2021-02-25 12:54:35
You have just bought a used vehicle, just that model that you have been looking for for months and that meets all your expectations. Now it’s time to take out insurance as soon as possible. Thanks to artificial intelligence (AI), MAPFRE has developed a unique and personalized system that is pioneering in Spain and has enormous potential to be applied in the future in other cases. In the coming weeks, the insurer will launch a pilot project for the automatic verification of damage through an algorithm applied to the hiring car insurance used. In this way, the client will be able to show the condition of the car body without having to travel and without the expert intervening, which will allow them to activate the policy instantly.
The operation is very simple. Upon completion of the contract online insurance, the user receives an SMS message with a link that opens a web solution on their smartphone and guides you in taking photographs of the vehicle from different angles: right and left sides, front and rear.
At that moment, a deep learning algorithm (known as deep learning) analyzes the images in real time and identifies the presence or absence of any type of damage. This analysis allows the policy to be adjusted in a personalized way. If the client agrees, they will be able to enjoy their insurance without waiting or traveling. And all this without human mediation.
How is it possible that AI knows how to distinguish a simple stain on the bodywork from a scratch? With a lot of training. And here the collaboration with the German company ControlExpert has been essential, which provided a pre-trained starting template with millions of photos of vehicles of different models and countries.
95% accuracy
MAPFRE then provided thousands of new images – treated anonymously – of cars corresponding to real hires in recent years in Spain. “To train the predictive model you need to teach it first. You must feed it with a very high and varied volume of images, as well as with the expected response for each of them, that is, the reality of the damage present. This way, after this learning process, you can give the model a photo that it has never seen and is able to determine if the vehicle has damage or not. The results we have obtained are spectacular, as they have enabled selective automation with a precision of 95%,” explains MAPFRE’s Innovation Delivery Manager, Daniel Almodóvar.
The effort has been great until the algorithm has achieved this level of success. During the first tests, if the photo was not of quality or was poorly lit, the AI detected the image from the parking sensors that many of the most modern cars have as bumps or marks on the bodywork.
The model allows you to show the state of the vehicle body without traveling or the intervention of experts, and activate the policy in a few seconds
This precision technology can have very positive effects for the insurance sector. In 2020 alone, there were more than 1.8 million used car transactions in Spain, a figure that will grow this year by up to 4% according to some studies. “The automatic damage assessment is the piece we were missing to give the definitive push and exploit the true potential of digital verification using photos, which began in 2019,” confirms the Technical Head of the Private Cars Area of MAPFRE Spain, Alberto Rodríguez.
Cross-functional teams from MAPFRE and ControlExport have participated in the development of this project, with specialists in data analysis, business or innovation along with engineers from CESVIMAP (MAPFRE’s R&D center) and expertise experts. The director of ControlExpert’s Technology department, Andreas Witte, confirms that its products, developed in close cooperation with international universities and research institutes, are based on leading technologies – among others, Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) e Instance Segmentation– capable of maximally deploying accurate predictive models for their clients.
The future of AI in the sector is promising, since these algorithms can also be applied in contracting home or business insurance. The key is to streamline processes and provide the client with a personalized, simple and modern experience typical of new times.
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