Level 46, Gateway Building, 1 Macquarie Place, Sydney NSW 2000

T: 61 2 8274 8600

Splash Pacific Life Re Australia’s Quarterly Newsletter

Volume 4, August 2018

NEOS Life launched to the market reinsured by Pacific Life Re and powered by UnderwriteMe

A message from our Managing Director Andrew Gill

NEOS Life, a new entrant to the life

insurance market, has chosen Pacific Life

Re as its partner reinsurer and

UnderwriteMe as its underwriting

platform. NobleOak will be the insurer for

the NEOS Life insurance product.

NEOS Life is focused on the Australian

retail advice life insurance market. The

company has spent considerable time

augment ing Underwr i teMe’s

Underwriting Rules Engine (URE) in order

to provide a fast and flexible process for

advisers and customers whilst being

rational in terms of its risk selection.

In testing to date, UnderwriteMe has

delivered Straight Through Acceptance

Rates upwards of 60%, compared with a

market average of around 15% - 20%. In

addition to this, NEOS Life has built, with

Pacific Life Re, a simpler application form

which had its genesis from similar forms

developed by UnderwriteMe in the

United Kingdom.

Advisers are struggling with the growing

burden of increasing regulation and

compliance. In partnership with NEOS

Life and NobleOak, our technology will

make it easier for advisers to provide life

insurance solutions to their valued

customers.

Welcome to the August edition of Splash, Pacific Life Re Australia’s quarterly newsletter. In this issue, our

Director of Research and Development, Stephen Edwards, provides some insight into Pacific Life Re’s

ongoing global cancer research project. We also have a lot of business news to share with you, having

experienced an exciting period of change recently.

We have partnered with a new entrant to the life insurance market and also recently announced internal

promotions within our Client Strategy and Solutions team. Please don’t hesitate to get in touch with me,

should you have any queries about any of these changes. We hope you enjoy reading Splash!

Tyson Johnston has been promoted to the role of Head of Client Strategy and Solutions,

reporting to the Managing Director. In his new role, he will have responsibility for Pacific Life Re

Australia’s strategy, marketing and sales, as well as developing new solutions for clients. Minico

Xia, who joined Pacific Life Re Australia as a Product Manager in 2017, has been promoted into

the role of Group Insurance Director, reporting to the new Head of Client Strategy and

Solutions.

Our Chief Medical Officer, Dr William Monday, featured in the latest edition of Best’s Review Magazine. He discusses how the

medical community is studying individuals’ genomes to not only cure diseases but also assess and prevent illnesses before

they occur. Follow this link for the full article.

MLC Life Insurance, UnderwriteMe’s first major client in Australia, saw their ‘straight-through’ acceptance rates for life

insurance cover jump 300 percent since implementing the new underwriting platform in April 2018.

Matthew Larkin and Tyson Johnston presented at the Financial Services Forum on “Removing Inefficiencies in the Life

Insurance Value Chain”. You can view the presentation here and don’t hesitate to get in touch if you wish to discuss our

global findings on these topics.

Latest news Pacific Life Re Australia

Level 46, Gateway Building, 1 Macquarie Place, Sydney NSW 2000

T: 61 2 8274 8600

Level 46, Gateway Building, 1 Macquarie Place, Sydney NSW 2000

T: 61 2 8274 8600

Splash Pacific Life Re Australia’s Quarterly Newsletter

Volume 4, August 2018

Pacific Life Re’s Global Cancer Research Project Stephen Edwards, Research Director

Pacific Life Re conducts a global cancer

study to keep up to date on emerging

trends and to estimate the changing

impact of cancer on its portfolio

worldwide. Taking a global view of things

like cancer helps to identify and prepare

for issues before they emerge.

As you would expect, every country’s

experience differs. Lifestyle factors,

cancer treatment strategies, genetics

and environmental differences create

large discrepancies between countries

for specific cancer sites.

For example, South Korea’s thyroid

cancer incidence rate in 2011 was

approximately 15 times that of the rate in

1993. The introduction of government-

funded thyroid scans is cited as a key

cause. Concerns around over-diagnosis

and unnecessary surgery have led to

changes in the country’s approach to

thyroid cancer screening, and

subsequently the rate has reduced since

2011. However, the impact on the

insurance market was severe and

projecting future trends in thyroid

incidence remains a key concern for

pricing.

On the other hand, male cancer

incidence in Hong Kong was one of the

only cohorts in our study that showed

consistent improvement over a long time

horizon. Reducing smoker prevalence

has reduced lung, stomach, and oral

cancer, while a hepatitis B vaccination

program has been linked to reduced

liver cancer rates. Isolating the trends by

cause and projecting future

improvements in them separately can

lead to very different estimates for future

Hong Kong cancer incidence.

The Hong Kong and South Korea

examples provide lessons for Australian

product development and pricing. For

example, while recent improvements in

Australian melanoma incidence rates at

younger ages could point to the efficacy

of public awareness campaigns, it could

also be affected by higher rates of

immigration at those age bands. The

emergence of self-screening apps for

skin cancer could also lead to a situation

like South Korea’s thyroid cancer

epidemic - creating unexpected future

increases in claim costs for insurers.

Australian insurers should be considering

experience worldwide not just when they

set future claim expectations, but also

when updating or refining product

definitions, particularly for trauma cover.

While a global study isn’t an easy

exercise it’s well worth the investment –

and we are happy to share what we’ve

learned with our clients to help them with

this.

Would you like to get in touch?

If you would like to discuss any of the articles further or talk about how we can support your business, please contact our Head of Client Strategy and Solutions, Tyson

Johnston at tyson.johnston@pacificlifere.com. For media enquiries please contact Andrew Gill, Managing Director at andrew.gill@pacificlifere.com.

Cancer Incidence Rates by Year South Korea vs. other countries

Total Cancer Incidence split by Site and Gender Australian Insured Population Mix