Federato – a global company whose AI-native full policy lifecycle platform is used by top insurers in the US – is launching in Australia and New Zealand.

The firm has opened a Sydney office and appointed Roland Slee as regional vice president, Asia Pacific and Japan, and Finley Roach as sales director, Australia and New Zealand.

Federato says its initial focus is insurers writing commercial lines in Australia and New Zealand, with Singapore, Japan and Korea to follow.

It believes few insurers in the region have AI working across the full policy lifecycle, with most still steering portfolios, pricing risk and settling claims on legacy systems designed decades before generative AI existed.

Mr Slee says of ANZ insurers: “Their question is where to apply AI so it changes the economics of the business, rather than shaving a few minutes off a task.

"That is precisely what Federato's platform has delivered for carriers in the rest of the world, and it is why we chose to base ourselves in Sydney rather than serve the region from offshore."

Mr Slee spent four years leading Guidewire's business across Asia Pacific and Japan, and before that had nearly 20 years in Oracle's Asia Pacific sales leadership. He later led Bravura Solutions' Sonata platform in the region.

Mr Roach says of technology transformation: “The hardest problem in insurance has never been ambition. It has been the core systems underneath. Most AI in this market is bolted onto platforms that were never designed for it.

"Federato has built AI into the core, across underwriting, claims and portfolio management in real time. That difference is what will let insurers in this region realise the full potential of the technology, rather than a fraction of it."

Federato says Mr Roach brings more than a decade of experience at the intersection of insurance, technology and strategic transformation. Most recently he spent seven years at Endava, where he led the insurance practice and worked with leading insurers across the region on large-scale technology and business transformation.