Back in 2017, Gain Compliance became the first new vendor certified by the NAIC since 2001.
We were the new kids on a very old block, and we were building an Annual Statement product from the ground up, making this a Greenfield Project.
That term, borrowed from the construction industry and applied to technology startups, meant that we were developing software in a totally new environment. We didn’t have to work around either prior technology choices or existing users and data – a prospect that was fun and exciting from an engineering perspective.
Still, the inherent risks of a Greenfield Projects are real and unavoidable: there were no promises that statutory reporting teams would embrace our new approach for statutory reporting. In fact, we faced the very real possibility that these teams would stick with software with which they were familiar.
Incumbency, in the world of software, can be hard to overcome.
It can also breed complacency.
While the other NAIC-approved vendors had familiarity on their side, they were experiencing the main downside of Legacy Projects. Existing customers, and their then-current expectations on how the software should work and how the data should be handled, created an environment where Gain’s competitors did the absolute minimum (and sometimes less) at every turn.
Instead of improving their offerings, these vendors were stuck firmly in maintenance mode – for all intents and purposes, their products were largely unchanged over the past decade.
Fast forward to the present day to check in on our Greenfield Project.
By starting with a Cloud-native approach, and by utilizing the latest best practices in software design and development, Gain has delivered a better experience to statutory reporting teams, and in the process, established that a better experience can trump familiarity.
We’ve improved outcomes for hundreds of carriers.
As much as the story of this new kid reveals the exciting possibilities of starting from scratch, it’s also a cautionary tale for those that choose to simply maximize short-term profits.
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