This week, Applied Systems hosted Applied Net 2023 at the Aria Resort in Las Vegas. With Applied celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, Applied Net brought more than 4,000 attendees to learn from more than 250 sessions, 290 speakers, and 90 exhibitors. 

During the opening keynote on Tuesday, Taylor Rhodes, CEO of Applied, shared how the company's dedication to the independent agency channel is inspiring continued developments in technology and products.

“We're obsessed with a simple equation that we believe aligns us with you, our clients," Rhodes told the room packed with thousands of independent agents. “The technology and products we deliver and support for you help you drive higher-than-average revenue growth at a lower-than-average cost structure and therefore help you earn a higher-than-average valuation for your agency."

In the challenging environment of a hard market, geopolitical unrest, talent shortages, and more, Rhodes highlighted the importance of continuing to harness data and technology to fuel that equation by “making our assets more integrated by increasing connectivity to more carrier markets," he said. “By using data to enrich workflows and give you more accurate reporting and insights, we can cut time out, we can cut cost out, we can cut friction out, we can help you be more competitive and win more business at a lower cost."

Rhodes also shared a number of improvements that Applied has made to its offerings. He unveiled Applied Epic's new dashboards, powered by Applied's partnership with Google, that provides modern reporting and analytics on agency metrics. Additional improvements to Applied Epic launched this year include a new browser version, document preview capability, and improvements to SMS and MMS messaging. Applied Epic has also enhanced its employee benefits capabilities by integrating Employee Navigator into the system.

Additionally, EZLynx, acquired by Applied in 2021, celebrates its 20th anniversary this year, marking the milestone by developing upgrades such as a new-and-improved user experience and progress on core rating capabilities, as well as personal lines text-to-quote capabilities and AI-powered marketing.

Rhodes also announced the launch of Tarmika Insured, a commercial lines quoting product to support customer-facing quoting and embedded insurance, allowing agencies to embed commercial lines quoting capabilities online and at the point of sale.

“Today's consumers are used to purchasing services themselves across many different industries, and insurance has lagged behind this trend for far too long," said Raghav Tanna, senior vice president of commercial lines, Applied Systems. “Tarmika Insured gets agents' trusted advice and commercial lines quotes in front of insureds in a simpler, digital way, creating a better customer experience and more profitable opportunities for agencies and carriers alike."

Rhodes' keynote also provided updates on Applied Pay, introduced at Applied Net 2022, which now has 500 agency customers and handles nearly $50 million per month in premium payment processing volume. The cloud-based electronic payments hub has seen multiple improvements in its roll-out over the year, including accounts receivable reconciliation, a hosted payment page “pay now" link and compliance and risk monitoring. Rhodes told attendees to keep an eye out on new Applied Pay features in the future, including solutions for the pain point of premium distribution.

Looking ahead to 2024, the rise of generative AI marks a new chapter in technology “enabling us all to have that same experience, to know more, to spend more time on higher value tasks and to serve our clients better," Rhodes said, noting that Applied has proofs of concepts and plans underway to implement AI. “It's our promise that we will be your partner in making AI advancements valuable for you, and that we'll do that safely, smartly and responsibly."

Closing out the keynote in a grand finale, Rhodes announced that Applied has donated $40,000 to Invest^SM, the insurance education program of the Big “I," to launch a learning management system to equip teachers to share the great opportunities in insurance. 

“We need a real focus and a commitment to upskilling talent and developing and recruiting the next generation of insurance professionals," Rhodes said. “Our partners at the Big 'I' through their Invest initiative play a critical role for all of us in developing a talent pipeline by introducing students to careers and insurance during high school. We believe in this mission deeply and we've been supporting the Big 'I' in it for years."

The Wednesday keynote was presented by Bear Grylls, global adventurer, best-selling author, award-winning TV host and former British Special Forces soldier. Grylls spoke to Applied Net attendees on failure, never giving up, and kindness. 

“We all like to gloss over the failures in our lives. But for me, my failures far outweigh the successes—they really do," he said. “If I think of the failed expeditions, the failed projects, the near-death moments, they definitely still come to me in the night sometimes. But the thing about those failures is that they've also made me. They built that resilience; they've forced me to adapt and get stronger."

Grylls shared one of his failures was his first attempt to join the Special Air Service (SAS), a special forces unit of the British Army. After six months of brutal training in the selection process, he was failed out. After his second attempt, Grylls was among the four recruits that successfully completed training. And of those four, three had failed training the first time.

“Failure is a doorway, it's that doorway you've got to go through if you're going to succeed," he said. “The one thing that failure isn't is the end."

AnneMarie McPherson Spears is IA news editor.