羞羞视频

Speaker: Suruchi Bhargava, Committee Chair

Keynote 1: Actuarial hat in the public sector: Actuarial thinking in government budgeting and social programmes

This session will discuss how actuarial thinking and data analysis is driving the policy making in public sector.

Speaker: Dr T.V. Somanathan, Cabinet Secretary of India

Delivered by IFoA President Paul Sweeting

Plenary 1: Boardroom ready: Weaving influence and impact

This session delves into the journey from technical expertise to impactful leadership, featuring insights from mid-career actuaries to seasoned executives. Through real-world experiences, it highlights key skills for board readiness: adaptability, emotional intelligence, cross-functional collaboration, and thought leadership. It offers a roadmap for actuaries aiming to influence decisions and shape the future of the profession.

Speakers: 

• Mr Anurag Rastogi, Council Member, IAI 
• Mr Subhendu Bal, Chief Actuary & CRO, SBI Life
• Mr Siddesh Ramasubramanian, CEO, InRisk Labs, India
• Kulin Patel, CEO, KA Pandit
• Asha Murali, Independent Actuary

Plenary 2: Threads of change: Navigating the insurance landscape

This plenary explores the shifting insurance landscape in India and developing markets, with insights from other economies. Topics of discussion will include climate risk, AI integration, regulatory shifts, and global macroeconomic trends. Senior industry practitioners will share their views on navigating challenges, seizing growth opportunities, and building future-ready organisations amid rising competition, emerging markets, and the evolving demands of a dynamic, global industry.

Speakers: 

• Prasun Sarkar, ICICI Lombard General Insurance Co. Ltd
• Sanjeeb Kumar, CEO, Gallagher Re / Past President IAI
• Ajit Banerjee, President & Chief Investment Officer, Shriram Life Insurance Company Ltd
• Ramakant Malpani, CFO, Hannover Re Consulting Services India 
• Suruchi Bhargava, Partner, K.A.Pandit

Math, models and markets: An actuary鈥檚 journey into quant engineering

Quantitative engineering has long been a core function for banking. But it has also become an important function for insurance. This is due to the increased complexity of financial instruments insurers invest in, more so in mature markets like the UK, and the regulator鈥檚 increased scrutiny of these products.  This session will cover:

• Background to quant engineering 
• How is it used in insurance
• The regulatory aspect
• Are there any cross disciplinary applications?
• Skill set required in this function, any current challenges and future direction 

This will be delivered in person and will be a fairly technical session. It should be of interest to actuaries at all levels interested in assets, investments, ALM and quant. This includes senior actuaries interested in understanding the investment and regulatory landscape in more mature markets like the UK.

Speaker: Jyotsna Kaushik, Phoenix Group

Parametric meets predictive: Reimagining catastrophe risk modelling for a warmer world

Climate change is accelerating the frequency and severity of natural catastrophes, challenging traditional actuarial models that rely on historical experience. In this context, parametric insurance 鈥� with predefined triggers and fast claims settlement 鈥� is gaining traction globally, particularly in underinsured regions and sectors. But its pricing and design raise critical actuarial questions: how do we model the volatility of future climates, price for basis risk, and ensure credibility in a world where past data is less relevant?

This session explores how actuaries can blend traditional catastrophe models, climate scenario analysis, and modern predictive analytics to support innovative parametric products. We will showcase a case study involving flood and wildfire risk pricing in Southeast Asia, using satellite data, climate models, and geospatial machine learning.

Topics include:

• Designing climate-responsive parametric insurance: thresholds, data sources, and payout curves
• Managing basis risk and balancing simplicity with fairness
• How actuaries can influence product viability through transparent, forward-looking pricing
• ESG implications: supporting resilience in vulnerable communities

This session is aimed at actuaries in general insurance, risk, or sustainability roles, especially those involved in product development, pricing, or capital modelling. A basic familiarity with catastrophe risk or climate-adjusted pricing is useful but not required.

Attendees will leave with a new toolkit for thinking about actuarial relevance in the climate era 鈥� where responsiveness, innovation, and social value must be balanced with data limitations and increasing uncertainty.

Speaker: Harsh Jaitak, Hymans Robertson

Pricing the priceless cloud insurance: An expected utility perspective

In modern times, life is unimaginable without the cloud. From governments to individuals, military operations to apparel listing, educational institutions to fashion houses, and the air force to shipping, many sectors and people rely on the cloud. 

With such strong dependence come massive challenges. There are cyber threats such as cloud outages, ransomware attacks, espionage attempts, data breaches, hacking, and cyber thefts. The list is so long that cyber losses are now treated on the scale of a catastrophe. 

As a result, the need of the hour is to build resilient systems for cloud computing for smooth functioning of day-to-day life. An obvious methodology to cover up losses is to resort to insurance. But the insurer has to be alert enough to survey the cyber landscape to price such novel cloud insurance policies. 

In our approach we introduce a methodology by which the insurer can determine the exact premium based on the 鈥榚xpected utility criterion鈥� and 鈥榗onstant absolute risk aversion鈥�. Our research points out serious drawbacks including underestimation of premium in the earlier approaches. And it fills the gaps in the scanty literature on cloud insurance. Back testing of this new strategy is then done for a plethora of loss distributions employed in insurance to obtain magnificent results. 
 
In this session we will have a live presentation, and it should be of interest to actuaries at all levels particularly those interested in cyber risk.
 
The presenter is Associate Professor.

Speaker: Dr Raj Kumari Bahl, University of Delhi

Revolutionising reserving: Exploring machine learning as a complementary dimension to traditional triangle methods

As insurance reserving faces the challenges of more volatile claims and increasingly complex data, the limits of traditional triangle-based methods are becoming harder to ignore. Techniques like the chain-ladder model have long been at the core of reserving. But their rigid structure makes it tough to keep up with emerging trends, detailed segmentation, and the need for more nuanced insights.

This research examines how machine learning (ML) can serve not as a replacement, but as a powerful parallel dimension. It can enhance reserving by offering predictive depth, data-driven segmentation, and scenario testing capabilities that are difficult to achieve through classical approaches alone.

Targeted at reserving actuaries, actuarial data scientists, and transformation-focused leaders, the presentation contrasts ML-based models with conventional triangle outputs, using real-world claim datasets. Two key ML approaches are introduced: 

1. Leveraging flat-structured 鈥榣oss triangle鈥� data for observation of trends
2. Using a segmented learning-based approach on a loss triangle

Rather than presenting ML as a magic fix, we emphasise a balanced perspective. We highlight where ML improves upon traditional methods, where it aligns with them, and where caution is required. We鈥檒l cover how to prepare actuarial data for ML applications while maintaining interpretability and auditability.

This will be an interactive live presentation. Attendees will leave with practical tools and a framework to assess and integrate ML into their existing reserving practices. We intend this to help make reserving smarter, more adaptive, and ready for the future.

Speakers: 

• Shivanee Mudigonda, AXA XL
• Sairaj Patro
• Swayam Kumar Patro

Actuarial science and entrepreneurship: The road less travelled

While topics like climate change, IFRS, RBC, and AI dominate actuarial discussions today, one vital area that remains largely underexplored is entrepreneurship. Specifically, how actuaries can leverage their skillsets to build and lead successful ventures. As the global startup ecosystem continues to grow, including rapidly in India, this conversation is both timely and necessary for actuaries worldwide.
 
This session will explore how actuarial competencies can be applied beyond traditional roles, especially in startups across fintech, insurtech, healthtech, climate modelling, and individual consulting. The aim is to encourage actuaries to view entrepreneurship not as an alternative, but as a natural extension of actuarial thinking in a fast-evolving economy.
 
This is not a lecture from an established expert, but a research-driven, discussion-led session based on curated insights from actuarial entrepreneurs and early-stage founders. It will feature:

• Emerging startup models and market gaps where actuaries can add value, including potential opportunities and target markets
• Why actuaries are well-positioned for entrepreneurship, and why many hesitate
• Pros and cons of staying in employment versus taking the entrepreneurial leap, offering a 360掳 perspective
• A reflective segment inviting the audience to consider how their current mindset aligns with entrepreneurial thinking, encouraging self-awareness without forcing conclusions

By engaging both experienced professionals and younger actuaries, this session aims to spark meaningful discussion. It seeks to inspire attendees to reimagine their roles 鈥� not just as analysts or consultants, but as innovators and leaders shaping the future of actuarial science.

Speaker: Surabhi Handa, M&G Global Services

Quantifying climate risk: A conceptual framework for emerging markets

The rising frequency and intensity of extreme weather events under climate change pose urgent challenges for insurers, especially in emerging markets where data gaps and resource constraints limit property-level risk assessment. 

This session introduces a framework that taps into publicly available climate projections and satellite-derived metrics to generate actionable climate risk scores across multiple perils. 

We illustrate how these scores can support underwriting, by identifying high-risk exposures, and inform pricing strategy, by aligning rate tiers with quantified risk levels. By integrating bias-corrected global climate projections with open-access satellite-derived vulnerability metrics, this methodology delivers a cost-effective solution that can be rapidly deployed and tailored to diverse operational environments.
 
By focusing on scalable building blocks, insurers in low-penetration markets can close protection gaps and enhance resilience. This session demonstrates how integrating climate scenario insights and geospatial data with core actuarial principles creates practical pathways for designing and pricing climate-resilient insurance offerings. These offerings reflect local conditions and emerging-market realities. Flood risk serves as a detailed case study to illustrate the framework鈥檚 practical application.

Key outcomes and takeaways:

• An overview of how publicly available climate scenarios and satellite proxies can be combined into practical climate-risk scores
• Guidance on embedding these risk metrics into underwriting workflows to identify and classify exposures
• High-level insights on translating risk scores into rate-tier structures that align premium levels with quantified risk
• Lessons on ensuring affordability and scalability in resource-constrained scenarios

Speakers: 

• Prof Eswar Prem Sai Guptha
• Prof Satya Sai Mudigonda
• Prof Pallav Kumar Baruah

All from Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning

Solvency in today鈥檚 age: NAT CAT pools and evolving regimes

This session will provide an update on the research carried out by the property natural catastrophe (NAT CAT) pools and solvency sub-groups of the IFoA鈥檚 general insurance Asia International Working Party. 

With a focus on the Indian market, we will: 

• Outline the protection gap in Asia and current attempts to use pools to address this gap
• Compare the Asian pools landscape with the rest of the world
• Share our views on the future state of managing NAT CAT risks and the role of public private partnerships to tackle both NAT CAT and non NAT CAT risks. The existence of such partnerships is key to ensuring provision of cover for adverse risks, and a solvent insurance world.

Further, we will dive into the current solvency regimes across the Asian market and how they have evolved in the recent years. We will:  

• Draw comparisons against the more established markets (such as the UK and Europe)
• Explore how global insurance firms have integrated the use of solvency calculations within their wider risk management framework
• Include some examples of capital optimisation that allow firms to make effective use of their capital while adhering to solvency regulations.

Speakers: 

• Ritika Rustagi, Mazars
• Manisha Sharma, Accenture
• Rochak Garg, Bajaj Allianz

Defined benefit pensions are back in India with the Unified Pension Scheme from April 2025. Foolhardy or inspired?

Almost three million central government employees now have the benefit of the new Unified Pension Scheme from 1 April 2025. It is a complex design with a defined benefit assured benefit with defined contribution pre-funding. Not to mention employees have the choice to remain in the defined contribution based National Pension System.  

Our presentation will appeal to anyone who wants to understand the actuarial, financial and risk perspective of the UPS and the potential implications it may have for pension scheme design in the future. Many PSUs have already started considering if they should re-look at their schemes too.   

We will show some illustrative calculations from the employee and employer perspective, as well as some qualitative considerations and global comparisons.  There are almost another 6.5 million state government employees who may be given this option in the years to come too. With PSUs, the combined total will be over 10 million potential members.

There is some talk globally about defined benefit pensions having a suitable role in the future, even amid the strong trend for defined contribution schemes in the last 20 to 25 years. Maybe the Indian government鈥檚 decision for its employees may turn out to be inspired? Or maybe the true costs will not yet be fully appreciated for years to come.

Speakers: 

• Kulin Patel, K. A. Pandit
• Rahul Salian, K. A. Pandit

AI ethics in public health decision-making: Navigating bias, transparency, and the role of actuaries

AI is increasingly being integrated into public health infrastructures, improving disease surveillance, predictive modelling, vaccine allocation, and emergency response. However, this integration raises ethical concerns, including algorithmic transparency, accountability, bias, informed consent, and public trust. 

This presentation focuses on AI-driven health insurance pricing, highlighting the utility of explainable machine learning models for risk assessment and premium pricing. 

While they are useful, these models can sometimes inherit or amplify data biases, leading to unfair cost allocations, especially among historically underserved populations. 

The evolving role of health pricing actuaries, who are at the intersection of data science, ethics, and policy, is crucial in this context. They must exercise professional judgment, monitor model fairness, engage in model governance, and communicate risks to regulators and consumers. 

This study proposes a governance framework grounded in algorithmic transparency, stakeholder deliberation, and anticipatory impact assessment to support ethical AI implementation in public health and insurance.

Speaker: Rupel Nargunam, Madras School of Economics

New perspective on interest rate risk modelling for solvency capital regimes

This topic explores various internal modelling approaches for calibrating capital charge requirements related to interest rate risk within solvency regimes. This area has been examined by the working groups contributing to the development of the new risk-based capital regime, which is still in progress in India. The discussion will follow the sequence outlined below:

1. Introduction to interest rate risk from a solvency perspective
2. Standard formula-based frameworks in global solvency regimes such as Solvency II
3. ZCYC curves as data source and key characteristics of interest rate movements in the Indian market
4. Advantages and challenges of global frameworks and their calibration approaches
   
   1. Parametric methods
   2. Principle component analysis
5. The role of mean-reversion in interest rate movements and its impact on VaR
6. Modelling mean-reversion: methodologies, advantages, and limitations, involving a detailed exploration of both parametric and non-parametric approaches:
   
   • Parametric methods
     
     • (i) Vasicek model
     • (ii) Cox-Ingersoll-Ross model
   • Non-parametric method
     
     • (iii) Cohort-based non-parametric rate VaR: Involves categorising trading days into cohorts based on observed interest rate levels (from high to low), and independently calibrating non-parametric VaR for each cohort.
7. Non-parallel and non-uniform shifts in ZCYC curves during stress conditions: Analysis of how extreme market scenarios can result in diverse movements across different maturities, leading to diversification effects. Also discussed are the challenges these pose to modelling and potential solutions to address these complexities.
   

Speakers: 

• Prasun Sarkar, Appointed Actuary & Chief Actuarial Officer, ICICI Lombard
• Manoj Babu Gatram, Vice President Actuarial, ICICI Lombard
• Yashasvi Sharma, Senior Actuarial Analyst, ICICI Lombard

Employer stop loss: A solution to low-limit health coverage?

鈥楨mployer stop loss鈥� is a variant of group health insurance. It is purchased by employers to help them self-manage the financial risk associated with large medical claims. They retain a portion of risk associated with employee health benefits in exchange for the potential of low premium costs and an opportunity to share in potential savings. As opposed to a fully insured arrangement where the risk is transferred dollar for dollar to an external insurer for a pre-determined premium, the risk for a portion of employee claims continues to reside with the employer. 

Rates of medical inflation worldwide are consistently high due to factors like aging populations, expensive therapies, increasing hospitalisation costs, and external supply chain shocks. This means that costs for healthcare services continue to increase at alarmingly high rates, consuming a growing share of national GDP. 

In the fight against stressed national finances, employer stop loss has been hailed as a potent weapon to tame high rates of medical cost growth while offering greater flexibility in health benefit plan design.

India and parts of Asia offer a fertile ground for experimentation. Especially as penetration rates for medical insurance increase amidst the growth of a vibrant middle class and greater awareness of what insurance does (and does not) entail. 

In this presentation, we take a closer look at: 

• The actuarial contributions that have helped propel the rise of this product class in the US
• What it could take to introduce and cement its place in other nascent, febrile health ecosystems

Speaker: Ankit Nanda, Optimum Global Solutions

Actuaries as product designers: Shaping insurance for the digital economy

Insurance is evolving to serve a digital-first customer base, from gig workers and micro-entrepreneurs to second-hand car buyers and platform-based users. Actuaries are increasingly involved not just in pricing, but in shaping how insurance products are designed, delivered, and adapted in real time.

This session explores how actuarial skills are applied in the development of modular, embedded, and usage-based products tailored for digital ecosystems. Drawing from practical consulting experience in general insurance, it will cover:

• The actuary鈥檚 evolving role in defining claim triggers, benefit logic, and seamless digital customer journeys
• How traditional actuarial assumptions shift when designing cover for gig workers, creator platforms, and other non-standard risks
• Balancing affordability, personalisation, and sustainability in opt-in or usage-based product structures
• Pricing without standard underwriting, using behavioural, transactional, or platform-based proxies
• Leveraging alternative data (for example transaction history and reviews) to enhance pricing and underwriting

The session will also include a focused case study on buyback insurance for second-hand cars. This is where pricing must reflect uncertainty in vehicle condition, usage intent, and fraud risk, all within a fully digital flow.
 
We will explore how actuaries work with product and tech teams to convert risk logic into real-time pricing engines, while ensuring fairness, regulatory compliance, and customer trust.

The session is relevant for actuaries in pricing, reserving, product, or innovation roles 鈥� particularly in emerging markets like India and Southeast Asia, or those exploring insurtech and customer-centric product design.
 
This will be delivered as a live, interactive presentation with real-time polling and audience engagement.

Speaker: Akshay Bhutani, Lewis & Ellis 鈥� Actuaries and Consultants

Excel to excellence: Becoming the actuarial leader you aspire to be

鈥淵ou start by solving problems, but you grow by solving people鈥檚 problems.鈥�

We as actuaries have technical mastery to solve problems proficiency in complex models. We have the depth of knowledge to make profound judgements. But do we have what it takes to become the actuarial leader we aspire to be?

We think we understand leadership, but maybe it is only a few who truly do. And just like actuarial science is mastered through study and practice, leadership is also a cultivated capability.

In this fast paced and dynamic world, we as actuaries must see beyond our actuarial qualifications and traditional areas of work. What we need for that is to learn and showcase that we are not just subject matter experts but also leaders who can shape the future of the financial world.

This workshop type session aims to be interactive and address the following:

• Transitioning from individual contributor to influencer: realising and learning leadership capabilities
• Stakeholder management: learning and applying leadership strategies
• Learning in depth the art of storytelling: facts tell but stories sell
• Learning effective communication: influence and lead with clarity
• Redefining leadership in the actuarial world: from Excel leaders to excellent leaders

The target audience for this session is all conference attendees including senior and accomplished leaders.

This session should be attended by actuarial leaders currently leading a team or who aspire to lead a team in future.

Speaker: Gurpreet Babbar, Accenture

The actuary鈥檚 dharma: Weaving risk, empathy and legacy into a changing world

In an age where actuaries are being called upon to do more than model 鈥� to communicate, innovate and uphold ethical decision-making in a world of uncertainty 鈥� what does it truly mean to be an actuary?

This session is a call to consciousness.

Krishna Patel brings a transformative perspective to actuarial science, blending real-world experience from catastrophe modelling, unique liability pricing, and stakeholder communication, with timeless philosophical insights from the Bhagavad Gita. The result is a deeply reflective and practical talk that challenges professionals to redefine their identity 鈥� not just as number crunchers, but as ethical storytellers, risk empathisers, and legacy builders.

Key reflections include:

• Can empathy be priced into our models?
• How do we act when data fails and uncertainty reigns?
• What does detached action (nishkama karma) mean for reserving, pricing, and client advisory?
• How can we use storytelling to influence not just decisions, but trust?

Speaker: Krishna Patel

Beyond the calculator: Debunking actuarial stereotypes through a fresher鈥檚 journey

Actuaries are often mislabelled as number-crunchers or accountants, but our role is to weave stories of financial security across global markets. Bani Dhir, Director at Mercer with 23 years of experience, shares her fresher journey to debunk stereotypes and inspire actuaries. 

At a 2003 Delhi wedding, her uncle鈥檚 鈥榓ccountant鈥� quip sparked laughter and a lesson in communication. A Genpact blunder 鈥� using 鈥榤ortality risk鈥� in a client call 鈥� taught her to simplify pensions as 鈥榩arathas for retirement鈥�. 

These anecdotes reveal how actuaries can transform complex models into relatable narratives. In India鈥檚 global capability centres, Bani learned to bridge cultural gaps, like blending UK directness with Indian consensus using a biryani analogy, fostering collaboration in multinational teams. 

This 30-minute interactive presentation, blending humour and storytelling, equips actuaries to communicate impactfully with stakeholders and reframe their identity as architects of futures, not just calculators. 

Attendees will learn to:

• Use analogies to simplify jargon
• Navigate cultural nuances in global teams
• Counter stereotypes like 鈥榙eath predictor鈥� with engaging narratives

Aimed at students, early-career actuaries, and leaders, the session assumes basic actuarial knowledge and offers universal insights for India, South Asia, and beyond. A live poll (鈥榃hat stereotype have you faced?鈥�) and #ActuaryRedefined hashtag encourage engagement. Join Bani to weave communication and collaboration into the actuarial tapestry, inspiring a vibrant profession.

Speaker: Bani Dhir, Mercer

The art and science of communication: Roleplaying effective and ineffective ways actuaries communicate

In today鈥檚 actuarial landscape, the ability to communicate complex models and risk insights is as vital as the technical work itself. Our session brings this challenge to life through a dynamic and interactive roleplay. 
 
Two actuaries, played by the presenters, will demonstrate contrasting communication styles: one that confuses and alienates stakeholders, and another that simplifies, connects, and inspires action. In this interactive session, my colleague and I will bring this challenge to life through a dynamic roleplay in real-world actuarial scenarios. 
 
We will engage the audience during the roleplay by inviting them to identify communication pitfalls and suggest better approaches, ensuring the session is both educational and memorable. 

Attendees will walk away with:

• Practical tips
• Deeper appreciation for communication nuances
• Tools to simplify complex messages using storytelling
• Strategies for engaging non-technical stakeholders with clarity and confidence 

This session will be beneficial for actuaries at all levels who seek to enhance their communication skills. But it will be particularly geared towards an audience with less experience in stakeholder management, who wish to develop this as their strength. By blending humour, realism, and interactivity, we aim to make this a memorable and transformative experience.

Speakers: Bishal Gupta and Sera Mathew, Swiss Re

Speaker: Preeti C, IAI President

Plenary 3: Cross-stitching innovation: Expanding the actuarial canvas

This plenary explores how actuaries are working together across disciplines 鈥� technology, public health, sustainability, and more 鈥� to tackle global challenges. Through insights and case studies, speakers will show how interdisciplinary approaches enhance decision-making and risk management. Aimed at both students and professionals, the session highlights how actuaries can drive societal impact and resilience by thinking beyond traditional boundaries.

Speakers: 

Yash Ratanpal, Leader Risk Consulting Acies
Prerna Nagpal, Investments Associate Director, WTW India
Sumit Ramani, Co-founder, Protect Me Well
Saigeeta Bhargava, Partner, PwC India
Swati Umre, Partner, EY India

Keynote 2: Precision meets principle

In the age of innovation and rapid changes, trust and ethics play a key role in maintaining a balance.

Speaker: Dr Rajeeva Karandikar, Chairman, National Statistical Commission

Plenary 4: From local roots to global reach: India鈥檚 actuarial influence

The discussion is to explore emerging business models of working from India for the global market. Leaders will share success stories, challenges, and future prospects. The session features experienced service delivery model experts, offering insights into navigating this evolving landscape and driving growth in a globalised work environment.

Speakers: 

• Megha Garg, Senior VP, Deputy Head Global Valuation, Swiss Re
• Mr Avnish Nainawatee, Director Actuarial, M&G Global Services India 
• Brian Chiarella, Lewis & Ellis, LLC
• Subhash Chandra. Director, Client Solutions, Pacific Life Re
• Mr Murshid A Kuttihassan, Actuary Lead, EY GDS

Bridging Excel and the cloud: Smarter actuarial product development

Excel spreadsheets remain the cornerstone of actuarial work, especially in pricing and product development for life insurance. While Excel offers familiarity and flexibility, actuaries often face key limitations such as long macro run times, restricted collaboration, limited accessibility, and poor model governance. These challenges can create bottlenecks in moving from prototype to production.

In this interactive session, we will explore several cloud-based solutions that help bridge the gap between actuarial modelling and production-ready systems. These solutions are designed to enhance scalability, improve model governance, support automation, and streamline the deployment process, all while maintaining the flexibility of traditional spreadsheet environments.

Participants will gain insights into how these technologies enable actuarial teams to focus more on innovation and analysis rather than manual processes and operational constraints. The session will also highlight how life insurance product development can benefit from such advancements, leading to faster time-to-market and improved efficiency.

This live, interactive presentation is ideal for actuarial professionals, product developers, and tech enthusiasts in the insurance space. It promises to offer a forward-looking perspective on modernising actuarial tools and workflows.

Speakers:

• Mahek Savla, K.A. Pandit
• Deepa Gupta, Coherent Global

Hacking the actuarial mindset: Navigating cyber risk and pricing

Cyber insurance is rapidly emerging as a critical line of business, driven by the increasing frequency and severity of digital threats. But actuarial approaches to pricing these risks remain underdeveloped due to their unique and evolving nature. 

This presentation will offer a structured overview of the global cyber insurance landscape. It will outline the limitations of traditional actuarial models when applied to risks characterised by intangible exposures, high accumulation potential, and a constantly shifting threat environment.

The session will examine key pricing challenges faced by actuaries. These include limited and inconsistent claims data, systemic and correlated risks, silent cyber exposures, and the difficulty of modelling tail events. These challenges hinder the direct application of conventional pricing techniques and demand more adaptive approaches.

The presentation will also explore the Indian cyber insurance market, where digital adoption is accelerating but insurance penetration remains low, especially among small and medium enterprises. Product development is largely reinsurer-driven, with minimal actuarial involvement to date. Regulatory initiatives such as the Digital Personal Data Protection Act may pave the way for more innovation and market participation. A comparison with more mature markets like the US and UK will provide additional context.

The session will conclude by presenting emerging actuarial methodologies, including rating factor models, experience rating, synthetic data usage, and advanced techniques such as generalised linear mixed models and Bayesian methods. The content is aimed at actuaries and insurance professionals seeking to expand their understanding of this fast-growing and complex area of risk.

Speakers:

• Deepanshu Madaan, EY GDS
• Shivali Chopra
• Aditi Periwal

Crypto assets, decentralised finance and actuaries

Crypto assets and decentralised finance (DeFi) is no longer in an experimental phase 鈥� it is now transforming how financial systems are built, accessed and governed. It is an emerging peer-to-peer financial system that uses blockchain and crypto assets to allow people, businesses, or other entities to transact directly with each other. 

The blockchain technology behind Bitcoin laid the foundation for DeFi infrastructure. The key principle behind DeFi is to remove third parties from the financial system, leading to greater accessibility, lower costs and transaction times. In an interview in August 2021, Deutsche Bank CEO Paul Maley said that "It鈥檚 necessary for any bank that wants to compete in the future, to make sure they have an ability to interact and interoperate with DeFi systems as they emerge.鈥� 
 
For actuaries, this is an opportunity to expand their expertise and relevance in next-generation finance. From monitoring the investment implications of crypto assets and modelling portfolio exposure, to designing DeFi insurance products that address smart contracts and parametric risks, actuaries have a growing role to play. Beyond insurance, they can contribute to the development of the DeFi ecosystem, analysis and design of tokenomics and protocol-level risk analysis.
 
This presentation aims to: 

• Decode the DeFi ecosystem
• Examine its evolving risk landscape
• Highlight real world case-studies
• Explore its barriers
• Discuss areas where actuarial expertise can lead to innovation and enhance financial resilience 

This interactive presentation is for professionals who are keen to explore enormous opportunities in the finance world where actuaries can meaningfully contribute.

Speakers: 

• Suruchi Bhargava
• Santosh Kumar Yadav
• Himani Naik

All from K.A. Pandit

Sandboxing the future: Digital twins and the new era of insurance experimentation 

Digital twins 鈥� virtual replicas of physical systems 鈥� are transforming industries like aerospace, manufacturing, and smart cities. But in insurance, their adoption remains limited due to concerns around dynamically innovating AI and IoT space. Despite the potential to revolutionise underwriting, claims, and risk prevention, digital twins are still seen as futuristic rather than foundational. 

This session will explore the following key themes through an innovative lens:

• What does a digital twin look like in insurance: of a person, a property, or a process?
• How do we build and validate the digital twins model?
• A balanced view of advantages and limitations including enhanced personalisation, predictive risk modelling, operational efficiency, data privacy concerns, model complexity, regulatory uncertainty, integration challenges.
• How the IRDAI鈥檚 2025 regulatory sandbox framework enables insurers to experiment with digital twin-based models in a controlled, compliant environment?

We鈥檒l explore these questions through an inclusive discussion on the emerging role of digital twins in insurance. We鈥檒l share use cases from health, property, and industrial insurance, and examine how actuaries can work with engineers, data scientists, and IoT specialists to bring these models to life. 

This will be a non-technical, exploratory session aimed at actuaries across levels curious about the future of real-time, data-driven insurance.

Speaker: Kajal Jain, KPMG

The evolution of insurance investing: Rise of alternative asset classes

The insurance industry has been undergoing a transformative shift as alternative assets are taking centre stage in portfolio construction. Traditionally dominated by equities and bonds, insurers are increasingly allocating to alternative assets such as private equity, infrastructure and private credit. This is to enhance diversification and achieve more attractive risk-return profiles, among other benefits. 

The shift seems to be driven by a combination of persistently low interest rates, the need for inflation protection and the alignment of long-term assets with insurance liabilities. From the perspective of the Indian market, the presentation covers IRDAI鈥檚 guidelines about insurers鈥� investment in alternative investment funds as well as treatment under evolving risk-based capital regime in India.

This presentation explores key considerations surrounding:

• Primary drivers propelling insurers towards alternative assets as well as characteristics of major alternative investment classes
• Critical risks that insurers must navigate along with governance, and regulatory challenges associated with alternatives
• Latest market landscape and portfolio composition shifts across global and Indian insurers
• IRDAI鈥檚 guidelines and treatment under evolving risk-based capital regime in India

The presentation is expected to be relevant for actuaries (more for life actuarial professionals), portfolio managers, risk professionals and leadership teams. The attendees will get an introduction into the popular alternative asset classes, gain insights into the benefits and risks of investing in these assets and learn about recent market trends.

The presenters of this session have worked closely with insurers and asset managers based in UK and EMEIA for several years and intend to enrich the discussion from their experience.

Speakers: 

• Smriti Sethi, EY GDS
• Paritosh K. Srivastava, EY GDS

Risk drivers for general insurance capital modelling: Market practice, parametrisation, methods and validation

Drivers of risk methods have become increasingly common within general insurance capital models over the last 20 years. While there has been discussion at GIRO and at a range of market forums there is limited research available on this topic. The Risk Drivers for GI Capital Modelling Working Party is drafting a paper that aims to help fill that gap. The paper sets out the range of market practice relating to drivers of risk in capital models and tools for practitioners. The paper addresses the following questions:

• What are the drivers of risks that are modelled? This will include the insurance market cycle, financial crises, inflation, and emerging risks.
• What are the approaches used to model these drivers?
• What are the differences in dependency structures and model output that the models generate?
• What are considerations for market practitioners who are validating models or considering building drivers of risk into a model?

In this session we will have a presentation featuring various members of the working party that will cover the key conclusions set out in the working party paper. It should be of interest to actuaries at all levels working in capital modelling. That includes senior actuaries and team leaders who are either validating capital models or are interested in using drivers of risk in capital models.

Speakers:

• Garvit Nagpal, Ernst & Young
• James Toller, Beazley
• James Norman, Proteus Consulting LLP

Plenary 5: The fabric of trust: Professionalism and ethics in actuarial practice

Speakers: 

• Preeti C, IAI President
• John Crooks, Group Chief actuary, RSA
• Paul Sweeting, IFoA President
• Mr Sunil Sharma, CEO, RGA, India