From Paris with two awards

Efma is a not-for-profit association established by bankers and insurers with a focus on retail financial marketing and distribution. Currently, more than 3,000 brands in 130 countries are Efma members, including over 80% of Europe’s largest retail financial institutions.

The association strives for continuous innovation. To achieve this, it organizes the «EFMA-Accenture Innovation Insurance award» which acts as a catalyst for innovation in the insurance sector and encourages insurers to develop better disruptive strategies. The third edition of the competition attracted 320 entries from 237 institutions in 45 countries for the eight award categories.

The Swiss insurance company AXA together with its two startups/AXAnauten, Veezoo and Advanon, won two award categories. The project SIRI-Bution, developed with Veezoo received the Artificial intelligence award. SIRI-Bution uses natural language processing to provide quick answers to employee questions by unlocking complex business data and providing clear and comprehensive insights.

The second project FlexCash platform was developed jointly with Advanon. The project received a prize for the category, Connected Insurance & Ecosystems award. FlexCash helps small and medium-sized enterprises to overcome liquidity bottlenecks and manage their cash flow, enabling them to pre-finance their accounts receivable invoices via the FlexCash platform and receive payment immediately.

Jean-Francois Gasc, Accenture’s insurance strategy lead for Europe, Africa and Latin America, said, “Innovation in insurance shouldn’t just be the domain of insurtechs and other startups. Insurers from around the world are embracing new technologies to develop innovations around the customer experience, transform their operations and create new efficiencies. The winners highlight how the use of AI, machine learning and the internet of things are reinventing insurance.”

(Press release/ran)