Hubbard Decision Research showed how standards are worth more than $1 billion per year in the insurance industry. ACORD is a not-for-profit association created by the insurance industry to facilitate the development of standards for its members.
Most major insurance companies in the US and around the world are members of ACORD and they participate in the development of standards to structure and streamline communications when insurance companies, reinsurers, brokers regulators and software development firms need to exchange data.
HDR was asked by ACORD to analyze what the impact of its standards on its members and the entire insurance industry. The analysis included not only time savings and productivity improvements from standards but also how the development of new products and software and their benefits are accelerated when there are known, reusable components. See these links to an ACORD announcement on the findings of the HDR study and a recorded interview of Doug Hubbard by ACORD.
