The life insurance industry is rather clunky in its current form, as it is full of antiquated processes that aren’t exactly ideal – especially when a loved one has just died. The last thing on people’s mind is filling out a raft of forms, getting copies of certificates – people just want to mourn. In a bid to clean up the mess and streamline a $2.7 billion industry, MetLife is planning to develop smart contracts and put all of its processes on the Ethereum blockchain. By doing this, multiple facets of the application and claiming process can become automated and run far smoother for everyone involved.
Starting Out with a Trial
MetLife’s Singapore-based incubator company – LumenLab – is teaming up with Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) and NTUC Income to develop Lifechain. It will be a smart contract platform that automates the claiming process by taking data and information from multiple different sources and auto-completing the forms. Once the platform has been developed, it will be trialed by the companies to see if it’s useful and practical. If it proves to be useful it will be fine-tuned and deployed by MetLife in the next couple of years.
Companies Already Ditching Ethereum
While MetLife is just turning to Ethereum to solve the issues of its industry, other companies are fleeing the network. After gas fees shot to record highs due to manipulation from rogue dApps, many reputable firms have been looking for alternatives. Deloitte is one of those firms looking for an alternative blockchain, and it has chosen VeChain. Deloitte will be shifting all of its customers over to its new VeChain network in the coming weeks to be able to offer a more robust service with a wider range of flexibility in its products. Hopefully, MetLife has a backup plan in place and is prepared to drop Ethereum in favor of another blockchain should Ethereum not be suitable.
Following in the Footsteps of North Korea
The Cheollima Civil Defense (CCD) has plans to free North Korea and is already issuing visas for its new country. These visas will be based on the Ethereum blockchain using a custom ERC-721 visa token. It’s the first time any country has issued visas on a blockchain, and it likely won’t be the last. MetLife is following in the footsteps of projects like the CCD.
If MetLife manages to pull off this massive task, it could completely revolutionize a $2.7 billion industry. Death is never an easy thing to deal with, so making the claiming process as simple and easy as possible is the most humane thing to do.
