Moving to Guidewire Cloud: Why OneSpan Sign is a key integration for P&C insurance

According to Gartner®, “Insurance respondents to the 2024 CIO and Technology Executive Survey report continued focus on application modernization, cybersecurity, data science and cloud, as seen in previous years. However, for 2024, respondents have reported increased funding for integration technologies, and APIs and API architecture have risen to the top of the priority list for the first time.”  

While GenAI and cyber/information security are vital for true progress, moving operations to the cloud, or “cloud modernizing,” addresses insurance companies' reliance on expensive, heavy, legacy, on-premises applications and processes.

2025 CIO cloud investments in the insurance industry

The cloud provides many technologies that digitize and automate tasks, increasing agility and creating significant cost and time savings. Moving from on-premise operating systems to the cloud eco-system (C2C technologies) means minimizing the burden of maintenance on teams and enables innovative technologies that can be added easily to focus on issues that can be solved with digital automation.

Insurance leaders have a clear opportunity to follow what platforms Chief Information Officers (CIOs) use, what vendors they work with to deliver greater business agility and innovation, and what integrations — like eSignature — make the most sense to implement to streamline processes and support the transition to cloud-based operating systems. 

According to the Gartner Survey, 86% of Insurance CIOs and Technology Executives plan on increasing their investment towards Cloud platforms in 2025. 
Process efficiency and increasing productivity are top of mind for CIOs, and they will become the main drivers for modernizing operations and transitioning to cloud platforms.

Guidewire is leading the way with cloud transformation

A top vendor for cloud solutions, Guidewire provides P&C insurance companies with software solutions for policy administration, claims management, and billing, all from a single platform. As insurers move into the cloud, Guidewire is uniquely positioned to deliver greater business agility and innovation as well as cloud platform excellence for P&C insurers as key to revenue and continued growth.

Guidewire Cloud combines resilient, trusted infrastructure with modular and interconnected cloud services to help insurers accelerate, adapt, and innovate. These services include leveraging easy-to-use integrations to maximize cloud benefits.

Guidewire Cloud and its integrations have a variety of benefits:
1.    Improving business agility: Adjust to market changes, enhance customer experience, and quickly meet evolving insurance industry needs.
2.    Relying on trusted infrastructure: Core systems are modernized with a cloud-first, hybrid architecture to ensure a resilient, secure, and regulatory-compliant platform.
3.    Achieving operational predictability: Costs for vital platform infrastructure and development resources are consistent while self-service developer tools and resources are available.

Powerful cloud integrations lead to faster time to market

Insurers can leverage a variety of integrations within the cloud, but one stands out: eSignature. A foundational part of any organization, the eSignature solution is a critical part of the digital technology stack as it ensures a legally binding contract/agreement between two or more parties - the insurer and the applicant or claimant. Implementing eSignature integration across use cases — from completing applications and accepting waivers to processing claims — helps provide a better overall experience for insurers and policyholders. 

eSignature integration can also:

• Streamline processes: Paper forms can take up to 45 days to complete if sent via mail, while digital processes can be completed in 15 minutes.
• Improve efficiency: Locking in controlled workflows that include eSignatures from start to finish reduces costs as well as document errors by 80%.
• Enhance security: Digital signature technology is built to encrypt and tamper-seal business documents and signatures, often after each signature.

Due to the high-volume need for eSignature integration, the product must be efficient, easy to use, and easy to implement. Low-code/no-code solutions are valuable as they don’t require significant coding knowledge, which ultimately saves companies time and money. As the majority of the nation’s P&C insurers move to the cloud, integrations like eSignatures will accelerate the pace of capabilities and ROI. eSignature technology is often the last digital link in the process in order to create a legally binding transaction that directly impacts revenue and cost savings. 

OneSpan Sign is a cloud-to-cloud, pre-built automation solution available for Guidewire PolicyCenter and ClaimCenter on Guidewire Cloud, and InsuranceNow. A powerful integration, it creates a streamlined approach to elevating productivity and accelerating time to market. With OneSpan Sign, insurers can quickly create eSignature workflows while maintaining compliance and security, vital in a highly regulated market like insurance and P&C where there is a high percentage of customer claims and disputes.

Plus, the powerful automation tool works seamlessly with the end user, whether the end user is a consumer, agent, or broker. Insurance use cases can vary in complexity requiring various workflows. Consider a claim resolution scenario. There are often multiple parties involved, and they all require document review and signatures, taking sometimes over 40 days to complete. By using the OneSpan Sign Guidewire integration, that process is accelerated significantly: 

• The workflow is first started within ClaimCenter. 
• The user simply identifies the claimants, selects the templated agreements, and clicks on "send for eSign" without going through the hassle of preparing documents with signature fields. 
• Claimants receive a completely white-labeled notification from the carrier they trust, increasing completion rates and reducing the risk of phishing scams.

OneSpan Smart Forms

While most P&C insurers have already integrated eSignature solutions into their workflows, many are still using static PDF forms which are difficult to manage and manipulate. Data collection is critical in the insurance industry. In fact, according to Smart Communications’ The State of Customer Conversations report, 67% (up from 53% last year) of customers would end an interaction if the way a company collects information is too difficult and PDFs, even if digital, are a pain point that slows down processes. 

Leveraging pre-built connectors between OneSpan and Smart Communications, we help insurers transform static PDF processes with long lead times to intelligent, guided pre-built connectors with SmartCOMM Smart Forms powered by SmartIQ™ from Smart Communications™. Smart Forms delivers personalized, interactive communications and fast, secure end-to-end digital form experiences resulting in improved experiences for insurers and their customers. By offering intelligent, guided user experiences, insurers reap the benefits of increasing customer engagement while streamlining internal processes, managing risk, and reducing costs.

OneSpan Sign vs. competitors

OneSpan specializes in high-volume, consumer-facing transactions for enterprise clients in the insurance industry that often require tightly integrated workflows. We’ve seen success helping customers modernize their digital transformation, including carriers and agents picking a single eSignature vendor to streamline processes across workflows. In fact, a direct-to-consumer car insurance customer switched to OneSpan saw a 23% higher completion rate in the first 30 days due to the ability to fully white-label the experience. 

In addition to white-labeling, OneSpan offers a variety of benefits as an eSignature alternative:

• Better price-per-value — OneSpan provides not only better pricing, but also a more flexible pricing model. Customers have seen up to 75% in savings and enjoy an improved overall experience. 
• Higher completion rates — OneSpan helps drive more revenue and profit due to user retention and form completion. After integrating OneSpan Sign and fully white-labeling their eSignature experience, one auto insurer improved completion rates by 23%.   
• Audit trail and security features — OneSpan Sign features a comprehensive audit trail, tracking who signed, in what order, when, and where with strong identity verification features. It provides a robust way of addressing legal risks and demonstrating compliance. Further, with bank-grade security, we boast current regulatory compliance standards and certifications, as well as data residency. 

Ready to make the switch? As you move your operations to the cloud, consider OneSpan Sign integrations. Explore the Guidewire cloud platform and see how OneSpan Sign integrations can accelerate business processes. 

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OneSpan Sign for Guidewire

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Sources:

• Gartner, Insurance CIO Priorities 2024: Insights for Technology and Service Providers’ Product Plans, By James Ingham, 2 January 2024. 
• Gartner Survey, 2025 CIO Agenda: Top Priorities and Technology Plans for Insurance, By Kimberly Harris-Ferrante, 13 September 2024.

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