Artificial Labs (Artificial), a provider of digital broking and underwriting technology for specialty and commercial insurers, has launched AgLabs, a new division dedicated to research and product innovation.
AgLabs will concentrate on the future of specialty insurance, examining how agentic artificial intelligence (AI) can transform interactions across the market. The unit brings together long-horizon research with practical tools that can be deployed immediately, giving brokers and underwriters the ability to streamline workflows now while building toward agent-to-agent (A2A) coordination over time.
A2A capabilities allow broker and underwriter agents to autonomously share, check, and refine information within tightly defined parameters, while preserving human authority over final decisions. The initiative focuses on the stage where risk data is transferred, interpreted, standardised, and negotiated.
Although insurers have invested heavily in digital systems over the years, this segment of the process still depends heavily on email and manual handling, leading to delays and inefficiencies. According to original research conducted by AgLabs among London market professionals, 88% of broker submissions reach underwriters without being fully decision-ready.
“AgLabs is built for a human-led market. Its purpose is to remove the administrative friction that consumes time and slows decision-making,” commented David King, Co-Founder of Artificial Labs.
“Insurance professionals are paid for their expertise, not for chasing missing data across endless email chains. AgLabs keeps people at the centre of the process while removing the friction that slows markets down. Our agents can do the legwork of coordination and clarification in the background, but the decision and accountability always stay with the human.”
The agents have been designed to function across organisational boundaries. Each one operates on behalf of a specific broker or underwriter, adhering to that firm’s rules, data frameworks, and operating context. Through autonomous communication, broker and underwriter agents can resolve routine queries and information gaps, escalating outcomes for human review and sign-off when required.
“Most AI initiatives in insurance stop at making individuals faster. AgLabs is focused on making the market faster,” added Alexis Renaudin, Head of AgLabs.
Renaudin continued: “We do that by initially fixing the pre-bind interaction layer where brokers and underwriters lose time translating formats, validating data, and chasing documents. Over time, this builds the foundations for a 24/7 agentic insurance ecosystem, where routine market interactions happen continuously, and humans engage only where judgement is required. This approach supports a pragmatic transition towards faster, always-on markets at scale, without forcing disruptive change or removing people from the loop.”
Additional survey data highlights the scale of the issue. Nearly two-thirds (64%) of complex risks require at least six exchanges, via email or calls, before a quotation can be issued. Meanwhile, 81% of teams report that significant time is spent manually gathering and correcting data instead of applying their specialist insight.
