Insurable Interest Canadian Insurance Blog

“Toronto, your Waabi will be arriving shortly.” Named after the Japanese word for “simple,” Toronto-based autonomous-vehicle startup Waabi just achieved the largest funding round in the history of Canada’s technology sector as it aims to accelerate the development of its physical AI platform, boost efforts to commercialize self-driving trucks, and enter the robotaxi market—via Uber’s platform—with plans to deploy a minimum of 25,000 autonomous vehicles on Uber’s ride-hailing service Toronto, ON (Jan. 28, 2026) – Waabi, the leader in Physical AI, is pleased to announce it has closed its oversubscribed $750M USD Series C round co-led by Khosla Ventures and G2 Venture Partners, and secured an additional milestone-based future investment from Uber to support a new partnership to deploy robotaxis powered by the Waabi Driver exclusively on the Uber platform. The funding, the largest fundraise in Canadian history, will fuel the continued advancement of Waabi’s Physical AI Platform, further accelerate the company’s commercial progress in autonomous trucking, and support Waabi’s expansion into robotaxis. Founded in 2021, Waabi has quickly ascended from industry upstart to leader in Physical AI. The company’s revolutionary Physical AI Platform enables true scale, generalizing to different form factors, geographies, and environments. Waabi’s Platform combines a verifiable...

The most complex and time-consuming task in insurance has finally been automated. The new agent navigates carrier portals, optimizes rates, and delivers bindable quotes in seconds, marking the final sprint toward a Fully Autonomous Agent San Francisco, CA (Aug. 12, 2025) — SUPERAGENT AI, Inc. is pleased to announce the world’s first Quoting AI Agent, a technological breakthrough that automates the single most critical and labor-intensive workflow in the insurance industry. For decades, the “quoting bottleneck”, the manual process of collecting data, navigating multiple carrier portals, and re-keying information, has limited agency growth. Today, SUPERAGENT AI shatters that barrier. The new Quoting AI Agent autonomously gathers customer data, navigates complex carrier rating engines, optimizes rates, and generates accurate quotes for agencies. The Quoting AI Agent will officially launch on February 11. Starting today, agencies can sign up for exclusive early access and book live demonstrations. “This is the moment the industry has been waiting for. We haven’t just built an AI Agent; we have solved the hardest problem in insurance,” declared Vlada Lotkina, CEO of SUPERAGENT AI. “By automating quoting and integrating it with our Inbound and Outbound AI Agents, we are giving agencies the power to scale infinitely. The...

Faster access to life insurance coverage will help Canadian families get protected sooner Part of Manulife’s market-leading AI capabilities to deliver innovative, customer-first solutions Toronto, ON (Jan. 29, 2026) – Manulife has introduced a redesigned electronic application and an enhanced version of its proprietary AI underwriting engine, MAUDE (Manulife Automated Underwriting Decision Engine). Together, these innovations enable automatic approvals in as little as two minutes for qualified applicants, helping Canadians access coverage faster and with less complexity. The enhanced application streamlines the process of applying coverage, and builds on Manulife’s position as an AI market leader. Designed to support advisors as they guide clients through the questionnaire, its new intelligent features improve usability – helping MAUDE make faster decisions and enabling underwriters to review complex cases more efficiently. By accelerating access to protection, these improvements reinforce Manulife’s mission to help Canadians live longer, healthier, better lives – supported by responsible, transparent, and customer-first AI. “Since launching last fall, advisor adoption has been strong. By December, more than half of eligible cases – 58 per cent – had approvals processed automatically through MAUDE, a 56 per cent increase from pre-launch,” said Karen Cutler, Chief Underwriter, Manulife Canada. “By combining smarter questions with advanced...

2025 societal losses total 3.4 billion Toronto, ON (Jan. 20, 2026) – The magnitude of catastrophic events experienced across Canada in 2025 pushed the insured loss total for the country to CAD 2.4 billion, according to CatIQ, Canada’s insured loss and exposure indices provider. Uninsured losses added $1.0 billion, bringing total societal loss to $3.4 billion, according to the Institute for Catastrophe Loss Reduction (ICLR), Canada’s leading source for disaster resilience knowledge. The insured loss figure of CAD 2.4 billion makes 2025 the ninth largest loss year for the country on record, putting the year on the lower end of the past five years of annual loss totals, and well below the record-breaking 2024 total, which currently sits at $9.1 billion. Based on 43 years of data, insurance covers about 54% of societal losses. The 2025 total societal loss is below the long-term trend, currently $9.1 billion per year and growing 9% annually after inflation, according to ICLR. Despite the average year in total loss, this year was anything but typical: 2nd in total catastrophes declared 2nd in ice storm losses 1st in fire catastrophes declared The costliest event in 2025 was the ice storm that struck Ontario and Quebec...

Toronto, ON (Jan. 15, 2026) – Ecclesiastical Insurance has released a new risk management resource aimed at helping community-serving organizations reduce theft and property damage losses, emphasizing that many incidents develop over time when small security gaps go unnoticed. The new bulletin, Property Security and Theft Prevention – A Practical Risk Management Guide, provides practical, standards-informed guidance for organizations including faith communities, non-profits, educational institutions, and heritage properties. It outlines preventative measures that can reduce theft risk while also limiting the damage commonly associated with forced entry. “Too often, organizations think about security only after a loss,” said Colin Robertson, Chief Risk Management & Customer Officer at Ecclesiastical Insurance. “This bulletin is designed to shift that mindset, helping organizations identify vulnerabilities early and take practical steps to protect the spaces, assets, and people that support their mission.” The bulletin includes guidance on: Conducting effective security and theft risk assessments Strengthening perimeter, access, and physical security Protecting high-value and vulnerable assets Using alarms, CCTV, and security guarding strategically Aligning security measures with applicable codes and standards “Security is stewardship,” Robertson added. “Proactive planning doesn’t just reduce loss, it helps ensure these organizations can continue serving their communities without disruption.” Access the...