More coordination, lower costs and greater customer satisfaction are the rationale behind the coming together of 13 Indian insurance firms to use a blockchain-inspired technology to create a storehouse of policyholder data.

The database will allow insurers to not need to repeat the registration procedure for multiple policies, thus cutting industry costs.

Akshay Dhanak, vice president for business systems and technology at HDFC Life Insurance, explained that if the same records are made available to several insurers in a blockchain, then the cost incurred for each member of the group is lower compared to when they individually conduct tests and make their own records.

Duplication of the recording of basic customer information may be avoided by creating an entire data set on blockchain.

In this instance blockchain technology is being used to create a secure form of a distributed and decentralised method of storing information based on the mutual agreement of parties involved.