Legal & General Launches World’s First Blockchain Reinsurance Platform

Legal & General, Britain’s largest manager of corporate pensions, today announced the launch of the first reinsurance platform driven by blockchain.

Known as ‘estua-re,’ it will initially be used to handle bulk annuities, which involve L&G taking over companies’ defined benefit or final salary pension schemes.

“We believe that blockchain is uniquely suited to the long term nature of annuities business as it allows data and transactions to be signed, recorded and maintained in a permanent and secure nature over the lifetime of these contracts, which can span over 50 years,” said Thomas Olunloyo, CEO of Legal & General Reinsurance.

L&G Reinsurance developed ‘estua-re’ using Amazon Web Services. Amazon Web Services uses the Hyperledger Fabric blockchain network. The company says the system lets multiple parties transact with each other without needing an intermediary. It adds manual reconciliation can be replaced with smart contracts, making the process much more efficient.

For now, L&G is only launching the blockchain platform for bulk annuity business outside its core markets of Britain and the United States. However, L&G spokesman said the platform could be extended to those two markets in future.

Globally, L&G manages over $1.2 trillion in total assets.