AI startup EarthDefine announces expansion of its building footprint deocoding and on-demand property information

EarthDefine, a provider of high-resolution spatial data announced the release of an updated building footprint database, which contains over 156 million footprints of commercial and residential structures across the continental United States. 

EarthDefine's latest update will allow insurers to identify with rooftop accuracy where structures fall within a parcel to improve risk rating, quoting accuracy, and claims response. EarthDefine's building footprints are generated using state-of-the-art deep neural networks.

This AI-based approach is extremely accurate (98% accuracy) and allows EarthDefine to continually grow its building footprint database to provide an updated snapshot of commercial and residential properties throughout the continental US.

In addition to its building footprints, EarthDefine provide the following property attributes to help insurers make better and more accurate risk-based decisions:

• Distance to Power Lines
• Tree Coverage
• Ground Elevation
• Building Heights
• Swimming Pools
• Building Change Detection

Vikalpa Jetly, CEO & Founder, EarthDefine: "We're extremely happy that we could get our latest geocoding and tree canopy update released so we could assist P&C insurers when they need it the most. According to NOAA, as of July 8, 2020, there have already been ten billion-dollar weather disasters in the US.  In order for insurers to truly understand the impact of wildfires and other severe weather events, they need to be able to take an address and pinpoint its exact location on a map for analysis. One of the benefits of our building footprint update is that insurers can now take an address and not only pinpoint the primary and secondary structures within a parcel of land, they can also tie in vital property data, such as tree locations, land cover, and distance to power lines to gain a better understanding about the impact of wildfires.  This information can then be used to work with agents and insured to take proactive measures like creating more defensible space or clearing brush next to combustible materials," said Jetly.  

EarthDefine's building footprints are the latest generation of geocoding solutions, which have evolved from zip code-based centroids to street interpolated geocoding and, most recently, parcel-level geocoding.  While these forms of geocoding may generate useful insights, they are also flawed because they are based upon assumptions on where properties are located on a map.  For example, with parcel-level geocoding, addresses are always mapped to the center of a parcel. This poses a problem because parcels often vary in size, so if a policy is located in the upper northeast corner or lower southwest corner, then a carrier will be basing their wildfire, flood, hurricane, hail, etc., determinations on the wrong location.  This can quickly lead to stacking errors where hundreds or even thousands of addresses in a book of business may be incorrectly geocoded, leading insurers to suffer higher losses than anticipated.    

EarthDefine's building footprints may be accessed as flat files or via a REST API and will benefit MGAs, Carriers, and Reinsurers throughout the insurance cycle by:

• Reducing post bind adjustments by identifying the correct location of an address during the time of quote
• Eliminating fraudulent claims payouts by validating addresses during FNOL
• Improving catastrophe modeling accuracy by pinpointing the exact locations of policyholders' addresses
• Uncovering high-risk locations
• Reducing underinsurance by identifying secondary structures within a parcel

www.earthdefine.com