Podcasts about Parametric

What if we could detect and suppress wildfires within minutes—not hours? In this episode of All Things Wildfire, we sit down with Carsten Brinkschulte, CEO of Dryad Networks, to explore the cutting-edge technology redefining wildfire defense. From solar-powered IoT sensors that detect fires in their earliest stages to SilverGuard, an autonomous drone system poised to revolutionize fire suppression, this conversation dives deep into the future of wildfire resilience.  We uncover how parametric insurance could reshape wildfire risk models and why collaboration between tech innovators and insurance providers is essential. Carsten shares Dryad's bold vision: a world where wildfires are extinguished before they can spread—using AI, sound wave suppression, and a fast-reacting web of intelligent systems.  Key Takeaways: Dryad's SilverNet detects ignition in minutes—before smoke is even visible. 85% of wildfires are caused by human activity, increasing the need for early intervention. Parametric insurance may unlock faster claims and incentivize prevention tech. Autonomous drones and sound wave suppression may be the future of firefighting. A call for industry collaboration to achieve fully integrated wildfire response systems. If you're in wildfire prevention, insurance, or technology—this is a must-listen episode.

Episode Info The Insurance Industry is facing a number of challenges today. And yet the number of strategies tools we can use to overcome those challenges is equally numerous. That's the spirit of the conversations my good friend Nick Lamparelli and I get into whenever we talk, and now, you get to hear what we talk about because we got together to take over Dave Wechsler's InsurTech Rap a couple of weeks ago, and I am releasing that episode on my show for all of you! Highlights from the Show The interview delves into the current challenges and innovations within the insurance market, focusing on the years 2023 and 2024. Key issues discussed include the impact of inflation, tariffs, and natural catastrophes on the industry. The conversation highlights the structural changes in the market, particularly the broken cycle of rate adjustments post-crises, and the ongoing struggle to balance profitability with affordability for both carriers and consumers. Regulatory challenges, such as difficulties in obtaining rate approvals, are examined, alongside the industry's frustration with continuous rate increases. The discussion also explores innovative solutions like parametric insurance, which offers a viable alternative to traditional models, and emphasizes the importance of diversification in business models, especially for mutual insurers. The interview touches on the economic effects of tariffs on trade flow and currency attractiveness, as well as the long-term cost of capital. Audience interaction enriches the conversation, providing additional insights into market challenges and potential solutions. The session concludes with gratitude towards participants and a teaser for future discussions on community-based insurance solutions. Key Points: Market Dynamics and Challenges: The conversation explores the structural changes in the insurance market, emphasizing the broken cycle of rate adjustments following crises. Challenges in finding a balance between profitability and affordability for carriers and consumers are highlighted. Regulatory and Rate Issues: The difficulty in obtaining rate approvals and the impact of regulatory actions on market dynamics are discussed. The conversation touches on the frustration within the industry regarding continuous rate increases and the need for alternative solutions. Parametric Insurance Solutions: The rise of parametric insurance as a viable alternative to traditional models is explored, noting its benefits and cost implications. Diversification and Innovation: The importance of diversification in business models, especially for long-standing mutual insurers, is emphasized. The potential for creative solutions like reciprocal models and community-based insurance solutions is discussed. Impact of Tariffs and Economic Factors: The conversation delves into the effects of tariffs on trade flow, currency attractiveness, and the long-term cost of capital. This episode is brought to you by The Future of Insurance book series (future-of-insurance.com) from Bryan Falchuk. Follow the podcast at future-of-insurance.com/podcast for more details and other episodes. Music courtesy of Hyperbeat Music, available to stream or download on Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music and more.

Watch this special Aftershow episode with George, Patrick, Dr. Brenda Wells, and a great team of East Carolina University (ECU) Pirates for a quick discussion about the latest … Read More » The post IJA Aftershow Special: Dr. Brenda Wells and her team at ECU! appeared first on Insurance Journal TV.

In this episode of the AgCulture Podcast, Jamie Luce—CEO and Co-Founder of AIR Parametric—breaks down how parametric insurance is changing the game for managing climate risks in livestock and dairy farming. He shares how their data-driven tool, Milkshake™, helps farms get fast support during extreme heat, skipping the usual hassle of filing claims. It's a simpler, smarter way to get coverage, no matter the size of the operation. Tune in now on your favorite podcast platform!Meet the guest:Jamie Luce is the CEO and Co-Founder of AIR Parametric, bringing over two decades of leadership in commercial insurance. With a career spanning Liberty Mutual, QBE, and Jewelers Mutual, he launched AIR Parametric to build new protections for agricultural businesses against extreme climate events. Luce holds deep expertise in underwriting, insurance strategy, and innovation.Connect with our guest on Social Media: LinkedInWhat you will learn:(00:00) Introduction(02:11) Parametric insurance (04:42) Heat index triggers(07:07) Localized data models(10:24) Pricing and policy tiers(17:09) Rise of alt insurance(22:25) Closing thoughtsDiscover the world of agriculture with the "Ag Culture Podcast".  This podcast will be a gateway for those passionate about agriculture to explore its global perspectives and innovative practices.Join Paul as he shares his experiences in the agricultural industry, his travels and encounters with important figures around the world.Available on YouTube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.Subscribe at ⁠http://www.agculturepodcast.com⁠ and keep an eye out for future episodes, bringing insights and stories from the vibrant world of agriculture.

“What do investors want?” is the primary question motivating Graham Sinclair, my guest today and one of the pioneers in sustainable investing: from launching the PRI (Principles in Responsible Investment) into emerging markets in 2007, to working with iconic firms like KLD, IFC, Parametric and AIG on Wall Street. We sat down to talk about Sinclair's course at Harvard Extension School, “Making the Sustainable Investment Case,” which is one half of the Sustainable Finance micro certificate and a benchmark for candidates in the Masters of Sustainability program. New for 2025 is a two-part deep dive on Nature x Investment, drawing on the cutting-edge work of Irina Likhachova in biodiversity and fixed income. Sinclair is once again using “Fund Labs” projects for hands-on experiential learning with four specialist sustainable investment managers: Bill Page + Liz Simmie + Garvin Jabusch + Christofer Halldin. Listeners are in for a treat as Sinclair offers a unique perspective on what investors want.

This podcast episode features the second panel session of the day at our Artemis ILS NYC 2025 conference, which was held on February 7th in New York City. ILS NYC 2025 was Artemis' eighth catastrophe bond and insurance-linked securities (ILS) conference held in-person in New York and saw more than 425 registered attendees enjoying insightful debates from our expert speakers, as well as valuable networking opportunities throughout the day. Attendees from across the globe assembled to hear thought-provoking insights from insurance-linked securities (ILS) market leaders, all under the theme of "Capturing opportunities (established & new)." Our next episode from the ILS NYC 2025 conference features the second panel discussion of the day, which was focused on the expansion of parametric risk transfer investment opportunities in the insurance-linked securities (ILS) market. The panel discussion was moderated by Martin Malinow, CEO, Parameter Climate. He was joined by: Sandra DeSilva, President & CEO, Mythen Re Ltd.; Tanguy Touffut, CEO, Descartes Underwriting; Urs Ramseier, Executive Chairman & CIO, Twelve Capital; and Sandeep Ramachandran, Portfolio Manager, Pier61 Partners. Panellists discussed the evolution of the parametric insurance, reinsurance and risk transfer market, speaking about the history of this segment and its maturity into a parametric ILS opportunity for investors. Speakers also explored what it is that makes parametric risk transfer an investable asset class in its own right, how this can be an attractive portfolio complement for ILS investors and where they expect to see growth in the use of third-party investor capital to support parametric insurance and reinsurance market growth. Listen to the full podcast episode of this parametric ILS focused panel discussion at ILS NYC 2025, for unique insights into developments in the parametric risk transfer market and how these present attractive investment opportunities and an area where the ILS market can expand its scope.

INTRO 1: Morgan Stanley & Parametric just created a new way to invest in women's sports - literally.In episode #136 of

Outline00:00 - Intro03:26 - Development: ETH Zürich07:15 - Growth: Minnesota and Wisconsin36:16 - Productivity: Caltech53:28 - Change: ETH Zürich01:37:18 - Continuity: University of Pennsylvania01:45:36 - OutroLinksManfred's website: https://tinyurl.com/mryp38w3Farewell lecture: https://tinyurl.com/2j5uxsp4Laying the foundations: an advisor's perspective: https://tinyurl.com/ym5e4437Internal model control. A unifying review and some new results:  https://tinyurl.com/vmm7a4tkInternal model control - PID controller design: https://tinyurl.com/rup3azjmRobust process control: https://tinyurl.com/8uhurkubRobust control of ill-conditioned plants: high-purity distillation: https://tinyurl.com/5xfty34cComputational complexity of mu calculation: https://tinyurl.com/24yvvcc7Robust constrained model predictive control using linear matrix inequalities: https://tinyurl.com/3pdk55kkControl of systems integrating logic, dynamics, and constraints: https://tinyurl.com/489ekvsnThe explicit linear quadratic regulator for constrained systems: https://tinyurl.com/mr2e3z83Model predictive control: https://tinyurl.com/2s4dafkd Parametric programming: https://tinyurl.com/2u9vj79yEmbotech: https://tinyurl.com/3f99ks65Embedded online optimization for model predictive control at megahertz rates: https://tinyurl.com/59z3vnb9Donoho's “Bridge from mathematical to digital and back”: https://tinyurl.com/3f9fk73wSupport the showPodcast infoPodcast website: https://www.incontrolpodcast.com/Apple Podcasts: https://tinyurl.com/5n84j85jSpotify: https://tinyurl.com/4rwztj3cRSS: https://tinyurl.com/yc2fcv4yYoutube: https://tinyurl.com/bdbvhsj6Facebook: https://tinyurl.com/3z24yr43Twitter: https://twitter.com/IncontrolPInstagram: https://tinyurl.com/35cu4kr4Acknowledgments and sponsorsThis episode was supported by the National Centre of Competence in Research on «Dependable, ubiquitous automation» and the IFAC Activity fund. The podcast benefits from the help of an incredibly talented and passionate team. Special thanks to L. Seward, E. Cahard, F. Banis, F. Dörfler, J. Lygeros, ETH studio and mirrorlake . Music was composed by A New Element.

If you're a homeowner, you're probably already familiar with the conditions imposed on insurance deductibles when disaster strikes. Cities and towns also have insurance for their losses when the weather gets destructive.Now, mayors along the Mississippi River are piloting a new insurance experiment to better help communities recover after disasters.Delaney Dryfoos, environmental reporter for the Lens Nola, has been covering this story for the Mississippi River Basin Ag and Water Desk and joins us for more.This was a busy year in politics – yes we had the presidential election, but Louisiana had some pretty noteworthy political happenings as well. Gov. Jeff Landry and lawmakers overhauled the state's tax code, and Republican Sid Edwards was elected to be the next mayor-president of East Baton Rouge Parish,  ending a 20-year streak for Democrats. Yesterday, we brought you Part 1 of Capitol Access reporter Brooke Thorington's “politics year in review” with LSU political science professor Robert Hogan. Today we hear the second part, and discuss what's on the horizon for future office seekers in Louisiana.Guaranteed income is the idea that to help some people in need, governments should give them cash, no strings attached. It's long been a pipe dream for many welfare reformers. And in recent years, that dream has been given test runs in cities across the U.S. and here in the South.The Gulf States Newsroom's Stephan Bisaha and WWNO's Aubri Juhasz have been covering the movement. They caught up to discuss how these recent pilots went.—Today's episode of Louisiana Considered was hosted by Adam Vos. Our managing producer is Alana Schrieber. We get production support from Garrett Pittman and our assistant producer Aubry Procell.You can listen to Louisiana Considered Monday through Friday at noon and 7 p.m. It's available on Spotify, the NPR App and wherever you get your podcasts.Louisiana Considered wants to hear from you! Please fill out our pitch line to let us know what kinds of story ideas you have for our show. And while you're at it, fill out our listener survey! We want to keep bringing you the kinds of conversations you'd like to listen to.Louisiana Considered is made possible with support from our listeners. Thank you!

In this weeks episode of Insurance Town I had the honor and privilege of interviewing my good friend and Brother from another mother Brian Thompson of Descartes Underwriters. We talk about all things Parametric Insurance. I have to admit I've been in this industry a long time and I've also had the privilege of interviewing a lot of insurance professionals, but I had not one clue about parametric insurance, Until now!!Brian is so good at breaking this down for me, and for you the audience, I am so thankful he stopped by and hung out with me for a little bit. We laughed and learned alot today! Sponsors:A big shoutout to our amazing sponsors for making this episode possible:Smart Choice: Your go-to partner for independent insurance agents.Canopy Connect: The easiest way to gather insurance data directly from clients.Olde School Marketing: Helping agencies stand out with custom branding and marketing solutions.

Listen in as insurance carrier veteran Jamie Luce, who recently founded a startup, says parametric products are an “untapped” pathway to unleash more value for customers, agents, insurers … Read More » The post Carrier Pro Turns Parametric appeared first on Insurance Journal TV.

Listen in as insurance carrier veteran Jamie Luce, who recently founded a startup, says parametric products are an “untapped” pathway to unleash more value for customers, agents, insurers … Read More » The post Carrier Pro Turns Parametric appeared first on Insurance Journal TV.

In episode 205 of The Big Cruise Podcast, we answer listener Scotty's question about Parametric rolling and share the latest cruise news from Celestyal, Virgin, Oceania, Ponant, Explora Journeys, Carnival, Costa & Princess LISTENER QUESTIONScott from NSW asks: Hi guys, it's Scotty from New South Wales again listener question Parametric Rolling: What it is and How to Avoid it on Very big cruise ships like Icon of the seas Keep up the good work guys. Look forward to hearing all about my questionsFor a more detailed answer on Parametric Rolling click the link below. https://www.tsb.gc.ca/eng/medias-media/fiches-facts/m21p0297/m21p0297-20240731.html CRUISE NEWS Celestyal commits to QatarVirgin Celebration Voyages are back for 2025Oceania unveils new 2026 Voyages PONANT opens Kimberley 2026 season with up to 30% early bird savings!Paddock Club access now available for all guests booking 2025 Monaco Grand PrixCarnival opens up more fun from coast to coast in 26/27Costa Cruises presents between the Earth & Sky of Africa. Sun Princess Debuts All-New Festive Holiday Experiences SUPPORT THE SHOWListen, Like, Subscribe & Review on your favourite podcast directory.Share the podcast with someone you think will enjoy the showBuy Me A Coffee – This podcast is only possible thanks to our supporters, simply buying a coffee keeps us on air. It is just like shouting your mate a coffee, and we consider our listeners close mates. https://bit.ly/2T2FYGX Sustainable Fashion – choose a TBCP design or design your own… all using organic cotton, green energy and zero plastic https://bit.ly/32G7Rdh Follow Chris and his latest videos on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/ChrisFrameOfficial CRUISE MAPS: Capture your Cruise with Perfect Precision. Transform your memories into treasured keepsakes with a GPS-crafted map that tells your story exactly as it happened. Listeners can save 10% on all purchases from the Cruise Maps website. Cruise Maps: www.thecruisemaps.com/tbcpmaps Save 10% using this promo code: TBCPMAPS Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Wesley is CEO and Co-Founder of Sola Insurance based in Atlanta, GA. Wesley comes from a tech background and jumped into the insurance industry at a flood insurance startup where he was tasked with working on the data side with private and FEMA flood maps. Realizing this data was telling us exactly where the damage is, Wesley became obsessed with how data can be used to automatically trigger an insurance claim payout. Sola is starting with supplemental tornado coverage for homeowners but plans to expand into every type of natural disaster to help people cover their deductible and immediate expenses. Sola has already been approved in 15 states as the first ever admitted personal lines parametric product, is fully reinsured through Lloyd's of London, and has partnered with hundreds of insurance agencies across the Midwest and Southeast. Highlights from the Show Wesley came on the show in Season 5 to share more of Sola's story, so be sure to listen to that for more background They recently launched a Wind & Hail product that like a hybrid Parametric/Indemnity proiduct in that it is data-triggered, but has validation of the loss through on-site inspection Their product speaks directly to an issue many insurers and homeowners are facing where providing traditional coverage is no longer financially viable yet homeowners are struggling to afford even high-deductible offerings that leave them excessively exposed – and mortgage lenders aren't comfortable with the coverage gap being created Sola's Wind & Hail product is cheaper than the money most homeowners would save by increasing their Wind & Hail deductible if they live in a hail-prone area, meaning they can get back to more complete coverage while saving money over what that coverage would have cost otherwise This episode is brought to you by The Future of Insurance thought leadership series, available globally from Amazon in print, Kindle and Audible audiobook. Follow the podcast at future-of-insurance.com/podcast for more details and other episodes. Music courtesy of Hyperbeat Music, available to stream or download on Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music and more.

How can parametric insurance transform risk management in an unpredictable world? Munich Re, a leader in reinsurance, is paving the way for innovative parametric solutions addressing weather-related and natural catastrophe risks. Robin Merttens is joined by René Mück, Global Head of Parametric NatCat, and Marcel-Steffen Reif, Global Head of Weather Agricultural Risks, to explore how Munich Re's data-driven insurance products help corporates, public sector entities and industries navigate complex and evolving risks. A key focus of the conversation is understanding the growing demand for parametric insurance, its role in bridging protection gaps and how Munich Re is developing solutions for emerging risks like green energy and agriculture. Key talking points: What does the Capital Partners unit at Munich Re do? How parametric insurance addresses gaps in traditional coverage. Revenue smoothing for industries like renewable energy and agriculture. Client use cases – from supply chain disruptions to hurricane protection. Addressing basis risk in parametric insurance and how to manage it. Expanding applications for parametric solutions, including public sector resilience. Sensor technology and its potential to enhance parametric insurance accuracy. The importance of client education and engagement in driving adoption. If you like what you're hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn. Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning. Continuing Professional Development This InsTech Podcast Episode is accredited by the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII). By listening, you can claim up to 0.5 hours towards your CPD scheme. By the end of this podcast, you should be able to meet the following Learning Objectives: Define the concept of basis risk in parametric insurance and its implications for claims. Summarise the role of client education in fostering adoption of parametric insurance. List the key industries benefiting from parametric solutions, including energy, agriculture and construction. If your organisation is a member of InsTech and you would like to receive a quarterly summary of the CPD hours you have earned, visit the Episode 328 page of the InsTech website or email cpd@instech.co to let us know you have listened to this podcast. To help us measure the impact of the learning, we would be grateful if you would take a minute to complete a quick feedback survey.

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Ola Jacob, Business Development Director for the UK & Ireland at Descartes Underwriting, a specialist Parametric Insurance MGA and Insurer. On today's episode, Ola will provide an educational deep dive into the world of parametric insurance. He'll explain what parametric insurance is, how it differs from traditional insurance, and why it is gaining traction as a data-driven solution to cover risks like natural catastrophes.  Ola will share real-world examples of how parametric insurance has provided significant value to corporate clients and industries adopting this innovative approach as part of their risk management strategies. KEY TAKEAWAYS When I started in insurance I didn't know much about it, but when you strip it down to its bare bones it's the idea of making good on your promise. That was a big draw for me because it felt altruistic. When it's done right, and someone receives their cheque for the claim after it's all gone smoothly is the best feeling in the world. The stigma we get from the bad experiences is what damages the image of insurance. The best solutions are ones that people don't know about, and ones that don't get in the way and make things better. If you're going to create a solution that helps it should have another login or portal, something clunky that gets in people's way, it should be cool and slick like a Rolex. Innovation can't be done on your own, when I won the Insurance Times Technology Champion of the Year Award, it was a reflection of the whole industry and all the people I've met on my journey that have been open to change. I don't think we've done it yet, I think there's so much more change to be had and I'm excited to see how we can push further. The biggest problem in parametric insurance is the name, because it sounds so complicated. But it's actually the simplest form of insurance there is. The Mantra behind all parametric policies is: When a pre-agreed parameter is met then a pre-agreed pay out is made. This forms the backbone of all parametric contracts. That differs from indemnity because indemnity is a promise to put you back in the same condition you were in before the loss, parametric is pretty much black and white. BEST MOMENTS ‘If you add parametric to indemnity it could really be a game changer that could change the face of how we do insurance forever.' ‘I've always wanted to come in and do something to help change insurance for the better with technology.' ‘In parametric products, the parameters must be measurable and independent, something that's not controllable by somebody else, like weather.' ‘Clients recover, using parametric insurance, with 10X less limit than they'd previously because of the speed of payout. And they'd planned how they would use that payout because they already knew what they were going to get if this event happened.' ABOUT THE GUEST Ola Jacob is the Business Development Director for the UK & Ireland at Descartes Underwriting, a specialist Parametric Insurance MGA and Insurer covering Natural Catastrophe exposure globally.  With over 12 years of experience in the London Market Insurance Sector, Ola has worked on UK Retail, Product Recall, Terrorism, Onshore Energy and Parametric insurance. Ola's background in Human-Computer Interaction and Psychology has fueled his passion for developing new approaches to risk transfer and managing risk for clients. As one of the pioneers of parametric insurance, Ola helped build a distribution strategy for one of the first successful parametric solutions in the London Market. In 2024, he was named Insurance Times Technology Champion of the Year for his innovative work. LinkedIn ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

The Daily Business and Finance Show - Sunday, 20 October 2024 We get our business and finance news from Seeking Alpha and you should too! Subscribe to Seeking Alpha Premium for more in-depth market news and help support this podcast. Free for 14-days! Please click here for more info: Subscribe to Seeking Alpha Premium News Today's headlines: A 100% recession call that never came to be Supreme Court rejects request to stay EPA power plant emissions rule The demise of TGI Friday's Goldman predicts a paltry 3% annual return for S&P over the next decade Boeing is said to weigh asset sales to raise much-needed cash TGI Friday's in talks for financing as it prepares for bankruptcy: report Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway lifts Sirius XM stake above 32% Bonds haven't fully priced in 'extreme' election outcomes, Parametric's Patel says Explanations from OpenAI ChatGPT API with proprietary prompts. This podcast provides information only and should not be construed as financial or business advice. This podcast is produced by Klassic Studios Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Guest Nolan Lawson Panelist Richard Littauer | Eric Berry | Justin Dorfman Show Notes In this episode of Sustain, Richard, Justin, and Eric revisit an unreleased interview with Nolan Lawson from 2020. They discuss Nolan's experience as a former maintainer of PouchDB, the emotional labor of being an open source maintainer, and the challenges that led him to step away from such high-profile projects. Nolan also shares his thoughts on the impact of reputation-driven development, open source community dynamics, and his journey towards a healthier relationship with open source. The conversation delves into the candid realities of burnout and the personal sacrifices often made by unpaid open source contributors. Nolan highlights his transition to more sustainable open source practices and his new interests including his work on a Mastodon client called Pinafore. Download now to hear more! [00:01:43] Nolan explains his background with PouchDB and shares his fascination with databases and browser technologies. [00:02:58] Richard shares his personal connection to PouchDB, mentioning how he discovered Nolan through his work on the project. [00:03:26] Nolan talks about his blog post form 2017 titled, “What it feels like to be an open source maintainer,” which reflected on the emotional toll and burnout he experienced for maintaining PouchDB. [00:05:33] Justin reflects on the impact of Nolan's blog post, describing it as a “shot heard around the world” in the open source community. [00:06:48] Eric asks why Nolan and other maintainers stay involved in open source despite the challenges. Nolan explains that reputational benefits and personal interest in the technology were initial motivators for staying involved. [00:10:27] Eric asks Nolan how he realized it was time to step away from maintaining PouchDB. Nolan shares that personal life changes helped him reassess his involvement in open source and reflects on advice he received from other maintainers. [00:14:36] Richard emphasizes the personal and emotional investment many maintainers have in their projects and Nolan acknowledges the privilege of being able to work on open source, but also the challenges it poses for maintainers who feel they cannot leave. [00:21:13] Nolan shares stepping away from PouchDB has improved his mental health and personal relationships and he maintains smaller open source projects. [00:24:00] Nolan explains the importance of being personally invested in a project and realizing when it's time to move on and Justin reflects on his own experience of stepping away from maintaining a project after years of involvement. [00:26:00] Eric asks if funding could have made a difference for Nolan's involvement in open source, and Nolan shares that he avoided funding, preferring to keep his work as a “labor of love.” [00:26:52] What is Nolan currently doing? He talks about maintaining a Mastodon client and focusing on personal projects that bring him joy. [00:30:00] Richard discusses the importance of balancing open source work with personal life and the need for a sustainable approach to maintaining projects. [00:30:46] Eric highlights the vulnerability and self-awareness Nolan has shown in discussing his open source journey, thanking him for sharing his experiences. [00:33:13] Find out where you can follow Nolan on the internet. Spotlight [00:33:41] Justin's spotlight is Metabase. [00:34:16] Eric's spotlight is Parametric. [00:35:08] Richard's spotlight is IPFS. [00:35:22] Nolan's spotlight is fake-indexeddb. Links SustainOSS (https://sustainoss.org/) podcast@sustainoss.org (mailto:podcast@sustainoss.org) richard@sustainoss.org (mailto:richard@sustainoss.org) SustainOSS Discourse (https://discourse.sustainoss.org/) SustainOSS Mastodon (https://mastodon.social/tags/sustainoss) Open Collective-SustainOSS (Contribute) (https://opencollective.com/sustainoss) Richard Littauer Socials (https://www.burntfen.com/2023-05-30/socials) Justin Dorfman X (https://twitter.com/jdorfman?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor) Eric Berry X (https://x.com/coderberry?lang=en) Nolan Lawson Blog (https://nolanlawson.com/) Nolan Lawson Mastodon (https://toot.cafe/@nolan) “What it feels like to be an open source maintainer” (Blog post by Nolan) (https://nolanlawson.com/2017/03/05/what-it-feels-like-to-be-an-open-source-maintainer/) PouchDB (https://pouchdb.com/) Pinafore (https://pinafore.social/) Salesforce (https://www.salesforce.com/) Working in Public: The Making and Maintenance of Open Source Software by Nadia Eghbal (https://press.stripe.com/working-in-public) Metabase (https://www.metabase.com/) Parametric (https://github.com/ismasan/parametric) IPFS (https://www.ipfs.com/) fake-indexeddb (GitHub) (https://github.com/dumbmatter/fakeIndexedDB) Credits Produced by Richard Littauer (https://www.burntfen.com/) Edited by Paul M. Bahr at Peachtree Sound (https://www.peachtreesound.com/) Show notes by DeAnn Bahr Peachtree Sound (https://www.peachtreesound.com/) Special Guest: Nolan Lawson.

According to Yann Barbarroux, Co-founder and CEO of Otonomi, “every year is like starting a new company”. It has been a year since we last caught up with Otonomi, and Matthew reconnects with Yann to discuss how parametric insurance helps mitigate supply chain risks, particularly in situations where traditional insurance falls short. Key topics include: Addressing pain points in maritime freight and global trade Developing and refining parametric insurance products Real-world case studies demonstrating Otonomi's solutions Strategies for managing accumulation risk Yann's expertise in risk management and its influence on Otonomi's approach Expansion of the air cargo market and new maritime product offerings Growing awareness and adoption of parametric insurance Leveraging AI to scale and enhance business operations Otonomi's global expansion plans and future funding strategies If you are interested to learn more about parametric insurance and non-damage business interruption, read our report here. If you like what you're hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn. Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning. Continuing Professional Development This InsTech Podcast Episode is accredited by the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII). By listening, you can claim up to 0.5 hours towards your CPD scheme. By the end of this podcast, you should be able to meet the following Learning Objectives: Explain how AI and developing new tools can help automate tasks within a business. Define parametric insurance and its impact in the perishable goods market. Identify the common issues in the cargo insurance space and how parametric insurance can solve them. If your organisation is a member of InsTech and you would like to receive a quarterly summary of the CPD hours you have earned, visit the Episode 320 page of the InsTech website or email cpd@instech.co to let us know you have listened to this podcast. To help us measure the impact of the learning, we would be grateful if you would take a minute to complete a quick feedback survey.

Join us at PA Talks 68 for an exclusive office tour and interview with Arthur Mamou-Mani, an acclaimed architect renowned for his innovative use of 3D printing and eco-friendly materials. Based in London, Mamou-Mani leads a pioneering architectural practice that combines cutting-edge digital fabrication with sustainable design principles. From creating mesmerizing pavilions like the Galaxia Temple at Burning Man to developing modular structures, Mamou-Mani is at the forefront of a new era in architecture—one where creativity meets environmental consciousness. In this video, we explore his studio's unique approach to design and fabrication, revealing how they push the boundaries of what's possible in sustainable architecture. Check out our weekly courses at the PAACADEMY about AI, computational and parametric design, 3D-Printing, and Metaverse: ⁠https://paacademy.com/courses/ View more news and like this video at: https://parametric-architecture.com Follow us on Instagram: ⁠  / parametric.architecture   Follow us on LinkedIn: ⁠  / parametric.architecture   Follow us on Facebook: ⁠  / parametric.archi   Follow us on Pinterest:   / parametricarchitecture   Follow us on X: ⁠https://x.com/parametricarch/ Listen to the world's best architecture podcast by PA: Youtube:    • PA Talks   Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/tr/podcast... Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4P442GM... © 2024 Parametric Architecture, LLC

I'm joined my Insurance and Underwriting veteran and thought leader, Nick Lamparelli, for this episode as we discuss the ideas in the new white paper I'm publishing, "The Economic Viability of Insurance," available starting today for free at http://www.future-of-insurance.com/profit. Highlights from the Show The approaches we have been using to stresses on underwriting profit historically have been cutting costs (focusing on expenses), taking rate, pulling out of markets or segments These approaches proved insufficient to deal with the scale of macro-level pressures insurers faced in 2023, and I would argue will continue to face going forward, like Severe Convective Storms (SCS, or, mainly, hail) and other Natural Catastrophes driven by Climate Change Social Inflation Supply Chain and Labor Constraints Inflation and more We should be looking at new approaches, including How we think about and respond to risk – tools we use to understand risk, select it intelligently to compete on, and harden it when we do choose to offer coverage Move to next-generation approaches to rating that are more dynamic, allowing us to stay ahead of the need for rate change rather than respond far too late and insufficiently Rethinking the products we offer to cover what have been come extremely different exposures from the ones our current products were designed for These solution can take the form of insurtech software or services; E&S/non-admitted product development; Parametric solutions to coverages no longer viable as indemnity products; and so much more Now is the time to really engage in the idea of doing things differently as we are seeing increasing difficulty in aligning prices that are affordable to buy coverage at with prices that are economically viable to sell it at, meaning the market may begin to fail to clear If that happens, other capital can come in and solve for the need for coverage, increasing the pressure insurers have seen on the decreasing percent of risks that are insured against (measured by NatCat losses that are insured vs. not), as one method) Download the paper today, and share it with your network to get more people talking about how we can push our industry ahead. This episode is brought to you by The Future of Insurance thought leadership series, available globally from Amazon in print, Kindle and Audible audiobook. Follow the podcast at future-of-insurance.com/podcast for more details and other episodes. Music courtesy of Hyperbeat Music, available to stream or download on Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music and more.

Please tune in to this episode of The Building BITE Podcast, as we hear from industry experts about key topics to help you be successful. The Building BITE hosts Chris Epps, LEED AP, and Mike Diercksen, CRIS, welcome back Patrick McBride, Head of Construction Property at Zurich North America. We begin the episode by revisiting our previous discussion with Patrick about Zurich and their evolving Parametric Offering. Patrick takes us through various examples of how the policy has grown, and ways in which he believes it will best impact the market at large. Through this conversation Patrick is able to help our audience better understand the various benefits offered through a Parametric Policy ultimately delivering our audience three key takeaways. 1. Less Talk, More Walk: It is time to lean in and take a deep dive on how Parametric Insurance can elevate your risk management strategy. By taking the time to work with your broker and seek out the quotation process, our industry will begin to elevate their understanding of the product and potentially find new and unique solutions to their risk profiles. 2. Stay Ahead Of Contract Requirements: While it is not yet standard, we are seeing a change in how contracts are being written when it comes to weather delays. Parametric Policies offer a unique solution, both for the contracts of today, and can be custom designed to help accommodate the contracts of tomorrow. 3. Policy Is Still Evolving: While many aspects of the Parametric Policy are still new to the industry, it is certainly not done growing yet. There is an active effort to expand coverage accounting for “Human Elements” such as air quality and extreme heat which is an area of growing need. Accounting for these new types of perils will allow for better alignment with site health and safety, aim to provide indemnity for project costs, and create alignment with other lines of insurance such as Workers Compensation. To learn more about how you can better prepare your firm for the opportunities ahead, listen to our full podcast episode with Patrick on “Demystifying Parametric Insurance.” Please like, share, and subscribe to this podcast!

Montauk Climate is a venture studio that launches and grows startups in the mobility, adaptation, energy, decarbonization, and sustainability sectors. Evan is a serial founder, power trader, board member, and investor with 20 years in the energy sector, including roles as Head of Venture Investing at Riverstone, a $40B energy investment and infrastructure firm. In this episode, you'll learn these four important takeaways and much more. How a venture studio works How he incentivizes experienced corporate executives to help build and lead the startups they launch Why compute is the current of the future, and how AI could be using 10% of global power in the years to come Why adaptive insurance using IFTT parametric functions is needed in a future disrupted by climate change

Riccardo Cosentino takes an ongoing LinkedIn debate with Ian Heptinstall live in this episode of Navigating Major Programmes for a fascinating conversation with one common goal: to elevate major programmes. The pair discuss the use of reference class forecasting, the predominance of strategic misrepresentation, and optimism bias during project estimation—both drawing on their practical and academic experiences to substantiate their points. “One of my concerns, if we think the problem with projects is that our estimates are too light and the answer is to increase the estimates, is that it is a vicious spiral. That just means expected costs will go up and up and up over time. If we separate the three elements of time, and think maybe we missed the target, not because the target was impossible, but our methods of execution were such that it made it very hard to achieve the target. That actually gives us an opening for a virtuous cycle because there are, so called, black swans that show that the same estimates are achievable and can be done reliably. ” –   Ian Heptinstall   Ian Heptinstall combines over 35 years of industry experience with academic expertise, to bring a unique perspective to CapEx & Construction Project Management and Procurement & Supply Chain. As an Associate Professor at the University of Birmingham, Ian focuses on practical methodologies like Theory of Constraints (TOC), critical chain, and collaborative procurement, which he advocates for practically improving performance in various industries. Key Takeaways:The importance of focusing on execution and preparation over quality of estimations  Tipping the Iron Law on its head with collaborative contracting, IPD and alliance contracting  Reference class forecasting in project management: advantages and limitationsImpact of strategic misrepresentation and optimism bias; the political influence on project estimates and management  If you enjoyed this episode, make sure and give us a five star rating and leave us a review on iTunes, Podcast Addict, Podchaser or Castbox. The conversation doesn't stop here—connect and converse with our LinkedIn community: Follow Ian Heptinstall on LinkedInFollow Navigating Major Programmes on LinkedInFollow Riccardo Cosentino on LinkedInRead Riccardo's latest at wwww.riccardocosentino.com Transcript:Riccardo Cosentino  0:05  You're listening to Navigating Major Programmes, a podcast that aims to elevate the conversations happening in the infrastructure industry and inspire you to have a more efficient approach within it. I'm your host, Riccardo Cosentino. I bring over 20 years of Major Programme Management experience. Most recently, I graduated from Oxford University Saïd Business School, which shook my belief when it comes to navigating major programmes. Now it's time to shake yours. Join me in each episode as I press the industry experts about the complexity of Major Programme Management, emerging digital trends and the critical leadership required to approach these multibillion-dollar projects. Let's see where the conversation takes us.   Riccardo Cosentino  0:53  Hello, everyone, and welcome to a new episode of Navigating Major Programmes. I'm here today with Ian Heptinstall, who is Associate Professor in Programme and Project Management at the University of Birmingham and he's joining me today from Birmingham, I assume. How are you doing, Ian?   Ian Heptinstall  1:09  Hi, Riccardo. Not quite Birmingham, I live in Cheshire. So I'm closer to Manchester or Liverpool than Birmingham.   Riccardo Cosentino  1:15  Okay.   Ian Heptinstall  1:16  But fortunately, most of my students aren't at Birmingham either, they're all over the world. Riccardo Cosentino  1:21  And I mean, maybe just for the audience, you and I connected a few times on LinkedIn exchanging views, exchanging comments on various posts on various topics. And so I think we finally, I think you finally prompted that we could have a more productive conversation on the podcast rather than on comments on LinkedIn, which is always helpful, but probably not the most conducive way of having a conversation. And so why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself?   Ian Heptinstall  1:48  Exactly, thank you, Riccardo. I am Ian Heptinstall. I'm a late career academic, I've been working in academia at the University of Birmingham now for five years, primarily in a teaching role, although I've started to add some research elements to that. And I currently teach on an MSc program that's delivered to part-time students who study by distance learning. So my students are working in project organizations on projects all around the world. And they want to add to that master's level insight. And as we were chatting too before, our focus in the UK is that at master's level, the key component of that is critical thinking, critical analysis, critical thinking, understanding the evidence behind ideas. But before I joined academia, I had 35 years or so in practical experience. I qualified as an engineer. I started working in the chemical industry in the mid-80s, mostly in project-related roles, either managing small projects or manufacturing facilities, and managing larger projects, being a technical expert, often supporting projects. That was back in the days when project owners had a self-delivery capability, so they had their own engineering organizations. Interestingly, in the 90s, the company I worked for was known as ICI, which doesn't really exist anymore. But it was the third largest chemical company in the world, so-called bellwether of the U.K. business environment and the U.K. stock market. But during the 90s, it was one of the many organizations that started to sort of what Professor Stuart Reid calls "hollowing out," that in-house capability of employees was reduced with a view to what we can but that service in as and when we needed it. And actually, in the late 90s and early 2000s, client organizations could buy that in because the contractors and consultancies had ex-employees there who had got that 20 years of experience of how to think like a project owner and what impact that had on managing the project through its own lifecycle. So that gave me the chance to see projects from the owner's perspective and a supplier's perspective. Later in the 90s, I was involved in one of the first collaborative contracted project alliances in the U.K. that wasn't in the oil and gas industry. And now, I don't understand why all project procurement is not done collaboratively using project alliances. But that's not the topic for tonight's discussion.  Riccardo Cosentino  5:08  Yeah, that's another podcast. That's another long podcast. You and I exchanged on this a few times.   Ian Heptinstall  5:14  Yeah, definitely.   Riccardo Cosentino  5:17  So what are we talking about today, then? Ian Heptinstall  5:20  We, as you said, we had some chats on LinkedIn about the ideas of the use of reference class forecasting, the predominance of strategic misrepresentation, optimism bias during project estimation, all wrapped up into what I've started calling the optimistic estimate hypothesis. In the debts, a proposed way that project environments work. The idea being because the data shows that most estimates, sorry, most projects fail to achieve their targets, Flyvbjerg made famous as the Iron Law of projects, was the Iron Law of mega project management, but became projects, that is about over time, over budget, under benefits, over and over again. And I think there's a significantly strong range of data that says a large proportion of projects fail to hit their own targets. So my argument wasn't with that conclusion. What I'm calling the optimistic estimate hypothesis says the reason for that is that the targets themselves were always impossible to achieve. And because they're impossible to achieve, that's why we never hit them. And therefore, the solution to that is to stop impossible targets being associated with projects when they get approved. And then the proposed intervention is using a technique known as reference class forecasting or a variation of reference class forecasting. So not always based on absolute values but relative percentage performance, which is another concern of the implementation of the method. It basically says, let's make sure that the target is at least compatible to targets we've had in the past. And on face value, I've got no issue with that. If, like me, you've come up from fairly mature project management and engineering environments, one of the estimating methods that has always been used is based on past performance. Riccardo Cosentino  7:56  Benchmarking.   Ian Heptinstall  7:57  Yeah. It's not performance benchmarking in the true sense of the term, it's taking your own data and seeing how compatible it is. Parametric estimating is a method, so long as you've got the feedback cycles from actuals that keep your estimating databases up to date. Now maybe tying into the observation about the hollowing out of project-owning organizations, maybe that feedback loop of capturing actuals and feeding it back into estimating data was broken. I don't know, you're probably more closely associated with that than I am. Professional estimators should not be naive of real estimating data in the past. I can't see it just as being biased from professional estimators. Amateur estimators, I can understand how they would be naive and miss things, but not professionals. Riccardo Cosentino  9:02  Look, I'm a big subscriber of your theory. I am 100% in agreement with you. In fact, I think your theory or thesis has got a lot of strength and in fact.   Ian Heptinstall  9:21  Can we clarify which one because I don't think the optimistic estimate hypothesis is valid. I'm just describing what it is. We're here for me to fix some holes in it.   Riccardo Cosentino  9:31  So, I actually think it's, I think it's actually very valid. And the reason I think it's very valid, because in my experience, I have always looked at a project, you know I've 25 years experience in this industry, and I always wondered from a purely technical standpoint, if you had unlimited access to data or if you have a lot of data and you have a lot of experience and you have a lot of experienced individuals, you can approximate an estimate. However, historically, or my experience was that all of the projects I worked on were over budget, all of them. So I could not understand how very capable, very intelligent human beings, with great experience could not estimate a closer to the actual. Because statistically speaking, I mean, if it was random, it will be 50/50. Right? You know, sometimes.   Ian Heptinstall  10:33  Why? There's many phenomena in the world that are not normally distributed. So why would we expect it if it was really random? But I don't think it is random? I think it's (inaudible). Riccardo Cosentino  10:48  I don't think it is random either. But that's what I'm saying. It's like, if it was random, it would be 50/50. Right? So if he was really, if it was impossible to estimate something, or really, really, really difficult to estimate something, then it will be a random outcome, which will be a 50/50. But that's not a problem we have because the majority of the projects are over budget, right? It's not, or at least the mega project. Let me define it a bit, a bit better, it's not really the mega project that I have experience with.   Ian Heptinstall  11:25  Shall I give you a mega project that smashed the reference class?   Riccardo Cosentino  11:31  Yes.   Ian Heptinstall  11:33  Anyone who travels a lot long distances will know Embraer who work along with Bombardier, make the sort of medium-sized passenger jets, with Boeing and Airbus on the much bigger jet. The reference class for designing, developing and bringing to operations a new passenger jet was between 80 and 100 months. And in the new jets that have been produced the century since the turn of the millennium, many have estimated six years, but they've all taken about eight years. Embraer estimated five years and completed the project seven weeks early. So had they planned and achieved to the reference class, they'd have brought the second generation E-jets, the E2 jets to market just before COVID struck. As it is now, the E2 jets have had, for them, record sales performance and one of the most efficient in their class on the market at the moment. So they didn't follow the reference class. And it's extremely complex to about a four to $5 billion project. Riccardo Cosentino  13:08  And I don't, okay, I think, I think, I don't, I think we were saying, I think I was trying to explain why I believe that the, how do you call it, the optimism estimate hypothesis, because it resonates with, why it resonates with me is because I think there is something systemic in the way the estimates are put together. I couldn't put my finger to it before I started reading, got myself educated on the topic. And that sounds a fairly rational explanation that, you know, strategic misrepresentation and optimism bias play a role in that. The reference class forecasting, I think I need to clarify, because I would never make an estimate out of a reference class forecaste. Like, that's not how you estimate things. And I think when you don't have the certainty, when you're talking about things where you making assumptions, you're never going to be 100% correct. So the way, personally, I think you have to do it and this is done in other industry, you triangulate, you know, you start from a bottom up, then you do a top down and then you start layering on qualitative factors and then at the end, you make a decision on what number to pick, but it's a decision based on on multiple parameters. And to me, reference forecasts, you know, I give the example many times about the mergers and acquisition industry, right? In M&A, you start with the discounted cash flow, lets you bottom up estimate of how much your company's worth and then, but whenever you do a DCF you need to make assumptions you know, you got to predict what the revenue growth over the next five years is going to be, blah, blah, blah. And so those assumptions might or might not be right. So you have one data point, then you have another data point, which is your reference class forecast. So in the finance industry, it's going to comps ratio, comps analysis, where you're looking at similar companies. You're looking at how much they're worth on the stock market and you trying to draw similarity. And that's your second data point that will be different from your bottom up. It'd be your top, right? So now you got two data points on trying to identify what a company is worth, and the worth of a company is very subjective as well. So then you got to layer in your qualitative analysis. So to me, yeah, I'm not here to debate the reference class forecast. It is an estimating tool. I'm here to debate that there is optimism bias and the risk strategic measure representation. And so what do we do about that? Ian Heptinstall  15:56  I agree that those things exist. The optimism bias, I'm not sure. I'm still still thinking about that bit. Because if you, in reading the literature, a strong link is made to the work of Kahneman and Tversky and Daniel Kahneman's introduction of the term optimism bias and estimates. And what's interesting is if you look at, Kahneman use as an example that he was involved in developing a new educational course and textbook in Israel, and when you read it through, the bad with retrospect estimates were from the non-experts, the expert in the room knew it would take seven years and had the reference class in their head. But they were not, you know, they were in a support role. So actually, the expert estimate was quite good. It was the amateur estimate that was deemed to be optimistic. But when thinking about that, it seemed to me that when we're talking about time and money, either spent or estimated, they, an estimate will have three components. The first component is what it is feasible to do with it. The perfect position. Then there's another set of factors that relate to things outside your control, outside influences, unknowable risks and things that could emerge that have an impact on how long something will take. But there are two separate components. There's actually a third component particularly relevant when we're talking about projects, and that the whole collection of, of managerial practices of how we go about doing the thing, so that the time that we estimate and the time that it takes, I like to see us having at least those three major components. Now, the "iron law of projects" tells us that the total time estimate was less than it actually took us. I think we get much more insight, if we think okay, well, which of those three components had the biggest role to play? Was it, it being feasible or unfeasible? Was the estimate that bad it was physically impossible to do? Were there things that were unreasonable that professionals to have known about in advance? Were there the black swans, so to speak? And if there were, at least that explains to us where the issue arose? Or was it how we go about managing and implementing our projects? Are they inherently inefficient? Are they the reason that we struggle so much to deliver to our estimates? So, I'm questioning is it the feasibility of the estimate that's wrong? Or is it how we've gone about doing it? Because in the field of construction capital projects, the methods around the world are fairly consistent. You know, where I've done my straw polls over my career, I see great levels of similarity. People often, "How do you know so much because you've never been to our country before?" Colombia, you're not that different. How do you know African oil and gas industry? I've had the same conversations. Because I've said you're not as different as you think you are. But I think that third element is where the differences arise. Now, an analogy that I often use is if we think about the winning a marathon, world class athletes have no problem running a marathon in two and a half hours. Now, if I estimate that I will run my first ever marathon in two and a half hours, that estimate is not unfeasible. It's very unlikely. But it's unlikely because of the managerial aspects. Will I put the time and effort into the training? Will I do the preparation? Will I drink less and eat better food? Will I? So it's how I go about preparing for the marathon. One of my concerns if we think the problem with projects is our estimates are too light, and the answer is to increase the estimates, that's a vicious spiral. That just means expected costs will go up and up and up over time. If we separate the three elements of time and think maybe we missed the target, not because the target was impossible, but our methods of execution was such that it made it very hard to achieve the target, that actually gives us an opening for a virtuous cycle because there are so-called black swans that show that the same estimates are achievable and can be done reliably. We touched upon the area of collaborative contracting, IBD, project alliancing. This project from hundreds of real-life projects that have tipped the iron law on its head, you probably know, well know the Walker Hartley and Mills paper from 2013 from Australia, they had, 4% of projects went over budget, and about 20% went over time. So 90% were on or under budget 75% were on or under time. And all they changed was how the projects was procured. Riccardo Cosentino  22:13  So you're not going to get an argument from me on on that topic because I do believe, I, you know, another hypothesis, I do believe that collaboration is the answer when you're dealing with complex projects. However, just going back challenging a little bit on the is it the estimate was not feasible to begin with, is it actually the execution, if we increase the budgets to begin with, are we just to even cover the poor execution. I'm paraphrasing what you're saying. But, having said that, well, yeah, and this, this is more on the, you know, when you are dealing with lump sum, turnkey contracts rather than Alliance contract, where ultimately, a client comes up with an estimate, right, they have their own estimate, they have a budget, and especially for public sector clients, those budget are, even are fully disclosed and known in ballparks. And now you have a contractor trying to win the work. And, I think we talked about this, before we came online is you know, the contractor knows that in order to win the contract will have to be near or below the client estimate. And so now, the optimism bias, the strategic misrepresentation is perpetuated in the bidding process by the contractors because they need to secure the work. Right? So in in an environment where you have lump sum turnkey fixed price, I do think it matters to start with the right budget, because that dictates the behaviors of the parties in the following steps.   Ian Heptinstall  23:57  But what is the right budget? If you want a budget that is very feasible to be achieved? If people work in a particular way, yes. But then you risk just wasting lots of money because a fixed price lump sum contract is that what it will cost you whether it's needed or not. And yeah, if there weren't these high-risk pressures on the participants to sort of play games, hide things, not be totally open and honest. And one of my concerns with the idea of strategic misrepresentation and the term deception, these people are being deceptive, no, they're playing by the rules of the game that are set in. Now, as Eli Goldratt once said, "Tell me how you measure me, and I'll tell you how I will behave. If you measure me in a dumb way, don't complain about my behavior." And I think that's what we're observing in many of the practices in the construction sector where owners are using processes and then they're complaining when they don't win, or change the rules of the game or the approach they take is to get better at this adversarial aggressive game. So we see projects where the most experienced, the most capable and the most highly-salaried individuals are those trying to control and police the contractual loopholes and administrating and nail everything down, and the lawyers, the commercial managers, the senior (inaudible). Yep. A fortune is being spent on people who are not thinking about   Riccardo Cosentino  26:00  Solving problems. Ian Heptinstall  26:01  How do we get this hospital built quickly? How do we get this hospital built so that it's open and treating people 18 months sooner than we have in the past? Or that we can have 20 more beds, or that we can free up some money to employ so many more healthcare practitioners? It's focusing on the skills on the wrong thing. And actually, I think the industry is going to have a big problem if we get our way and collaborative contracting becomes the norm. What are we going to do with the hundreds of thousands of professionally qualified contract police? That's what a lot of people do. Riccardo Cosentino  26:46  Ian, again, I'm not gonna argue with you, because on that you and I agree, 100, like, to me, I think you said it and I always say it, like, there are resources on projects that add no value or solving problems for the success of the project. And so redirecting the the effort to those results, or redirecting those resources, to more meaningful, yeah, as I said, a lawyer, you know, a claim against the client does not make concrete being poured faster, you know? A schedule analysis in order to substantiate a claim does not make concrete being poured faster. Ian Heptinstall  27:29  And actually, the the issue with that is I think that the skills and the capability to manage the detail flow of work so that concrete is poured faster and worked on sooner, that sort of logistics flow management capability is also petrifying. Now, projects that are getting into techniques and methods like lean construction, are starting to work on that, or project production management are starting to bring in some of those skills and knowledge of how to how to manage the flow of work. But it's suddenly become a niche rather, whereas it should really be core. And the core skill is actually contract administering and locking up (inaudible).   Riccardo Cosentino  28:23  No value add, right? There is no value add to the ultimate goal, which is building infrastructure.   Ian Heptinstall  28:29  Back to the strategic misrepresentation, maybe. Riccardo Cosentino  28:30  No, I actually wanted to probe you on this, because I've had a few people in the past challenging me, and you and I have exchanged messages on this topic. But you know, one of the big criticism, and this is a small parenthesis because this is not what we're talking about today, but like the cost certainty, right? You know, I have people telling me, well, you know, if you don't have a fixed price contract, you don't have cost certainty. Ian Heptinstall  28:58  And they have got evidence that the contracted price is the final price. I have not seen that evidence. And whenever I ask experienced practitioners, they say none of the final price is always more than the tender price. So if you want cost certainty, put so much padding in there that everybody can fill their boots. But if you're in the public sector, that's almost malfeasance. Yeah, just just wasting taxpayers money just so that you can have an easy life. That's not what a professional job should be about, in my view. And I think the important point in there is focusing on reliability. Are you hitting our targets? The only thing that we can do is we take the target as sort of wherever it comes from that's the important thing and we've just got to match it. What about absolute value?  Why are we not focusing on what is the absolute value? Yeah, but by the reliability school of thinking, it's better if your company makes $10 million a year, having targeted $10 million, that's actually better than making $15 million of profit in the year, because your target was 18. The 15 is rubbish, because you were 18% underneath your target, it's much better to have 100% reliability even if the profit is lower. I don't buy that. There is a role for a stretch target. The idea of smart has caused a lot of damage to performance improvement. Now, if you're looking to strive to continuously improve the performance, you don't want to put too much pressure on the individual if they miss what they're trying to achieve. Now you need to be able to manage in different ways. You need to be able to, the accountability is about how somebody goes about doing the job. Not the trivial, easy to measure accountability of numbers on a spreadsheet. I don't need to know how they're doing the job, I just need to look at some numbers. Well, if you want a simple career, become an arm's length investor or go buy a casino in Las Vegas. Because then you don't care about the individual gamblers and who makes or less. You're managing by the average statistics of the organization. On project, we want to be the individual who knows what to do. We need to be striving for what is it we do to deliver a P-10 project? Not let's make our life easy, and plan for P-90. And that's my other concern about if we blame the estimate, we're taking the focus off our leverage improvements or improvement, our leverage opportunities for improvement rather, those are how we go about doing projects. And I actually believe that if we focus first on absolute performance, reliability will get better. Yeah, that I don't whether you play golf, I (inaudible). Riccardo Cosentino  32:45  Unsuccessfully. Yes. Ian Heptinstall  32:47  My son is very good at playing golf. And he's got a very low handicap, certainly much lower than mine. And his focus, the focus of low handicap golfers is getting better at golf. Their focus is absolute performance. And you know what comes with it? They're much more reliable, their variability of play also goes down. But if you focus on just playing to your handicap, yeah, you will do some very different things. And you might, you might play to your handicap, but you won't do very good rounds of golf. And I think on project, we should be focusing on how can we make your project performance significantly better? Yeah, I think if I was still operating in large, mega projects, I'd be frustrated that the Starrett Brothers and Eken could build the Empire State Building and formed it in 10 days in 1929 when we can't do anything like that today, and I don't believe it's because we have safety rules these days. It's nowhere near as simple as that. If the industry had started to perform like other industries have, the Ford was making the Model T around that time, yet cars are just as affordable these days, but you get much, much, much more for your money. Construction projects cost more and take longer.   Riccardo Cosentino  34:31  Yeah, I take your point. I mean, you know, absolutely, I mean, we should be focusing on measuring performance and focusing on the performance because ultimately, that's the stuff that gets things built. It's not, an initial estimate is not what gets things built. But unfortunately, stakeholders and shareholders focus on it.   Ian Heptinstall  34:57  They want to make more money. If you've only got a business, the idea of risk comes with any entrepreneurship and business. They know all their forecasts or estimates. Yeah, if sales come in on forecasts, somebody's been playing with the numbers. Yeah, nobody can see the future. So where do you think that comes from? Riccardo Cosentino  35:23  Again, I think cooperation and public, especially public company, by any corporation, has to deliver, has to provide indication of future performance.   Ian Heptinstall  35:37  Yeah. Let me give you an example. Because my other set of black swans that disprove the optimistic estimate hypothesis, so I've mentioned all the data on collaboratively contracted budgets, so all done. All projects are not overspending. It is possible to deliver and achieve the estimates. There's no evidence on those projects that the estimates have been done in any different way. And if they have, then that approach has helped avoid optimism bias and strategic misrepresentation. Which surely must also be a good thing. But one of my other set, and this is the Embraer example that I used earlier on, that's an example that have used the critical chain of both scheduling and execution management, which is, needs a collaborative team. But exploits that collaboration to identify issues much earlier on and overcome them. So it focuses on that doing the work. Even though from one perspective, it's just a way of scheduling and reporting. If it's done well, it helps to introduce a much higher frequency, a higher cadence of reporting and decision making at a much lower level. That is what achieves more efficient performance. So on critical chain, critical chain, scheduling and execution projects, hit their project-level commitments, very, very regularly. I know many organizations and I have talked to people in many organizations who have sort of moved from 20% projects on time in full to 95-100% in all sorts of project domains, simply from changing how they're scheduing and managing execution. They've also increased productivity as well. But if we're just looking, the reliability has gone up at the project level. What hasn't changed is the ability to predict how long individual tasks take. So that's the sort of strange dilemma, the individual tasks are nowhere near as predictable and reliable. But the overall project is, and I think if you're striving for reliable project level, cost and time is quite feasible, I think. I think it's quite feasible to live it. But if you pass the same mindset down at the detail levels of projects and try and get each individual task and activity to give an estimate, turn it into a commitment will hold you to accountable for it, that actually drives the behaviors that makes the project level achievement much worse. Riccardo Cosentino  38:56  Yeah and why is that? Ian Heptinstall  38:59  I think its inherent in the behavior of complex systems. Because the future is unknowable. And we all know that estimate is a fancy professional name for guests. So the important thing when you're working is to work efficiently and flag up issues that can have a consequence to the rest of the project as soon as you notice them without giving the boy who cried wolf signals that sort of says I've got a problem when it's not a real problem. And methods like critical chain, try and sort of do that damping. So individual tasks that are just taking a bit longer than normal the project to accommodate because we know that some projects, some tasks will have problems and some will go smoothly. But in advance we don't know which. So methods like critical chain and the costing equivalent for collaborative contracting, let's not worry about it. Because if we don't make those estimates into commitments, they will average each other out. That's one of the ironies of organizations that use Monte Carlo simulation to try and sort of aggregate up the numbers and produce and use the central limit theorem to get overall probability distributions at the project level. Because the the basic method of sorry, the basic algorithm for Monte Carlo assumes that the pluses balance the minuses. That's built into the maths. The trouble is, behaviorally, the managerial behaviors inhibit that, because the task estimates are commitment, what tends to happen is tasks get completed, on the due date or later. It's the managerial behaviors that inhibit a project or task saying ours finished three weeks early, the next task can start earlier. But that plus and minus is built into the maths of Monte Carlo. So when critics say well, Monte Carlo analysis is inaccurate, because the numbers never look like the analysis, and you know, a P-80, we never, we don't have 80% of the cases coming in, under or on that number. So the method must be wrong. Or actually, maybe it's giving us some insight into our managerial practices, or inhibiting the sort of pluses and the minuses. So I think that's what critical chain builds in. It allows and encourages the Task Managers to, so long as they're working in a focused way and they're reporting regularly, if it takes longer, it takes longer, because we know, there'll be other tasks in the project that go shorter than expected. And because we've removed the managerial obstacles to reporting admitting an early finish, nobody's going to come back and said, You must have added your estimate. We will reduce all of your other future estimates. We'll say, great, well done. Look who's with you. So in effect, you're embracing the inherent uncertainty, so that the central limit theorem will apply. And so that the project actually gets a tighter normal distribution. So the reason we don't get that in reality, in more common conventions, is that the management practices inhibit the pluses and the minuses averaging out. That's one hypothesis. That's the underpinning thinking.   Riccardo Cosentino  43:05  So if we link that back to the initial, at the beginning, you were talking about the three element of the hypothesis, right? Is a project over budget because of the inherent lack of feasibility of the initial estimate, poor, at the other spectrum, is the poor management, sorry the management practices we're not running these jobs properly and that's why we're late and over budget. And what was the middle one? The middle one was   Ian Heptinstall  43:34  Those are the true black swans and unknowable risks that come along with that, you know, they, that the the ground conditions on your chosen route, really were bad. Yeah, whether you do lots of geotechnical surveys before or after that is still at risk. Riccardo Cosentino  43:57  So your, one of your hypothesis, if I'm not mistaken, is that if we focus on the unfeasibility of the estimate, if we assume that is the unfeasibility of the estimate that is creating the delays we were hiding, that allows us to hide the true reasons why the project is going bad. Ian Heptinstall  44:20  Yeah, and it   Riccardo Cosentino  44:21  It could be the black swans or it could be poor performance.   Ian Heptinstall  44:24  Yeah, it hides it and it stops us focusing on getting our performance well. So yeah, back to my marathon running analogy. I had someone looked at some data from the London Marathon. So the P-90 duration for winning the marathon is six hours 15 minutes. And if I planned for the P-90, six hours 15, and managed to achieve it, great but no big thing counts a great winner. And to be honest, I will be dissatisfied myself. Because I know if you've, if you've put some time and effort in, it's quite feasible for average humans to hit the P-25 or the P-10 number. So it's not it's not the estimate, it's how we go about doing it. That's, that's my main concern. We've lost, we're blaming the estimate, and we're losing focus on execution. And there's so much actual strategic opportunity for executing differently. I, once we get the estimate, right, we turn the handle, turn the handle, churn out the railway easy.   Riccardo Cosentino  45:47  Okay, so now, the comments on LinkedIn are not very conducive to understand each other's points. So I think that's the conclusion I draw. And I agree with you, I 100% agree with you. My only note is that I also tried, the reason I'm a big defender of optimism bias, which is human representation is for very similar reason to yours, but I'm coming from a different perspective. You know, I am so fed up of seeing, especially in large, mega projects, sponsored by the public sector, they end up becoming political, in Canada will be a hockey puck, a political party, right? They just get tossed around. And, you know, there's a new government and an old government and you know, there's a blame game that happens. And the blame games is always around project over budget and late, right? And there is never a recognition of, you know, there's, the management of the project was very poor and that's why he's over budget. Well, you don't actually know that, Mr. Politician, or Miss Politician, you don't know that. You just, you're using that situation to your political to create political advantage. And so to me, I find that it's also disingenuous, right? It's both sides of the coin, it's two sides of the same coin, right? Where, you know, estimate could be used not to focus on the performance, but that performance being good or bad? Because a lot of time, my experience is that project leaders get blamed for project being late. And the analysis is never done why was the project late? And there's never an analysis around was it ran properly and you had a bad estimate? Or did you have a good estimate and and they were ran badly? I think I agree with you that the conversation should be about the project performance, always should be about the project performance. And I would, I, sometimes, you need a proper estimate to have a proper conversation. Ian Heptinstall  48:01  Oh, yes, you, you definitely need to have a decent estimate that in the same way, that the iron law of projects doesn't prove that the management was bad, it doesn't prove that the estimate was bad, either.   Riccardo Cosentino  48:16  Absolutely. Ian Heptinstall  48:17  You need to scratch below the surface. That's my concern about the optimistic estimate hypothesis is it's being used in many environments as the explanation for the iron law. And therefore we focus on the estimate. And there's promotion of reference class forecasting, which good estimates are always based on the reference class anyway. And if they're not, there's something sort of structurally strategic wrong with the organization that's delivering the projects. And that will touch upon your comment there regarding that. Where's the analysis being done? Where's the evidence being gathered from an individual project and fed back so that future projects at least don't suffer from those particular issues and problems? How's that being built in? When I started, we had such a system, this so-called double loop feedback, so that project managers on a project, the guidance was reasonably well up to date, whether it was estimates, methodologies, checklists, they were kept up to date. If you don't have that, it's very difficult for organizations to manage and continuously improve their performance. But, having said that, I see these so many execution, efficiency opportunities that I'm not sure why that's where we don't start. Yeah, there's some opportunities in that I've mentioned and discussed that there's also the idea, which also has a very strong evidence base, that projects that move into execution, before sufficient preparation has been done, the extensive data from IPA, Independent Project Analysis and the CII, Construction Industry Institute, in the U.S. Yeah, that sort of 30-year-old data, a strong correlation between the degree of preparation before execution is commenced. But how many projects today, the politicians want to talk, they talk about shovels up, get shovels on the ground. I want some shovel-ready projects. Okay. But that does mean we've spent seven to 10% of the capital value to get them to shovel-ready state. No, you can't do that. I know one of the Canadian public sector bodies has that, oh that's done on out of operating expenses. And we don't want you to spend more than 2% of the capital value, getting it to a final business case. Well, that's bonkers. Because as soon as the business case is approved, somebody's going to rush into execution. And that's going to be wasteful.   Riccardo Cosentino  51:35  Absolutely. Absolutely. Ian Heptinstall  51:37  So I think, once we've sorted those things out, then we can start using the once we've crossed the execution and the preparation things off the list, then we can start looking at the quality of the estimates, I think.   Riccardo Cosentino  51:54  I mean, as project practitioners, I mean, researchers in the U.K., I mean, there is, unfortunately, sometimes we discuss and discuss these topics with a certain amount of preassumptions in, there are some things that I assumed are understood, right? And so my starting point is always I assume that we have capable contractors and capable supply chain. So that's typically the starting point for my analysis, which is not always true, but that I want to, I always try to start from there. So if you start from there, then obviously I've already solved that problem. And then now I want to focus on the strategic misrepresentation and optimism bias in the estimate process, right? Because my starting assumption is that we have a capable supply chain. Ian Heptinstall  52:55  Let me give you just one example from my own experience, when I worked at a contractor. We had a probably one of our largest clients, we had a strategic relationship with actually the project owner that we did all the building services work on their projects, and they had dozens of projects every year. When we estimated, and interestingly, we put an estimate for the building services together when the conceptual design was put together. And this, although our pricing was through an agreed mechanism, this particular client had a fixed-price approach, I want to go to a main contractor, but your work will be sort of given to them on a platter, they will be told to use you etc. But we want single point of contact. That meant that when we estimated the amount of man-hours we put in on a job, it ranged from x to 2x. Simply dependent upon who we were working alongside. And that was not just competence. It wasn't even at the level of the company. Yet the people who came and the way they managed the worksite could double the demand on our resources. And that that's a significant impact. And strangely, it was the same number that I had when I was buying spray dryers in the chemical industry 20 years earlier. And one of the global manufacturers told me yeah, depending who the client is, some clients take two times the demand on our engineering hours than others with the questions they asked. They're all competent. So there's enormous differences with how you put competent people together. You can't just assume a team forms like putting a hockey team together.   Riccardo Cosentino  55:01  I said, I made that assumption and never said it was the correct assumption. But, you know, I need to simplify certain things in order to have certain conversation. But yeah, you're right. I mean, it's not the right assumption. Ian Heptinstall  55:15  And it's a common one. And the, particularly, if you tie it with this assumption that a competitive market force will drive innovation within your supply base. It may do but it won't necessarily, particularly since main contractors are basically, variable cost organizations. They're not high-fixed cost. They're not major upfront investment that they react and increase temporarily, their variable costs only after they've won a contract. I'm not sure that that sort of market will drive innovation, you, you just need to be similar or slightly better than your fellow competitors. You don't need to be world-class, you just need to beat the other guy or gal in the room. Riccardo Cosentino  56:12  That's the bear story, right? We have that. Ian Heptinstall  56:15  That's it. That's exactly the bear story. And I think there's many from back in my procurement days, there's many examples where owners facilitating supply-side innovation, drove significant improvements. But if they just sat there and waited for responses to tenders, nothing would have changed. They the whole topic of so-called reverse marketing, where it's the customer who encourages suppliers to enter new supply markets, or to work in different ways. It's a known technique that I wish I saw more of it amongst major project owners in the construction space. Riccardo Cosentino  57:07  Look, I mean, I might not have time to unpack this, but like, and it goes back to your alliance contract, right? I mean, that the reason and it's a very crude description, and you're probably gonna cringe the way I say it. But you know, when you have alliance contracting, especially the public sector clients have to be at the table, right? Now, the cost overruns are no longer somebody else's problem. They're our collective problem. And so you need to come to the table. So the, you know, for the contractor, it basically removes the unproductive resource, legal and commercial resources. And so now you have all of the resources, just focusing on problems. On the public sector, you actually create skin in the game, where now you don't longer have a command and control posture, because you have transmitted fixed price risk to somebody else, you're at the table, you need to contribute to problem solving, and you need to help, like you said, innovation. But that only happens if you have the legal and the right legal commercial framework that is associated with alliance, in my mind. I don't think you can achieve that through any other, because any other commercial contractual method, because the behaviors that those frameworks create, are not conducive to collaboration and innovation. Because exactly what you said, I mean, a contractor, a contractor will do what a contractor will do. Like it's a variable cost organization, they're not going to invest in R&D because the next project might not need the R&D you just developed for this project. And an owner wants to, as you said, there was an all-knowing how to most of the owners worldwide. And now the owner organization doesn't actually have the resources and the capability to be at the table, to be the informed or capable owner that is needed to run these projects. Ian Heptinstall  59:10  They got to have some of it. Because I think that input depends on what the project is about. I'd like to start thinking about the inherent project and forget who employs the people that you need in your project team. So doing a project is a team sport. And you need people around that table with the sort of operating experience for what the asset will be used for. And you need that mix of expertise. And very often the owner organization is the obvious place to provide that kind of expertise. Now, I'm less convinced that the owner has to be the one with the team facilitation syncronization skill. I think that depends on the individual you've got. And that can come from any, ideally, any one of the participants. And if you're short there, you might have to bring in an additional individual or party to manage that synchronization. But that could that could come from any of them, not necessarily the owner. But which is, you know, thinking lifecycle cost, an understanding of needs, regulatory environment, the political environment, those sorts of changes will probably come from the owner. So their representatives, there's a lot of value they can add, rather than being arm's length, and hoping that the, your contractors will sort that out by themselves is, as one of my friends would say that you're taking hopium. Riccardo Cosentino  1:01:01  The command and control posture right, I think you call it arm's length, I call it command and control posture. Anyway, I'm conscious of time. (Inaudible) Yeah, I mean, this has been a fascinating conversation that I want to thank you for, for joining me, thank you for suggesting that we do this. And honestly, I'd love to maybe, on another episode, to pick up the collaborative contracting versus lump sum debate, right? Because it's a very live debate right now in where I am in Canada, even in the U.S. a little bit. But Canada, or we are certainly now starting to enter the collaborative space and you can see, yeah, I love to have a conversation with you about that on another episode.   Ian Heptinstall  1:01:57  That sounds like a plan, Riccardo we'll work on it. Riccardo Cosentino  1:02:01  Great. Okay. Ian, on that note, again, thank you for joining me, and I look forward to further exchanges, both on another episode or on LinkedIn. Ian Heptinstall  1:02:14  Thanks, for the opportunity. And yes, this gets around the 125 or 1250 character limit of LinkedIn. Riccardo Cosentino  1:02:23  Absolutely. Ian Heptinstall  1:02:24  Thanks for the opportunity. I've enjoyed it. Thank you. Riccardo Cosentino  1:02:26  Thank you. Bye now.   Riccardo Cosentino  1:02:29  That's it for this episode of Navigating Major Programmes. I hope you found today's conversation as informative or provoking as I did. If you enjoyed this conversation, please consider subscribing and leaving a review. I would also like to personally invite you to continue the conversation by joining me on my personal LinkedIn at Riccardo Cosentino. Listening to the next episode, we will continue to explore the latest trends and challenges in major programme management. Our next in-depth conversation promises to continue to dive into topics such as leadership risk management and the impact of emerging technology in infrastructure. It's a conversation you're not going to want to miss. Thanks for listening to Navigating Major Programmes and I look forward to keeping the conversation going. Music: "A New Tomorrow" by Chordial Music. Licensed through PremiumBeat.DISCLAIMER: The opinions, beliefs, and viewpoints expressed by the hosts and guests on this podcast do not necessarily represent or reflect the official policy, opinions, beliefs, and viewpoints of Disenyo.co LLC and its employees.

In the first iteration of our upcoming parametric series with Raincoat, Matthew sat down with Jonathan Gonzalez to delve into how parametric insurance can be integrated with traditional indemnity insurance, the technical and regulatory challenges, and the importance of creating products that customers perceive as fair.  Watch this space for some very exciting episodes coming up. Key talking points: Importance of iteration and scaling  Parametric should be looked at as a tool The connection to smart contracts and parametric What is ‘truth' in insurance? What is ‘fair' in insurance? The key to successful integration How much human intervention goes into running the model Evolving role of brokers  The openness of the insurance industry to new solutions If you like what you're hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn. To find out more about InsTech, our membership and offerings visit www.instech.co or contact us hello@instech.co Continuing Professional Development This InsTech Podcast Episode is accredited by the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII). By listening, you can claim up to 0.5 hours towards your CPD scheme. By the end of this podcast, you should be able to meet the following Learning Objectives: Describe the connection between smart contracts and parametric and why this is important Explain the difference between ‘truth' and ‘fair' in insurance Identify how the role of the broker can evolve when it comes to parametric insurance and its integration If your organisation is a member of InsTech and you would like to receive a quarterly summary of the CPD hours you have earned, visit the Episode 305 page of the InsTech website or email cpd@instech.co to let us know you have listened to this podcast. To help us measure the impact of the learning, we would be grateful if you would take a minute to complete a quick feedback survey.

In this podcast episode, Dr. Marcus Schmalbach, a specialist in parametric risk trading and CEO of RYSKEX, joins Joel Appelbaum of IRMI and Captive.com to explore the evolving landscape of the captive insurance industry, parametric risk trading, and the emergence of parametric 144A catastrophe (cat) bonds.  Dr. Schmalbach sheds light on recent market innovations and their implications for the insurance and capital markets, including the key features and achievements of the Beazley and Lloyd's London Bridge 2 deal as well as the significance of Swiss Re's industry-loss-triggered cyber-catastrophe bond. 

Higher-for-longer rates, along with elevated municipal-bond issuance, may signal that attractive entry points for muni investors are here for a bit longer. Though reinvestment season is typically a slower time for new issuance, this is an election year, which may mean issuers will want to avoid the uncertainties that come with every election season. Fund flows and rich ratios are concerns, but the asset class's ability to provide low-risk, tax-exempt income remains a key feature, especially if inflation pressures increase. Joining hosts Eric Kazatsky and Karen Altamirano on the May edition of Masters of the Muniverse is Nisha Patel from Parametric. In this month's episode, we discuss the market outlook for the second half of the year and how technology overlays are driving Parametric's strategies to help maximize returns.

I love how easy it is to predict things about you based on what you like or dislike.Did you know, for example, that if you buy fresh fennel, you are likely to be a low insurance risk? If you like traditional architecture and old buildings, you are more likely to have a conservative, right-of-centre worldview. Whereas if you like modern architecture, you will lean to the left.For what it's worth, there are plenty of 20th-century buildings that I find beautiful. I like Art Deco; I like Bauhaus stuff; I think a lot of modern US residential architecture is great. But I think a lot of more recent Deconstructivist and Parametric stuff has disappeared up its state-funded backside and has no chance of standing the test of time. Post-war social housing the world over is verging on the sinful, it is so ugly, not a patch on the almshouses built a century before for the same purpose, when mankind was far less “advanced”. Meanwhile, the glass-fronted apartment and office blocks that blight cities worldwide may be nice to look out from, but to look at they are horrible.When I look at, for example, what has been built in Lewisham, Elephant and Castle or along the banks of the Thames, you have to wonder what on earth people were thinking. What a wasted opportunity to build something with beauty that endures.I was looking out on the Thames from Canary Wharf the other day. Here is what we built.Here is what was possible.In any case, it is inevitable that most modern architecture will not be beautiful. Inevitable! It is built into the system. Let me explain why.Yes, there is regulation. When final say falls to the regulator, not the creator, and he/she never thinks in terms of beauty, only rules and career risk, and construction is always planned with his or her approval in mind, you immediately clip your wings and more. Imagine Michelangelo, Rembrandt, or Beethoven requiring regulatory approval for their work. Under this banner falls health and safety, bureaucracy, the technocratic mentality, planning, standardisation of materials and their mass production, and more.But there is something even more fundamental, which makes lack of beauty inevitable. That is the system of measurement itself. In the past, before mass-produced tape measures were a thing, we made do with the most immediate tools we had to measure things: the human body. Traditional weights and measures were all based around the human body. A foot is, well, a foot. A hand is a hand. A span is a hand stretched out. An inch is a thumb. There are four thumbs to a hand, six to a span, 12 to a foot, 18 to a cubit, which is the distance from elbow to fingertip. A yard is a pace, which happens to be three feet as well. A fathom is the arms stretched out - two yards, or six feet. It goes on: a pound is roughly what you can hold comfortably in your hand. A furlong is the distance a man of average fitness can sprint for. A stone is what you can carry without strain. A US pint is a pound of water, enough to quench a thirst, and so on. Man is indeed the measure of all things, to paraphrase Protagoras. Spread the truth about weights and measures.Da Vinci noticed it. “Nature has thus arranged the measurements of a man: four fingers make one palm. And four palms make one foot; six palms make one cubit; four cubits make once a man's height," he says in his notes for Vitruvian Man.It turns out the feet are very similar the world over and have been throughout history. The foot, for example, was the principal unit in the design of Stonehenge. Here are some different feet from around the world and from throughout history:The cubit was the principal unit of the Pyramids. The pound is the oldest measure of all and goes all the way back to the Babylonian mina.Here's the thing: proportion is inherent to traditional weights and measures because they derive from the human body, which is proportionate. We are biologically programmed to find the proportions of the human body attractive. The religious will argue that God made man in his own image. Traditional weights and measures derive, therefore, from God, or his image at least, and so are divine.The metric system, on the other hand, is not based on the human body, but on the earth itself. A metre is supposed to be one 10 millionth of the distance from the North Pole to the Equator (though one of French scientists measuring the distance forged the data, so the measure is flawed). The idea of a system based on the earth itself rather than the human body was to achieve a “universal measure based on the perfection of nature” and “a system for all people for all time” to use the words of those who commissioned the measure in the years after the French Revolution. Metric may have a brilliantly simple and comprehensible design, based around the number 10, but unlike traditional weights and measures, proportion is not intrinsic to it. For the purposes of science and for safety, as I argue in my lecture with funny bits, How Heavy?, a universal system of weights and measures is a very important thing. Thanks to the simplicity of decimals (again which derive from the human body and the ten fingers we use to count), metric can scale up or down for use in nanotech or in macrotech .As proportion is inherent to traditional weights and measures, buildings based on them will inevitably have inherent proportion and thus all the beauty which comes with proportion. But most of the world now uses metric in its building, which has no inherent proportion, so it becomes inevitable that modern buildings will not have the proportion inherent to older buildings, unless, the architects deliberately plan otherwise, which most of the time they don't. Thus is modern architecture inevitably not beautiful.It's why even functional old buildings, such as barns or warehouses, have a beauty to them. The proportion is inherent in the foundational weights and measures. It is missing in modern buildings.In the past, weights and measures changed, even if only slightly, from region to region. The result was regional diversity in buildings. Using local materials will have added to this regional individuality. But the world over now using the same system of weights and measures, following similar regulations, using similar mass produced materials, means modern architecture will lack beauty the world over. Bland conformity reigns. Even something as foundational as an old brick is proportionate. A brick is a hand in width. For obvious reasons: so a brickie could handle it.In short, unless an architect or builder takes deliberate steps to remedy this problem of proportion, modern buildings will only ever be beautiful by accident. Here's a little irony: if you like traditional weights and measures, you're more likely to be right of centre, favour free markets, individual responsibility - all that kind of stuff. Favour metric, and you're one of those evil left-wing technocrats who champions government intervention, experts and the BBC.Now go tell your friends about this amazing post.Until next time,DominicPS Here is my lecture with funny bits about weights and measures from the Edinburgh Festival in 2022. I think it's probably the best of all my lectures so far.PPS And here is an 5-minute extract from Italian TV series Sense of Beauty, which I presented a few years back, about beauty and architecture. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.theflyingfrisby.com/subscribe

Dive into the world of parametric insurance with Garrett Koehn, President of Executive Lines and Chief Innovation Officer at CRC. In this episode of "Know Your Risk and Insurance Coverage with RiskProNet," Garrett sheds light on the origins of parametric insurance, its evolution beyond weather-related events, and its growing applications in various sectors. From automatic triggers to social benefits and data-driven underwriting, discover how parametric insurance is revolutionizing risk management. Join the conversation to explore the intricacies of this innovative insurance approach and its implications for businesses and insurers alike.Timecodes:Introduction and Overview (00:00 - 01:00)Exploring Parametric Insurance (1:00 - 3:19)Benefits and Applications (3:19 - 0:05)Marketplace Applications (5:05 - 7:43)Data-Driven Underwriting (7:43 - 10:51)Future Trends and Innovations (10:51 - 13:11)Blockchain and Emerging Technologies (13:11 - 16:01)Introduction of New Products (16:01 - 18:57)Evolving Landscape and Broker Role (18:57 - 21:44)Resources:Become a member at RiskProNet.comConnect with Garrett Koehn on LinkedinConnect with Chip Arenchild on LinkedIn

Was sind parametrische Versicherungen? Dabei handelt es sich um eine immer beliebter werdende Art der Versicherung, die sich an spezifischen Parametern und Ereignissen anstatt an der traditionellen Praxis der individuellen Schadensbegutachtung orientiert. Diese Art der Deckung ist besonders für Unternehmen und Organisationen geeignet, die Naturkatastrophen, Wetterschwankungen oder anderen schwer zu prognostizierenden Risiken ausgesetzt sind. Besonders ist vor allem ihre Fähigkeit, schnellere Auszahlungen zu ermöglichen, da die Auszahlungsbeträge durch vorab vereinbarte Parameter definiert sind.  Laut einer Analyse von Allied Market Research vom Mai 2022 betrug der globale Markt für parametrische Versicherungen im Jahr 2021 etwa 11,7 Milliarden US-Dollar und wird voraussichtlich bis 2031 auf rund 30 Milliarden US-Dollar steigen. In dieser Folge diskutieren wir mit renommierten Experten wie Nikolaus Haufler, Founder und CEO von Wetterheld, und Mario Tucholke, Commercial Director DACH bei Descartes Underwriting, die Charakteristika parametrischer Versicherungen und wie sie den Versicherungssektor verändern können. Dabei erörtern wir die genaue Funktionsweise von parametrischen Versicherungen, die Vor- und Nachteile für Versicherer und ihre Kunden sowie die damit verbundenen Herausforderungen und Chancen bei der Einführung parametrischer Versicherungen. Moderation: Thomas Schmerling, Senior Manager Strategy & Transactions, und Marius Münzel, Senior Consultant Strategy & Transactions. Ihr habt Fragen oder Anmerkungen? Meldet euch einfach bei uns per Mail unter eyfintechandbeyond@de.ey.com mit Feedback oder Vorschlägen für Themen oder Gäste.  

Based in Little Rock, Arkansas, Brian Thompson is a seasoned insurance professional with over 15 years in the industry across various roles including Reinsurance and agency ownership. Currently serving as the Business Development Manager for North America at Descartes Underwriting, he is instrumental in expanding the company's presence in the US market through a client-centric focus on solving challenging placement problems with innovative solutions.

Today, you'll learn about how your ears are eavesdropping on your eyes, a bold new study on the anti-inflammatory effects of psychedelics, and an astonishing new discovery linking hoarding disorder with ADHD. Ears & Eyes “Your Eyes Talk to Your Ears. Scientists Know What They're Saying.” by Dan Vahaba. 2023. “Research Discovery: Astonishing Connection Between Vision and Hearing.” by Doug Garfield. 2023. “Parametric information about eye movements is sent to the ears.” by Stephanie N. Lovich, et al. 2023. Psilocybin & Depression “Psilocybin induces acute and persisting alterations in immune status in healthy volunteers: An experimental, placebo-controlled study.” by N.L. Mason, et al. 2023. “Study suggests single dose of psilocybin safe and effective as treatment for major depressive disorder.” by Justin Jackson. 2023. “Increased global integration in the brain after psilocybin therapy for depression.” by Richard E. Daws, et al. 2022. ADHD & Hoarding “Strong connection found between ADHD and hoarding disorder.” by Eric W. Dolan. 2023. “Hoarding disorder.” by Mayo Clinic Staff. 2023. “Who really hoards? Hoarding symptoms in adults with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and healthy controls.” by Giacomo Grassi, et al. 2023. Follow Curiosity Daily on your favorite podcast app to get smarter with Calli and Nate — for free! Still curious? Get exclusive science shows, nature documentaries, and more real-life entertainment on discovery+! Go to https://discoveryplus.com/curiosity to start your 7-day free trial. discovery+ is currently only available for US subscribers. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Wesley is CEO and Co-Founder of Sola Insurance based in Atlanta, GA. Wesley comes from a tech background and jumped into the insurance industry at a flood insurance startup where he was tasked with working on the data side with private and FEMA flood maps. Realizing this data was telling us exactly where the damage is, Wesley became obsessed with how data can be used to automatically trigger an insurance claim payout. Sola is starting with supplemental tornado coverage for homeowners but plans to expand into every type of natural disaster to help people cover their deductible and immediate expenses. Sola has already been approved in 15 states as the first ever admitted personal lines parametric product, is fully reinsured through Lloyd's of London, and has partnered with hundreds of insurance agencies across the Midwest and Southeast. Highlights from the Show Sola Insurance is a new class of financial insurance products that helps homeowners cover their deductible and immediate expenses after natural disaster events Sola is developing new products that pay period faster and more transparently so they can get back on their feet Right after a disaster, there's an immediate need for assistance while you wait for a traditional claim to get handled (even if it's handled quickly) Deductibles have increased across many lines of insurance, with homeowners choosing $2,500 deductibles twice as frequently just over four years ago, which is more than most Americans have saved for emergencies Many homeowners policies or coverages within them have significantly higher deductibles, like for wind or quake The pressure to increase deductibles is only getting worse, as discussed in this WSJ article we mentioned The cost of capital and providing insurance for carriers is going up, with 30% increases in reinsurance The initial product is a Tornado parametric coverage, which is the first time a startup has launched an admitted parametric product They have capacity from Beazley and fronting from Spinnaker They've just had their first two claims after the Hendersonville tornado outside of Nashville, Tennessee, and paid both within 60 hours of the tornado touching down They see this as complementary to existing coverage, and have seen a lot of interest and support from independent agents who are looking for ways to create coverage to fill in for increasing deductibles to keep insurance affordable With the original HO policy developed in the 1950s, Sola is trying to create solutions for what risk looks like today Their next priority is Wind & Hail, which is segmented out on traditional HO policies and is a frequent cause of loss Wesley started Sola in the Global Insurance Accelerator in 2021 and is young, along with his co-founders, and they haven't let that stop them or slow them down in an industry where tenure and tradition continue to carry weight Wesley credits a two things with their success despite their age: An innate sense of curiosity, which helped him to really get into the issues at hand and stay open to learning People can't deny the work that you've done, so the team has ensured they keep delivering and proving themselves, balancing the need to spend time building relationships with delivering tangible milestones and results This episode is brought to you by The Future of Insurance book series (future-of-insurance.com) from Bryan Falchuk. Follow the podcast at future-of-insurance.com/podcast for more details and other episodes. Music courtesy of Hyperbeat Music, available to stream or download on Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music and more.

Tim Platenkamp fuses the socialist calculation debate with republican thought. Future Histories International Find all English episodes of Future Histories here: https://futurehistories-international.com/ and subscribe to the Future Histories International RSS-Feed   Shownotes Tim Platenkamp Tim Platenkamp (Website): https://timplatenkamp.nl/ Platenkamp, Tim. The Constitution of Socialism. Forthcoming: https://timplatenkamp.nl/research-projects/ Platenkamp, Tim. The Socialist Community of citizens: An Institutional Design of Republican Socialism. Nieuwegein 2020. (Master Thesis pdf): https://scripties.uba.uva.nl/download?fid=c2736566   Further Shownotes Reddebrek. Socialism, Cooperative and Republican: Bernard Moss. 2016. libcom.org: https://libcom.org/article/socialism-cooperative-and-republican-bernard-moss Market Socialism (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_socialism Nove, Alec. The Economics of Feasible Socialism Revisited. 1991. HarperCollinsAcademic. (pdf): http://digamo.free.fr/nove91.pdf Soviet economic planning (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet-type_economic_planning#Analysis_of_Soviet-type_planning Calculation in-natura (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calculation_in_kind Khozraschet (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khozraschet Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Federal_Republic_of_Yugoslavia Types of socialism (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Types_of_socialism Commoning (wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commons Spanish Civil War (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Civil_War Popular Front (Wikipedia): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popular_Front_(Spain) Geoff Bailey. Anarchists in the Spanish Civil War. International Socialist Review, Issue 24. 2002. (pdf): https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/geoff-bailey-anarchists-in-the-spanish-civil-war.pdf Estrin, Saul. Yugoslavia: The Case of Self-Managing Market Socialism. Journal of Economic Perspectives, Volume 5, Number 4. 1991. (pdf):

This was the sixth session of the day at our Artemis London 2023 insurance-linked securities (ILS) market conference, held on September 5th in London, UK. Around 240 attendees enjoyed a busy day of thoughtful catastrophe bond and insurance-linked securities (ILS) focused discussion from industry experts, as well as valuable networking opportunities. This session features an expert panel discussing parametric triggers in insurance-linked securities (ILS) and the future potential for parametric triggers in developing capital market backed responses to growing climate risk exposures. The panel discussion was moderated by: Rowan Douglas, CEO Climate Risk and Resilience, Howden Group. He was joined on stage by: Stephen Lathrope, Global Head of Insurance, ICEYE; Michael Bennett, Head of Derivatives & Structured Finance, the World Bank Treasury; and Edern Le Roux, Head of ILS and Cat Modeling, Descartes Underwriting. The panellists discussed how parametric triggers have helped insurance and catastrophe bond protection expand to some underserved areas. We heard of the need for greater collaboration between private and public entities, as well as the growing demand for disaster insurance protection for governments and their entities. The panellists also discussed the important role of technology in the creation of parametric triggers and how this can help drive innovation and triggers that are increasingly closely calibrated to the underlying risks that insurance and reinsurance products are protecting against. Listen to the full podcast episode to learn more about the future of parametric triggers in the insurance-linked securities (ILS) market.

Get ready for 2024 and a brand new episode! We discuss non-parametric statistics in data analysis and AI modeling. Learn more about applications in user research methods, as well as the importance of key assumptions in statistics and data modeling that must not be overlooked, After you listen to the episode, be sure to check out the supplement material in Exploring non-parametric statistics.Welcome to 2024  (0:03)AI, privacy, and marketing in the tech industryOpenAI's GPT store launch. (The Verge)Google's changes to third-party cookies. (Gizmodo)Non-parametric statistics and its applications (6:49)A solution for modeling in environments where data knowledge is limited.Contrast non-parametric statistics with parametric statistics, plus their respective strengths and weaknesses.Assumptions in statistics and data modeling (9:48)The importance of understanding statistics in data science, particularly in modeling and machine learning. (Probability distributions, Wikipedia)Discussion about a common assumption of representing data with a normal distribution; oversimplifies complex real-world phenomena.The importance of understanding data assumptions when using statistical modelsStatistical distributions and their importance in data analysis (15:08)Discuss the importance of subject matter experts in evaluating data distributions, as assumptions about data shape can lead to missed power and incorrect modeling. Examples of different distributions used in various situations, such as Poisson for wait times and counts, and discrete distributions like uniform and Gaussian normal for continuous events.Consider the complexity of selecting the appropriate distribution for statistical analysis; understand the specific distribution and its properties.Non-parametric statistics and its applications in data analysis (19:31)Non-parametric statistics are more robust to outliers and can generalize across different datasets without requiring domain expertise or data massaging.Methods rely on rank ordering and have less statistical power compared to parametric methods, but are more flexible and can handle complex data sets better.Discussion about the usefulness and limitations, which require more data to detect meaningful changes compared to parametric tests.Non-parametric tests for comparing data sets (24:15)Non-parametric tests, including the K-S test and chi-square test, which can compare two sets of data without assuming a specific distribution.Can also be used for machine learning, classification, and regression tasks, even when the underlying datWhat did you think? Let us know.Do you have a question or a discussion topic for the AI Fundamentalists? Connect with them to comment on your favorite topics: LinkedIn - Episode summaries, shares of cited articles, and more. YouTube - Was it something that we said? Good. Share your favorite quotes. Visit our page - see past episodes and submit your feedback! It continues to inspire future episodes.

Arian Hakimi is an architect and the founder of Arian Hakimi Architects and a former Lead Designer at ZHA and also he is one of the talented instructors of PAACADEMY. Some of Arian's projects include KAFD Metro Station, Unicorn Island and many more. In this episode Arian discussed his journey of becoming an architect, his experience, recent projects, and his vision for computational and parametric design.   Check out our weekly courses at the PAACADEMY: https://parametric-architecture.com/workshops/   Follow us on: Instagram: https://instagram.com/parametric.architecture/ X: https://x.com/parametricarch/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/parametric.archi/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/parametric.architecture/   Listen to this podcast on: Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/tr/podcast/pa-talks/id1503812708 Google Podcasts: https://tinyurl.com/3zrxnejf YouTube: https://youtu.be/_HZuWXT7g10

Jean-Christophe Garaix, Head of Agriculture & Parametric Insurance for Liberty Mutual Reinsurance, and Andy Thompson, Co-Founder & CEO of Safehub, join the show to discuss their collaboration on addressing earthquake exposure. Using Safehub's IoT sensors, they've been able to design a parametric insurance product that's live in Mexico City – one of the most quake-prone areas in the world – that brings building-specific shake accuracy to the adjusting of claims. This allows for an affordable coverage that can be provided quickly while solving for the basis risk inherent in previous earthquake data like shake maps. Together, they're working to create great resiliency through the network effect of improved and more point-specific data coming together to paint accurate pictures of risk and how it plays out. Highlights from the Show Jean-Christophe (JC) Garaix oversees the parametric business for Liberty Mutual Reinsurance, looking for external / third party index for the basis to adjust a risk Andy Thompson, co-founder of Safehub, is a structural earthquake engineer by background who became acutely aware of the lack of individual-building performance during earthquakes and other shaking events, and sought to create a sensor-based solution that's easy to deploy to solve this Existing tools are about regional effects, which are helpful for municipalities or disaster response efforts, but not useful for a specific building, where the impact of one building could be completely different to that of a neighboring building Smarthub has been working with many building owners for years to help with business continuity, maintenance and general management of their properties, but thought this could increase resilience by solving the basis risk issue JC talked about by partnering with an insurer The size, simplicity and stand-alone nature of Safehub's solution allowed Liberty Mutual to extend a coverage like this to smaller insureds in addition to their large property clients For parametric coverage to succeed, JC jokes that you need education, education and education Liberty is looking at similar solutions for other types of events, like cyclones where there is broad-brush data, but they need to measure the wind speed at a specific location to offer coverage for an individual property Today, the issue is less about data availability (which was the issue a decade ago), and more one of product design A barrier to adoption of the kinds of sensors that allow for solutions like this has been the complexity of installation, making the commercial market more attractive for such products Bringing asset-specific data in a bigger network allows for more resiliency and protection by enabling parametric and other innovative products that can close protection gaps, offer cover options This episode is brought to you by The Future of Insurance book series (future-of-insurance.com) from Bryan Falchuk. Follow the podcast at future-of-insurance.com/podcast for more details and other episodes. Music courtesy of Hyperbeat Music, available to stream or download on Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music and more.

On this episode, I was joined by Jeanne Moldenhauer, Vice President at Excellent Pharma Consulting. Jeanne and I discuss: -Steam Sterilization - Moist and Dry Heat -Biological/Chemical Indicators, Placement and Resistance -Cycle Development and Validation -Overkill Cycles vs Product Specific Cycles -Parametric Release of Steam Sterilized Products  Jeanne Moldenhauer is subject matter expert on a variety of sterilization and validation processes in the healthcare industry. Jeanne has been very involved in the remediation of contamination issues including: sterility test failures, media fill failures, mold contamination, and Burkholderia cepacia. She also has extensive background in the rehabilitation of companies with negative FDA findings, restoring them to compliance. She has served on the Scientific Advisory Board, Program Advisory Board and Technical Book Advisory Board and was an Interest Group Leader for the Parenteral Drug Association (PDA) (1998-2016). Jeanne has also served on advisory committees for emerging technologies (rapid methods), aseptic processing and sterilization for FDA.

Arbol, an MGA specializing in parametric insurance, has been rapidly growing and expanding since we last spoke a year ago. Arbol recently announced a partnership with reinsurer Beazley, enabling them to deploy capacity in the US for weather risks. Tune in to Henry Gale, Senior Research Analyst at InsTech as he speaks to Arbol's CEO, Sid Jha, about Arbol's plans to to target unmet risks in the energy and agriculture sectors and its new products to help companies manage climate risks beyond insurance. Key talking points include: Insuring renewable energy and agribusinesses with parametric Helping companies understand their exposure to climate risks Measuring carbon offsets and the potential for carbon credit insurance Building an ecosystem for climate risk management Hybrid parametric insurance for difficult-to-insure risks "Climate risk time bombs" in our financial system If you like what you're hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn. Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning. To find out more about InsTech, our membership and offerings visit www.instech.co or contact us hello@instech.co Continuing Professional Development - Learning Objectives InsTech is accredited by The Chartered Insurance Institute (CII). By listening to any InsTech podcast, you can claim up to 0.5 hours towards your CPD scheme. By the end of this podcast, you should be able to meet the following Learning Objectives: Describe how parametric insurance mitigates climate risks.  List areas within different industries where parametric insurance can close the coverage gap. Explain how parametric insurance can help understand both past and future pay-outs with data. If your organisation is a member of InsTech and you would like to receive a quarterly summary of the CPD hours you have earned, visit the Episode 274 page of the InsTech website or email cpd@instech.co to let us know you have listened to this podcast. To help us measure the impact of the learning, we would be grateful if you would take a minute to complete a quick feedback survey.

What does parametric insurance mean to Jonathan Gonzalez, Co-founder and CEO of Raincoat?  Raincoat is a technology company that works with brokers and insurers to develop and distribute parametric climate insurance for consumers in at-risk regions. The company is involved in parametric schemes around the world and aims to extend parametric protection to those exposed to disasters globally.  In this week's podcast Jonathan speaks to InsTech's Henry Gale, to discuss how Raincoat has expanded since the last podcast, and asks us to consider whether parametric insurance will ever simply be known as “insurance”? Talking points include: Lessons from operating parametric programmes where pay-outs were triggered Why parametric insurance is relevant across the world Raincoat's approach to collaboration with brokers, insurers and distribution partners How parametric insurance is a “tool” Consumer attitudes to parametric How will the category of “parametrics” evolve in the future? If you like what you're hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn. Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning. To find out more about InsTech, our membership and offerings visit www.instech.co or contact us hello@instech.co Continuing Professional Development - Learning Objectives InsTech is accredited by The Chartered Insurance Institute (CII). By listening to any InsTech podcast, you can claim up to 0.5 hours towards your CPD scheme. By the end of this podcast, you should be able to meet the following Learning Objectives: Explain what parametric insurance is and how it can be scaled in the future. Develop an understanding of the importance of collaboration in innovation Summarise what lessons can be learnt from historical data and previous pay-outs to inform and aid the development of parametric insurance If your organisation is a member of InsTech and you would like to receive a quarterly summary of the CPD hours you have earned, visit the Episode 268 page of the InsTech website or email cpd@instech.co to let us know you have listened to this podcast. To help us measure the impact of the learning, we would be grateful if you would take a minute to complete a quick feedback survey.

Adam Rimmer first saw the potential of parametric insurance while working at RMS, the world's largest catastrophe modeling firm. Whilst there, he and co-founder Ian Bartholomew structured and modeled triggers on over $2bn of parametric insurance products and catastrophe bonds to protect governments and large corporations in the US and around the world. They are now using those same principles on a scalable platform. The result is FloodFlash, the first sensor-based parametric flood solution set to provide affordable cover to the businesses, corporations, and communities that need it most. 

Scott M. Lawin is CEO/COO of Candy Digital, Inc., a next-generation sports and culture digital asset platform, providing authentic objects and experiences that deepen fan engagement and connect people to their passions.Before launching Candy, Mr. Lawin founded Parametric, LP, a private investment and advisory firm focused on early-stage opportunities in blockchain, fintech, art, and real estate. From 2010-2017, Mr. Lawin was the Chief Operating Officer of Moore Capital Management, a $15bn global alternative investment management company. Prior to joining Moore, Mr. Lawin served as Chief Operating Officer of the Liquid Markets business at Fortress Investment Group following a 12-year career at Goldman, Sachs & Co.Mr. Lawin serves on the Boards of Art Money and Srinidhi Investment Group and is an Advisor to the MIT MET Fund, Stonyrock Partners, Dore Partnership, 24/7Office, and Streetlinx. He is the Founder of Museum of the Street, Vice-Chairman and Director of Hudson River Park Friends, and an Advisory Board member of JUST Capital and The Kitchen.Mr. Lawin earned his BS in Architecture from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1993 and is a Founding member of the Dean's Advisory Committee for the MIT School of Architecture and Planning. He and his family reside in Tribeca in New York City.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Stephen Palley (@stephendpalley) is a litigation partner and co-chair of Brown Rudnick's Digital Commerce group. Stephen is a seasoned litigator with over 20 years of extensive courtroom experience litigating and trying complex commercial matters. Stephen has written extensively and been quoted widely on legal issues arising from the use of Blockchain technology, with appearances in both print and television media. For more on Stephen's background, listen to episode 28 of Law of Code: #28 - Stephen Palley: Crypto regulation, building a team, and defining decentralization. Show highlights: [2:30] Analogies in crypto: Smart contracts and dumpsters. [14:00] Intangible scarcity: Why blockchain's enable scarce, intangible assets. [18:30] Licensing regimes: Future of front-ends and developers. [26:30] Evolution of crypto law: Has it aligned with Palley's expectations? [31:45] Insurance and digital assets: Parametric insurance, oracles and blockchain technology. & much more. Disclaimer: Jacob Robinson and his guests are not your lawyer. Nothing herein or mentioned on the Law of Code podcast should be construed as legal advice. The material published is intended for informational, educational, and entertainment purposes only. Please seek the advice of counsel, and do not apply any of the generalized material to your individual facts or circumstances without speaking to an attorney.

Andrew Jernigan is co-founder and CEO of Insured Nomads, an emerging leader globally in disrupting the way insurance is designed and delivered for the modern company. Insured Nomads is positioned at the intersection of insurance and safety innovation, building a delivery model for health insurance enabling employers to provide health, medical, wellbeing and security for their team no matter where they are in the world. In this episode, Andrew shares his passion for protecting people around the world and what it takes to build a completely new insurance model, adapting an antiquated travel insurance product to the needs of remote workers. His extensive experience in the healthcare, insurance and banking industries locally provided him with the unique experiences and perspective to break boundaries through the merging of technology with humanity. In particular, how the need for remote workers in a new global workforce has continued evolving into a more flexible format for the employer and their team.   Andrew is a graduate of Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama. In addition to serving as CEO, Andrew is also a passionate fighter for justice through support of Not For Sale, and a Strategic Advisor for Shap, and Share Hope International, and co-host of the popular podcast, The New Nomad. This episode was recorded live at Insurtech Insights New York 2023 in conjunction with InsurTech Association and our friends Joanna England Sebastian Tollak Megan Kuczynski. Follow the Insurtech Leadership Podcast airing weekly hosted by Joshua R. Hollander. We give you up-close access and personal insights from the leaders of the fastest-growing #insurtechs and most innovative #insurance carriers and brokers.

Array Cast - July 21, 2023 Show NotesThanks to Bob Therriault, Conor Hoekstra, and Adam Paszke for gathering these links:[01] 00:01:49 J on AWS https://code.jsoftware.com/wiki/System/Installation/Cloud KXcon '23 videos https://kx.com/kx-con-23-recordings/ KXcon '23 ArrayCast review episode https://www.arraycast.com/episodes/episode54-kxcon23[02] 00:04:10 PyTorch https://pytorch.org/ Dex Programming Language https://github.com/google-research/dex-lang/ Coursera https://www.coursera.org/[03] 00:07:48 Torch7 https://github.com/torch/torch7 Torch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torch_(machine_learning) Lua Programming Language https://www.lua.org/ Python Programming Language https://www.python.org/ Alpha Go documentary https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AlphaGo_(film) Tensorflow Programming Language https://www.tensorflow.org/ LuaJIT interpreter https://luajit.org/[04] 00:15:43 Automatic differention https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_differentiation[05] 00:18:25 GPU https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics_processing_unit TPU https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tensor_Processing_Unit4[06] 00:20:56 Machine Learning https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_learning[07] 00:29:30 AutoGrad Library https://autograd.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ JAX https://github.com/google/jax Vectorization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vectorization[08] 00:33:10 Dex White Paper 4 pages https://openreview.net/pdf?id=rJxd7vsWPS Dex White Paper 20 pages https://arxiv.org/pdf/2104.05372.pdf Dex Tutorial https://google-research.github.io/dex-lang/examples/tutorial.html MatLab Programming Language https://www.mathworks.com/products/matlab.html[09] 00:35:40 Rank Polymorphism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parametric_polymorphism#Higher-rank_polymorphism[10] 00:37:42 Futhark Programming Language https://futhark-lang.org/ Dex and Futhark https://futhark-lang.org/blog/2020-12-28-futhark-and-dex.html ArrayCast Episode with Troels Henriksen https://www.arraycast.com/episodes/episode37-futhark[11] 00:39:00 Haskell Programming Language https://www.haskell.org/[12] 00:40:30 Ad Hoc Polymorphism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hoc_polymorphism Parametric Polymorphism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parametric_polymorphism NumPy Python Library https://numpy.org/[13] 00:46:15 CUDA GPU Language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CUDA[14] 00:53:13 XLA JAX compiler https://hpc.nih.gov/apps/JAX.html[15] 00:56:57 Triton OpenAI https://openai.com/research/triton[17] 01:01:44 Languish language tracker https://tjpalmer.github.io/languish/ LLMs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_language_model[18] 01:05:43 github/google/Jax github/google-research/dex-lang[19] 01:08:00 Nix https://docs.haskellstack.org/en/stable/nix_integration/[20] 01:09:25 Adam's secret project - TBA[21] 01:10:28 Contact AT ArrayCast DOT com

Today's episode features a conversation with Alan O'Leary, a scholar and artist based at Aarhus University. On today's episode, we discuss Alan's origin story, the videographic "society," academic labor and mode, organizing videographic events, and more. We also discuss Alan's video, "Nebular Epistemics: A Glossary (Scholarship Like a Spider or Spit)," and Kathleen Loock's "Reproductive Futurism and the Politics of the Sequel."  Support the podcast on Patreon. Follow the show on Twitter. Learn more at the pod's website. Get the free newsletter. Will DiGravio hosted and produced this episode. Emily Su Bin Ko is the show's associate producer, and also co-hosted and edited this episode. Music by Ketsa: "Live It," "Anvil," and "Refraining."

While supply chains are under increasing pressure, many losses associated with cargo delays go uninsured. If shipments are late, perishable goods are lost, business is interrupted and budgets are overspent. Henry Gale speaks to Yann Barbarroux, CEO and Co-founder at Otonomi about the insurance product the company has built to cover supply chain delays for third-party logistics companies and freight forwarders. Topics include: Getting cargo underwriters at Lloyd's comfortable with a delay product Three approaches to distribution for new insurance products How the Ever Given ship stuck in the Suez Canal affected supply chains Customer responses to parametric products Otonomi's experience in the Lloyd's Lab If you like what you're hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn. Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning. To find out more about InsTech, our membership and offerings visit www.instech.co or contact us hello@instech.co Continuing Professional Development - Learning Objectives InsTech is accredited by The Chartered Insurance Institute (CII). By listening to any InsTech podcast, you can claim up to 0.5 hours towards your CPD scheme. By the end of this podcast, you should be able to meet the following Learning Objectives: Explain some of the financial challenges cargo shipment delays cause Describe some of the benefits of creating successful partnerships Identify the key role underwriters have in financial risk If your organisation is a member of InsTech and you would like to receive a quarterly summary of the CPD hours you have `earned, visit the Episode 255 page of the InsTech website or email cpd@instech.co to let us know you have listened to this podcast. To help us measure the impact of the learning, we would be grateful if you would take a minute to complete a quick feedback survey

Parametric insurance solutions continue to be more broadly adopted, but the technology behind their triggers is also critical and solutions are developing fast.  Artemis recently spoke with Callum Higgins from Moody's RMS, a Product Manager for Moody's RMS event response services, and Martin Hotz, Head Parametric Nat Cat at Swiss Re Corporate Solutions, to learn more about how parametric triggers are used in hurricane insurance and risk transfer today.  The pair discussed advanced catastrophe risk modelling tools and their application in delivering parametric risk transfer solutions, with a particular focus on hurricane risk and the Moody's RMS HWind product.  Higgins explained some of the use-cases for the HWind product in risk transfer and said that, "Specifically, in the insurance-linked securities space, around live cat trading for instance, making decisions around that, but also on the investor relations side. So being able to communicate to your investors while the storms approaching lands, what that could mean for the funds, for instance.  "The ILS space is one area we've seen HWind forecasting in particular being used quite a lot."  Hotz highlighted how Swiss Re uses the HWind product, saying, "We offer parametric hurricane insurance to our commercial insureds based on the wind-speed data from Moody's RMS and their HWind real-time data and we have issued our first policy that settles based on HWind back in 2016.  "So we're now in our eighth hurricane season of providing such cover and did pay also in some of the industry-shaping events over the past couple of years.  "For us, HWind meets the criteria of being a fast, independent and reliable data service, which as with any parametric policy is always at the core."  Listen to this full podcast episode for insights into parametric insurance and risk transfer, as well as the role of models and real-time data in parametric triggers.

Bessie Schwarz is Co-founder & CEO of Floodbase, a service that provides flood tracking for disasters and insurance. Powered by satellites, machine learning, and on-the-ground observation, they're on a mission to enable all communities to prepare & respond to climate disasters. 1.5B people face flood risk worldwide, with $15T of economic activity at risk of flooding by 2040. This is climate adaptation at its finest. We dive deep into…what exactly is climate adaptation? What's parametric flood insurance? How is Floodbase enabling all climate adaptation financing? This episode is particularly valuable for…BIG THINKERS! Bessie is the quintessential founder who saw an incredible opportunity and took massive action to make it happen. If you're looking for inspiration on launching a startup that has BOTH impact and money in it, look no further. Check out https://climatemayhem.com/bessie for show notes. Connect with Ty Wolfe-Jones and Jakub Kubicka With Ty Wolfe-Jones on LinkedIn With Ty Wolfe-Jones on Twitter With Jakub Kubicka on LinkedIn With Jakub Kubicka on Twitter Subscribe to Climate Mayhem On any podcast platform Read all show notes at climatemayhem.com Ask a question or suggest a topic on our What-The-Climate Listener Mail Form