Insuring the Jetsons: How the Future Will Reshape Risk and Insurance

The Tech is Real. And It’s Coming Fast!

Over the next 10 years, the U.S. will experience a cascade of technological adoption across nearly every industry:

• Autonomous logistics, fleets and last-mile drone deliveries are expected to reshape transportation and warehousing, cutting costs but increasing cyber and liability risk
• AI agents embedded in legal, financial, and clinical workflows will create productivity gains but also new types of errors and omissions gaps
• Smart buildings and AI-managed infrastructure that respond dynamically to usage, temperature, and climate threats will require new forms of property and environmental coverage.
• Humanoid robots providing care, service, or security roles will blur the lines between human and machine responsibility
• eVTOL aircraft and urban air mobility platforms will challenge traditional aviation insurance, urban zoning, and public liability norms
• Wearable robotics in construction, healthcare, and logistics will transform workers’ comp, bodily injury claims, and return-to-work protocols

And that’s just the beginning. As companies scale these tools, they unlock huge efficiencies and safety benefits, but they also encounter risk factors that are entirely new and complex.

New Tech Means New Risk – And the Old Playbook Won’t Work

Emerging technologies don’t just add risk; they change its shape. Traditional insurance models, based on clear fault, linear supply chains, and physical perils, are being outpaced by systems that are:

• Autonomous: When AI drives the car, writes the code, or makes a care decision, liability shifts from operator to manufacturer to software vendor
• Interconnected: Smart cities and IoT-enabled buildings create a series of cascading vulnerabilities. A breach in one node can ripple across entire systems, with consequences ranging from physical damage to regulatory non-compliance
• Invisible: Algorithmic bias, misinformation, synthetic identity fraud, these digital phenomena can erode brand trust and spark litigation without any physical event occurring

A single product malfunction, a misclassified AI prompt, or a compromised facial recognition system can result in millions in damages, reputational fallout, and legal scrutiny.

And as technology permeates the workforce, we face new labor risks too: mental health issues from human-AI interaction, injuries from exoskeleton malfunctions, or professional liability when an AI co-pilot makes a costly mistake. Employers must re-evaluate workplace safety standards, training programs, and HR compliance.

These aren’t tomorrow’s risks. They’re happening right now.

It’s Time for Insurance to Lead

If innovation is rewriting the risk equation, insurance must become the new constant. That means evolving from a passive safety net to a proactive risk enabler. At EPIC, we see our role not just as brokers or underwriters, but as strategic partners helping clients future-proof their business.

This requires deploying a new generation of solutions:

• Cyber Liability: Not just breach response, but full digital trust protection across cloud, AI, and IoT ecosystems, including contingent cyber, reputational risk, and third-party vendor failures
• Technology E&O: Covering algorithmic misjudgment, generative AI hallucinations, and software-driven omissions that impact clients or consumers
• Product Liability for Robotics and Automation: Tailored for devices with semi-autonomous decision-making capabilities, including smart home tech, commercial drones, and industrial bots
• Builder’s Risk + Embedded Sensors: Protecting smart infrastructure from construction through operation, integrating environmental, delay, and cyber coverages
• Workers’ Comp for Human-Machine Teams: Accounting for job functions assisted by robotics, haptics, and real-time biometric feedback
• Captive Structures and Parametric: Giving clients more flexibility and responsiveness around climate-linked disruptions, cyber exposure, and system-wide failure scenarios

What ties these solutions together isn’t just coverage; it’s insight, the ability to anticipate the questions a client doesn’t even know to ask yet.

From Risk Transfer to Risk Translation

Most clients don’t come to us asking, “How do I insure a humanoid robot?” They come asking, “What does this new tech mean for my business, and what could go wrong?”

Our job is to translate that ambiguity into strategy:

• Working with clients upstream, before the tech is deployed or contracts are signed
• Mapping emerging liabilities across partners, vendors, platforms, and systems
• Educating boards and executives on blind spots, contractual vulnerabilities, and reputational exposure
• Negotiating with underwriters who may not have seen these risks before

For instance, a smart factory deploying automated forklifts and predictive maintenance systems may need a hybrid policy that combines cyber, property, equipment breakdown, and business interruption, with custom wordings that account for software patches, sensor failure, or AI-controlled downtime.

This is where EPIC thrives: at the edge of innovation, embedded in the real-world concerns of companies trying to move forward without falling behind.

Lead or Be Left Behind

Emerging tech will change your products, your people, your premises, your processes, and your exposures. The question is not whether you will face new risks. The question is whether you’ll face them with the right partner.

The Jetsons future is no longer distant. It’s already boarding. Make sure you’re insured for the ride.