercial insurance carriers to
profit from better underwriting. FirstBest's UMS is a business solution
provided as a Web-based platform for underwriting all lines of business. It
uniquely delivers straight through processing, exception-based
underwriting, real-time collaboration, knowledge management, a management
dashboard, and an execution platform for predictive modeling -- in one
integrated solution. The deployment of this solution results in increased
revenue and profitability, closer agent-underwriter relationships,
management visibility into the underwriting process, and the continuous
capturing and sharing of underwriting experience and best practices.
For more information, please visit www.firstbest.com.
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Press contact:
Meira Primes
VP Marketing
FirstBest Systems
781.863.6005
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