3 takeaways from ITIC Global 2026: growth, partnerships, and getting the balance right

Istanbul gave us a week of rain, strong Turkish coffee, and a whole lot of conversations about where international insurance is headed.

The Acclaim team spent the week at ITIC Global 2026, catching up with familiar faces, meeting plenty of new ones, and hearing how insurers, assistance companies and technology providers are thinking about the future of the industry.

The agenda covered everything from geopolitics and medical inflation to technology, provider networks and the changing expectations of travelers. But some of the most interesting conversations happened outside the sessions, where companies were talking about something a little more immediate: where they want to grow, what's getting in the way, and who can help them get there.

Here are three takeaways that stuck with me.

Growth is creating new opportunities for innovation

Travel demand continues to grow, creating opportunities for insurers and assistance companies to expand into new markets, introduce new products and reach new customers. And increasingly, that growth is encouraging companies to rethink the value they deliver.

One of the opening sessions highlighted the changing dynamics of travel insurance purchasing, particularly in Latin America and Southern Europe. With comparison platforms making it easier to shop on price, insurers face an interesting challenge: how to stand out beyond price and help travelers recognize the value of the protection they're buying.

That theme came up in our conversations throughout the week, too. In one discussion, we talked about how travel insurers are looking for ways to engage more policyholders, including the many customers who never need to file a claim. Additional benefits, services and experiences could help insurers deliver value throughout the customer relationship, rather than only when something goes wrong. It's an exciting shift in how the industry thinks about innovation and customer experience.

We also met companies expanding into new markets, launching new products and looking for ways to support that growth without adding unnecessary complexity. What works in one country doesn't necessarily work in another, particularly when it comes to local payment methods, currencies, banking relationships and reconciliation.

For insurers looking to grow internationally, having the right operational infrastructure in place is an important part of making those ambitions a reality. That's an area we're particularly focused on at Acclaim. The infrastructure supporting an insurer's operations needs to be able to grow with the business, not become another obstacle along the way.

Getting the balance right between cost, care and customer experience

Finding the right balance was a recurring theme throughout the conference, particularly as insurers navigate rising medical costs and pressure to keep coverage affordable. Travel insurance is sometimes purchased primarily to meet visa requirements, rather than because travelers understand the protection they're buying. It raised an important distinction: compliance isn't necessarily the same as meaningful coverage.

That same theme came through in a debate titled “Is Cost Cutting in Travel Assistance Putting Patient Safety at Risk?” Aurélien Gueye, CEO Medigo, made an important point: there's nothing wrong with cost containment when it means paying the right price and avoiding unnecessary costs. The concern is when efforts to contain costs go too far and become cost cutting at the expense of patient care.

It's a distinction that extends beyond pricing. Delivering a good experience also depends on what happens behind the scenes, from coordinating care and providers to managing claims and payments across different countries and systems.

For me, the takeaway was that efficiency and better patient outcomes shouldn't have to compete. The goal is to remove unnecessary costs and friction while protecting the quality of care and experience that insurance is meant to deliver.

Partnerships are how the industry moves forward

While the agenda was about risk, the conversations on the conference floor were about growth and collaboration. Throughout the week, we met companies exploring new markets, developing new products, improving existing processes and looking for technology that can help them do more without adding complexity.

What stood out was how often the conversation came back to partnerships. International insurance is an incredibly interconnected ecosystem. Insurers, assistance companies, healthcare providers, technology platforms and service organizations all rely on one another to deliver the full experience. No single organization operates in isolation, and every part of that value chain has a role to play.

One question kept coming up in different forms: how can we work better together? We talked about connecting payments with existing claims systems, simplifying reconciliation and making it easier to manage different payment flows across markets.

A recurring theme was the challenge of knowing exactly what happened to a payment and connecting it back to the right claim or transaction. Moving money is one challenge. Knowing exactly what happened to it, and being able to reconcile it back to a claim, is another.

For Acclaim, those conversations were especially exciting. We believe there's a huge opportunity to make the movement of money across insurance simpler, more connected and more transparent.

But the bigger takeaway goes beyond payments. The better the different parts of the ecosystem work together, the better the experience for everyone involved.

And that's what makes events like ITIC so valuable. They bring people from across the industry together to share ideas, build relationships and find new ways to solve problems together.

Until next time, ITIC!

If there's one thing I'm taking away from Istanbul, it's that this industry isn't short of ambition. Companies are looking to grow, innovate and build better experiences for the people they serve. And increasingly, they're looking to one another to help make that happen.

We're heading home with plenty of conversations to continue and new relationships we're excited to build.

Want to continue the conversation? Contact our team.