RIMS is in Orlando this year, a rather ironic location. The P&C insurance industry is in a bit of a fantasy world these days, with increasing reports of reserve inadequacy (anecdotal to be sure) while the soft market continues with few signs of firming pricing.
Monday was a bit of a blur; back to back meetings in the exhibit hall, interspersed with the inevitable encounters with old friends and colleagues passing on the latest news about who’s moved where and what deals are in the works.
The private equity folks are here as well, scouting for promising companies they can buy and use as a ‘platform’ to build a bigger company. There’s talk of several potential deals in the works – more on those as they develop.
The conference itself looks to be rather sparsely attended. Exhibit hall traffic is noticeably light, and few sessions are filled. This is likely due to a combination of the ‘AIG hangover’; big insurance companies are reluctant to send lots of folks to nice destinations (yes, some do think of Orlando as a ‘nice’ destination); the continuing soft market and financial impact thereof (more than a few insurers and vendors have recently laid off staff); and the lack of solid, new information delivered at the conference itself.
I’m using twitter to post brief comments/observations throughout the day – for updates sign up for my feed (Paduda). Here are a few quick takes from Monday.
The PBM world is consolidating at the top, and growing at the lower end. Some of the newer entrants are seeking to carve out niches based on clinical expertise in pain management (MyMatrixx), innovative pricing (PMOA), a focus on smaller payers (don’t use our name) or a push into the mid-tier (don’t use our name either).
There’s a lot of turmoil around Coventry Work Comp, with recent layoffs in their MSA division and in the IT support area (bill review specifically). Reports are that Coventry will ‘own’ the bill review application source code and related assets as of October 1 2009; what they will do then appears to be up in the air. While they would undoubtedly like to move all their payer clients over to BR 4.0 (their platform) from Ingenix’ PowerTrak (the system used by former Concentra clients) there is significant resistance to that move from PowerTrak users. That resistance, coupled with the expense of maintaining BR 4.0 and the recent layoff of BR support staff are clouding the crystal ball.
I’ll try once again to get a read from Coventry staff as to their strategy and direction; I don’t expect much as my repeated requests for information and dialogue have been met with silence. That’s too bad, as they have been and continue to be the dominant player in the comp managed care business, and their directional changes will dramatically impact their current – and potential – customers…
Apr
21
