At the 10th anniversary of InsureTech Connect (ITC), the theme “A Wonderland of Possibilities” could’ve easily leaned into the fantastical. But this year, what truly stood out wasn’t a whimsical future it was a practical present. ITC 2025 marked a turning point in the insurance industry’s journey from catching up to transformation, to actually owning it.
Instead of lofty AI hypotheticals or buzzword-heavy panel sessions, the tone of the conference was grounded and execution-focused. Leaders weren’t speculating about what might happen, they were showing what’s already working, where it’s being deployed, and how it’s delivering results. If anything, the real wonderland wasn’t in the fantasy of what could be, it was in the clarity of what’s already possible when innovation is driven by human-centered design, operational alignment, and bold leadership.
Leadership: The Core Tech Stack
One of the most defining moments came from Liberty Mutual CEO Tim Sweeney, who didn’t deliver a shiny demo or announce a flashy new partnership. Instead, he gave the room something far more valuable, truth. Sweeney laid bare the reality that today’s insurers face a convergence of threats: climate risk, cyber volatility, legal system abuse, and the exponential growth of generative AI. These pressures aren’t theoretical anymore, they’re crashing into legacy structures that simply weren’t built to move this fast.
He argued that innovation has become an existential necessity and challenged leaders to stop treating it as something that happens in side labs or innovation centers. Real change, he said, starts with building cultures that reward curiosity, tolerate failure, and connect experimentation at the front lines to capital investment at the top. “The best ideas won’t come from the CEO’s office,” Sweeney said. “If they do, we’re in trouble.”
What followed wasn’t vague encouragement, it was a clear directive. Companies need systems where innovation can survive the pressures of scale, structure to support continuous learning, and partnerships that don’t just validate ideas but stretch them. Liberty Mutual is walking that talk, leveraging collaborations with MIT, deploying AI in underwriting and claims, and using operational feedback to drive rapid learning cycles. Innovation, in this new model, isn’t a sideshow. It’s the main act.
The Rise of Right-Time Decisioning
While many have been chasing “real-time data” as a benchmark, a standout panel featuring leaders from USAA, ServiceNow, and WTW flipped the script. They introduced a sharper, more strategic concept: “right-time” data.
The difference is subtle but critical. Real-time data is fast. Right-time data is ready, timed and structured precisely to support decisions at the moment they need to be made. The shift demands a new infrastructure mindset, one built on event-driven architecture rather than massive data lakes, and supported by underwriting systems that can respond dynamically instead of relying on fixed rating tables.
As one panelist described, we’re moving away from retrospection and toward a state of continuous insight. The most forward-thinking carriers aren’t focused on speeding up old systems, they’re redesigning them entirely to support decision ecosystems that behave like responsive software: modular, adaptive, and constantly learning.
Execution Over Hype: Product Launches with Impact
This year’s “Break Your News” stage didn’t disappoint, but the most talked-about launches were the most actionable. Intellect AI introduced an AI-native claims and billing workbench that finally closes the loop between underwriting intent and execution. It’s the kind of foundational play that unlocks more than just efficiency. It enables faster iteration on products, tighter feedback loops, and scalable intelligence across the policy lifecycle.
Hot on their heels, MGT Insurance announced what may be the industry’s first truly vertical, AI-native commercial carrier. With underwriting decisions made in under two minutes and embedded AI supporting every stage of the policy lifecycle, MGT is turning speed into strategy. Backed by a fresh $21.6 million Series B, the company is positioning itself not just as a digital insurer, but as an orchestrated platform designed for scale from day one.
What both launches signal is that the age of standalone tools is fading. The new winners are building full-stack ecosystems designed to support rapid, intelligent, and integrated decision-making.
Agentic AI: Reimagining Roles, Not Just Workflows
Salesforce’s main stage presentation delivered what may have been the clearest vision yet for how AI will redefine insurance not just through automation, but through role transformation.
Their Agentforce platform moves beyond the “copilot” metaphor that dominated last year’s conversation. In 2025, AI isn’t riding shotgun, it’s working alongside you. Agentforce isn’t just summarizing meetings or automating workflows. It’s enabling front-line reps to operate with context, intelligence, and empathy.
The impact is already measurable. At Sammons Financial, Agentforce helped cut contact center attrition nearly in half, from 45% to 20%. The reason? Reps were no longer just fielding calls. They had the tools to solve problems proactively, deliver value in real-time, and make customer interactions meaningful.
As Salesforce put it, agentic AI doesn’t just reduce workload, it restores purpose. And that shift, from automating tasks to elevating roles, may be one of the most profound cultural changes unfolding in the industry today.
Small Language Models, Big Results
While large language models (LLMs) have dominated headlines, a quieter and arguably more strategic innovation came from InsOps Inc. Their launch of an insurance-specific small language model (SLM), designed to run entirely within a carrier’s own infrastructure, may prove to be one of the most impactful advancements shown at ITC 2025.
Unlike general-purpose AI tools, this SLM is schema-trained on carrier-specific data structures, meaning it can answer complex operational questions like “What’s our loss ratio in Texas for class code 377654?” instantly and securely. With no external APIs and zero data risk, the model integrates deeply into the carrier’s environment, transforming how internal teams interact with systems and surface insight.
InsOps even used their model to migrate a large mainframe claims system to Guidewire in under four months. That’s not just modernization. That’s acceleration, delivered safely and scalably.
Modernization Without Breaking What Works
On the modernization front, CAST Software made a compelling case for incremental, intelligent transformation. Rather than pushing the tired “rip and replace” narrative, CAST encouraged CIOs and enterprise architects to focus on clarity, visibility, and alignment. By decoupling value from legacy systems and using architectural intelligence to guide decisions, organizations can evolve without losing operational stability.
This “pragmatic transformation” approach resonated with many attendees, especially those who’ve seen firsthand how disruptive large-scale overhauls can be. The message was clear, you don’t need to blow up your systems to move forward. You just need a smarter way to map value.
Agents Finally Get Their Spotlight
For too long, agents and brokers have been left out of the innovation conversation. ITC 2025 changed that with the introduction of ITC Agents, hosted by Ryan Hanley of Linqura. Hanley delivered a powerful message: “This is where the business starts. Agents belong in the room.”
His advice to producers was clear, don’t waste time on tools that merely automate the grind. Look for platforms that empower your people to be more human, more consultative, and more effective. If you’re not training your team on AI right now, even at the most basic level, you’re creating a skills gap that’ll take years to close.
That sentiment was echoed by Tara Kelly of Splice, who reminded everyone that trust isn’t built during the claims process. It’s built long before, in every quote follow-up, every safety reminder, every check-in. Her company is helping insurers transform those everyday interactions into micro-moments of connection. As she put it, “Commerce happens on a bridge of trust. AI can help build that bridge but only if we use it to be more human, not less.”
The Bottom Line: Are You Building, or Waiting?
ITC 2025 wasn’t about proving that AI is powerful. We already knew that. It wasn’t about confirming that the insurance industry is innovating, anyone paying attention can see that it is.
What this year revealed was something more subtle, but far more important. That leadership, alignment, and execution are the real differentiators now. Technology is no longer the bottleneck. Strategy is. Culture is. Structure is.
Carriers that continue to treat innovation as a bullet point under the CIO’s roadmap will fall behind. Those that redesign around value delivery, speed to insight, and human-centered orchestration will thrive. The technology is here. The use cases are proven. The talent is rising. The only question left is, are you ready to build?
