In recent years, life insurers have begun a major push in collaboration with technology companies to surmount a frequent bottleneck in the sales process: shortening time spent on medical underwriting, which can extend the sales cycle by weeks or longer.

An eye-opener among these industry initiatives is the use of facial analytics technology to measure a life insurance applicant’s life expectancy. An April 20 Associated Press article shines a spotlight on a tech startup offering this capability, Lapetus Solutions Inc.

The venture-backed company boasts a life insurance underwriting engine, Chronos, that uses biodemography (biological and demographic determinants of aging and longevity), facial analytics and life event data to engage consumers online and speed approval of coverage.

How fast? About 10 minutes — no medical exam needed. Policy prospects, the article notes, can simply upload a “selfie” to the life insurer’s web portal and answer certain health and lifestyle questions about themselves online. Thereafter, the facial analytics technology extracts information on the biological, genetic and behavioral traits of the applicant and links these traits to variations in mortality risk.

The result: a more accurate and reliable estimate of individual lifespan relative to metrics based exclusively on chronological age. Among them: body mass index (BMI), which is a less than accurate gauge of health and longevity for the under-45 crowd. That’s because BMI fails to account for such variables as muscle mass and body type.

Chronos’ facial analytics technology complements BMI calculations by factoring in individual differences; and by detecting and correcting for applicants’ misrepresentations regarding their height and weight.

Likewise, Chronos can compensate for other measures that commonly miss the mark in life expectancy estimates. Example: an applicant’s smoker status. The cloud-based software can flag applicants who are likely to live longer; and who may have been less than truthful about past smoking habits.

The Chronos engine additionally integrates “life event data” — published works and data from thousands of global experts on longevity and health — to assess a policy applicant’s mortality and morbidity risks.

Lapetus’ facial analytics can detect whether you’re aging faster or slower than your chronological age — to a point. The Associated Press article notes that the technology recognizes the use of makeup, but isn’t so reliable in flagging plastic surgery.

This caveat aside, the technology is attracting interest. According to the article, “several life insurers” (which Lapetus left undisclosed) are testing Chronos. It’s a fair bet that partnering insurers (current or future) were present at the Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Plug and Play Tech Center’s 2017 Insurtech Innovation Platform(a forum for connecting startups and corporations), held earlier this month. Major insurers represented at the gathering included Aon, Farmers, Munich Re, Swiss Re, Travelers and USAA.

“By participating, [Lapetus] will gain exposure to leading insurance carriers, brokers, and investors interested in partnering with tech startups developing products and services with industry-changing potential,” the company notes in an April 5 press statement.

Carriers that decide to commercialize the technology will ultimately have to secure approval from state regulators. The Associated Press article adds that Lapetus is researching how facial analytics can also warn of the future onset of diseases, such as diabetes, various forms of dementia and coronary heart disease.