Verisk Analytics

Verisk exhibits multiple, mutually reinforcing advantages. Intangibles and regulatory embedment: ISO’s industry‑standard policy language, loss costs and rating rules are filed across all states and territories, processed via some 2,000 filings annually, and supported by 240 experts and specialized lawyers.

Regulators rely on ISO constructs and statistical agent services to standardize the market. This creates legal and procedural inertia that is hard to replicate. Switching costs: Insurers build products, underwriting rules and workflows around ISO content, Verisk property and auto attributes, and claims tools (e.g., estimating and anti‑fraud).

Migration would mean multi‑year retooling, retraining, and regulatory re‑filing, so churn is minimal. Network effects: contributory data and statistical submissions scale Verisk’s databases to tens of billions of records, improving model accuracy and actuarial outputs as more carriers contribute.

The value of analytical outputs improves with breadth and quality of data. Efficient scale and cost advantages: As the designated statistical agent in all states, Verisk spreads fixed data ingestion, quality controls (~3,000 checks), and modeling R&D over a very large base, yielding structural cost efficiency.

Catastrophe models further benefit from scale and are gaining incremental regulatory validation in California. Competitive dynamics: In catastrophe modeling Verisk competes primarily with Moody’s RMS; in underwriting and claims, LexisNexis and CoreLogic feature.

Despite credible rivals, Verisk’s embedded regulatory infrastructure plus data gravity provide resilience.