The history of insurance technology in Columbia began, arguably, in 1869 with the founding of Seibels & Ezell, an insurance agency. Given that General William T. Sherman and his army had burned Columbia to the ground in 1865, there could not have been much property to insure in those days. Nonetheless, Messrs. Seibels and Ezell began a company that would eventually become known as Seibels, Bruce and Company and that still exists today, well over 130 years later. The Seibels founding was relevant to insurance technology because it spawned a long, notable, and ongoing legacy of innovation in the insurance business. The first notable achievement in this regard was Edwin G. Seibels' (1866-1954, and son of the founding Seibels) invention of the vertical filing cabinet. Here's an excerpt of the "Filing Cabinet" article on Wikipedia:
"The vertical filing cabinet (vertical file cabinet in the United States) more or less as in use today was invented by Edwin G. Seibels in 1898. He was working in his father's insurance office and realized that the then current system of folding papers into envelopes and storing them in pigeon holes could be improved if the folding was dispensed with. The documents could then be stored in large envelopes (hangfiles) vertically, in drawers."
The vertical file was but one of Edwin Seibels notable innovations. He grew the company to global proportions from its Columbia base. A summary of his achievements, including the particular role of the University of South Carolina, can be found in this article accompanied by a 5.5 minute video clip, produced in conjunction with his induction into the South Carolina Business Hall of Fame in 1990.
After World War II, an Arkansas G.I. worked part-time at Seibels, Bruce while obtaining an undergraduate degree, and then an MBA. His name was Roy L. Faulks. He rose through the ranks to become the company's senior financial officer. In the late 1960's he hired another USC student (who also went on to receive a bachelor's degree and then his MBA) named Larry Wilson. Through Faulks' sponsorship and Wilson's leadership, in 1972 Seibels, Bruce developed the Policy Management System - an integrated policy and claims administration system that took advantage of visual data display (prior systems had been based on punched cards or magnetized tape). The company began marketing the system to other insurers in 1974. PMS became a separate division of the company in 1976 and by 1980 there was an IPO for the Policy Management Systems Corporation (PMSC).
By the mid-1990's PMSC had become the largest company of its kind - that is, focused on computer services for the global insurance industry. The company achieved revenues of $650M, had 6,000 employees in 30 countries, and was traded on the New York Stock Exchange. It was acquired by Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC) and still operates today as the largest part of CSC's Financial Services Group.
Throughout PMSC's growth in the 1980's and 1990's, other insurance technology firms began setting up offices in Columbia to take advantage of the growing pool of insurance-technology-savvy employees. There were also entreprenerial start-ups as individuals saw opportunity and embraced the risk of a new business venture. Acrosoft is a notable example, but there are others.
When CSC acquired PMSC, Larry Wilson left to become involved in venture capital. He eventually affiliated with FirstMark Capital (fka Pequot Ventures) and through them spawned a number of Columbia-based insurance technology companies, including Eagle Eye Analytics and Dovetail Insurance.
This history is titled incomplete because it is, of course, still being written. In fact, its more exciting portions have yet to happen. It is also called incomplete for more pragmatic reasons. First, many important names and events have been omitted, not because the author deems them unimportant but because he's ignorant of them. Readers are invited to submit suggested revisions to info@InnovationInInsurance.com. Second, there are major story lines which are not Seibels-related which should be included. Perhaps most notable among them are the story of how Columbia has come to be place where more health insurance claims are processed than anywhere else in the U.S., and probably the world. Joe Sullivan, CEO of Blue Cross Blue Shield of South Carolina (BCBSSC), and his successor Ed Sellers catapulted their firm into a major force in insurance claims processing. BCBSSC now processes over 2 million health claims a day, and is ranked in the top 3% of data centers worldwide (see more here).
Again, we solicit our readers' help to make Release 2.0 of this history more comprehensive and more accurate. See suggestions to info@InnovationInInsurance.com.