No industry is safe from “disruption”, but insurers are particularly susceptible. A recent study says insurance underwriters have a 98.9% chance of being replaced by artificial intelligence – making it the most under-threat white-collar profession out there. AI is, after all, tailor-made for the pattern-spotting nature of risk assessment.

Take “Insurtech” startup Lapetus, which is helping life insurers calculate what to charge customers. It assesses a range of factors based on a selfie – your BMI, your skin and so on – to work out when you’re likely to, er, kick the bucket. Aerobotics, meanwhile, uses drone technology to analyze crop health, and then turns that data into an accurate premium. And as data-collection techniques become even more advanced, trends like these will only accelerate. US health insurers, for example, are banned from using genetics-based pricing – but given that life insurers aren’t, it might only be a matter of time...

Meanwhile, insurers have generally relied pretty heavily on sales agents, brokers, or “bancassurance” (cool name, bro) to sell their policies. But thanks to improvements in digital services, customers have become more willing to buy insurance directly from the providers themselves – and these middlemen are disappearing. And that could mean massively reduced costs: Prudential employs 660,000 agents in Asia alone.

What else is on the agenda? Many insurers are encouraging customers to turn their homes into smart homes as a way to improve security and – more importantly – limit the need for payouts at all. Some even expect to follow Silicon Valley firms in moving to a service model: according to an executive at Swiss insurer Chubb, a monthly subscription fee could get you a “predict and prevent” service to protect your home.

But insurers will also likely be affected by all the other implications of the subscription economy. As a society we’re increasingly choosing to rent rather than buy – homes, cars, you name it. And most traditional insurers still aren’t up to speed with new markets like ride-sharing or Airbnbs. That’s led to an influx of startups that are – like Lenny, which offers very short-term insurance on vehicles, and Guardhog, a home-sharing insurer.

The big players aren’t blind to the threats posed by the new kids on the block. So it’s probably a smart move on German giant Allianz’s part that it’s providing insurance for car-sharing startup Drivy. Keeping up with the times is key: adapt or die – or worse, change your LinkedIn status to “Looking for new challenges”.

The takeaway: Tech is changing the insurance industry by cutting costs, opening up new markets and inviting challenger brands onto the scene.