Global risk modeling and analytics firm RMS has launched Version 18, the latest version of its leading catastrophe risk management software.
V18 provides a host of modelling updates across the Asia Pacific region and North America, as well as an updated terrorism scenario model.
Post Loss Amplification (PLA) – which allows the impact of claims inflation, economic demand surge to be modeled – has also been added for all the updated and new models.
“Asia Pacific has always been important to us,” commented Mohsen Rahnama, Chief Risk Modeling Officer at RMS.
“The inclusion of new models for the region, including Philippines Typhoon, India Flood and South Korea Earthquake should help enhance the opportunities for established operators and new entrants to better understand the potential for risk, and for growth, in these important markets.”
The new Philippines typhoon model captures risk from wind and flooding, coastal storm surge and season precipitation-driven flooding.
Model updates for Australia cyclone includes the most recent market and meteorological data and lessons learned from recent events, such as Cyclone Yasi in 2011, Cyclone Marcia in 2015 and Cyclone Debbie in 2017.
Australia earthquake updates reflect the latest scientific view of seismic hazard by incorporating data from the 2018 national seismic hazard map from Geoscience Australia. RMS say that updated event rates and ground motion models, combined with insight from local experts, provide the most up-to-date view of seismic risk in the country.
A new fully probabilistic India flood model combines the “latest science with local engineering knowledge”, with an event set based on 125,000 events across 9,033 catchments throughout India; accounting for monsoon rainfall and expanding areas of impermeable ground in major cities such as Mumbai, Chennai and Delhi.
“Flooding is an international phenomenon and V18 offers customers a more granular view of this on a more global scale,” said Rahnama. “Updates can take many years in development, however, it is timely that the Australia Earthquake and Cyclone updates come just after we opened our Australia office last year.”
India earthquake has been updated using the latest sources and vulnerability models, with the signification validation of model using the systematic approach working with clients and academia, and includes high resolution geotechnical information for hazard amplification to differentiate risk.
The South Korea earthquake update covers ground shaking, liquefaction, and landslide risk, enabling users to comprehensively assess earthquake risk in the country.
“With the release of Version 18 we are confident that we are continuing to deliver the high standard of accurate information and analysis that our clients know and expect from RMS,” added Rahnama.
Looking beyond the Asia Pacific region, V18 expands the North Atlantic Hurricane model to cover the risk from hurricanes in the East Pacific basin. It also features storm surge updates in the U.S., as well as vulnerability updates across the U.S. and the Caribbean.
Marine Cargo was also updated further, allowing detailed insight into cargo fragility and exposure accumulation, enabling the identification of vulnerable concentrations of static cargo, the measurement of port accumulations, and the analysis of loss severity for key events.
Additionally, an updated terrorism scenario model includes database updates for the U.S., UK and Belgium; updates to hazard footprints and changes to the default time of day, to react to changes in peak times across different occupations.
