Don’t Miss Out On Your Yearly Shot Of Inspiration. Dia Amsterdam!

DIA (Digital Insurance Agenda) is the largest insurtech conference connecting insurance executives with insurtech leaders from across the globe and  will take place on 16-17 May 2018.

The last edition of DIA welcomed over 1.000 attendees representing 40 countries from all 6 continents.

DIA offers an excellent opportunity for insurance executives to connect with peers from all over the globe and discuss the challenges that insurers all face, and learn from each other.

First of all, can you tell us a bit about DIA Amsterdam and its story?

I founded DIA  together with Reggy de Feniks two years ago.  Reggy and I both have a 25 year track record as strategy consultants, having worked for insurance carriers in a large number of countries in Europe, in the Americas and in Asia. In 2010 we wrote ‘Reinventing Financial Services’, published by Financial Times Prentice Hall, that turned out to become a worldwide bestseller, with more than 100,000 copies sold in eight languages. The book got us invited in many boardrooms and we are now speaking at conferences every week. 

What we learned is that insurance executives would like to accelerate innovation and work with insurtechs to achieve this. Unfortunately, they do not have a comprehensive overview of what is taking place in the insurtech space. Among insurtech leaders we have experienced something similar. Of course they know the big multinational inurance carriers, but not all the insurance firms that operate in one country only. And insurance is a fragmented market, with many companies in each market, and each company is attractive in terms of size and needs. So, we learned there is a great need to connect insurance executives with insurtech leaders. And DIA is tapping into exactly that need. We created a platform to connect the change agents in insurance, to accelerate innovation.

The first DIA took place in Barcelona and was immediately recognised as a totally different kind of event. We have 50 carefully selected insurtechs on stage, each doing 8 minute live demo presentations, so that you can see what the real added value is. Powerpoint is strictly forbidden, making DIA different and much more dynamic than any conference you’ve seen before.

At the last edition, DIA Munich in November 2017, we welcomed more than 1,000 people representing 42 countries from all 6 continents.

Could you share some tips about the content of this year?

The theme of DIA Amsterdam (16-17 May) is ‘platforms and ecosystems’. To solve the real needs of customers and to make the best use of technologies it is critical to work together much closer than ever before. Not only with the traditional partners in the value chain, but also with other service providers that play a key role in solving the real need of customers. Think of real estate brokers, automotive brands and health providers. But also with insurtechs and other tech providers and even competitors. We see ample examples of successful collaborations, and many of the 50 insurtechs that are on show work together with other parties in this fashion.

Why should insurance companies attend in this activity?

In just two days they will get an overview of the latest that is taking place in the insurtech space worldwide. An extremely efficient way to review the current digital strategies, or enhance these with new ideas. We devoted ample time and space in the program and venue for networking. So that insurers can get one-on-one in deeper discussions with insurtechs they are interested in. Furthermore, we noticed that DIA offers an excellent opportunity for insurance executives to connect with peers from all over the globe and discuss the challenges that insurers all face, and learn from each other.

What is innovation for you?

We distinguish three different levels of innovation. 

The first level is related to ‘digitising the current business’. Much of the innovation efforts focus on this first level and aim to improve operational excellence and cut costs in the process. This is much needed, because there is still a lot of room to decrease the combined ratio and to create a solid foundation for the future. Examples include using advanced alogithms to innovate claims management. 

The second level is about creating new services that can be offered in addition to the traditional product range. Think of apps providing feedback on driving behaviour or reminding diabetes patients to take their medication. This second level is all about dramatically increasing contact frequency and customer engagement with new added value.

The third level is about exploring new business models and new revenue streams beyond the traditional insurance domain. Perfect example is Abracar, of Allianz. Abracar assists car owners with selling their car. With millions of cars being sold from consumer to consumer every day an attractive market to be part of.

Abracar (Munich, Germany) was developed in 2016 as part of the Accelerator program of Allianz X and is the first spin-off of the incubator. The startup is Germany’s first professional car broker. They help car consumers to sell their car at the highest price without any effort. Abracar takes care of all steps of the selling process starting by creating a professional expert’s report, over 50 pictures, writing an attractive listing, filtering the potential buyers, negotiating the final price and preparing the contract. The car buyer benefits from the expert’s report, an Allianz warranty, financing solutions and competent consulting.

What will participants see at DIA Amsterdam that they do not in other events?

First of all an unrivalled line-up of 50 carefully selected insurtechs from 26 countries from all over the world. From startups to mature solutions of the most famous tech providers. Solutions that assist in the various stages of the value chain and primary process, from marketing and sales to claims and core system solutions. In life, health and general insurance. Topics and technologies vary from blockchain and open API platforms to artificial intelligence and the internet of things.

The thought leaders on stage include Wayne Xu, the COO and creative mind behind Chinese insurer Zhong An. ZhongAn is China’s largest online insurer and the world’s first insurtech unicorn (valued at more than 1 bn USD). The company was founded only four years ago by Alibaba, Tencent and Ping An. The Chinese online insurance group raised 1.5 bn USD last September, for a valuation of 10 bn USD. ZhongAn already sold more than 7.5 billion policies to around 535 million customers. We’re very honored that Wayne will do his first ever appearance in Europe at DIA Amsterdam.

Other thought leaders on stage are Tom Van den Brulle (global head of innovation Munich Re), Reza Khorshidi (chief scientist AIG) and Volker Buettner (head of group innovation Generali).

Last but not least, expect a totally different kind of venue. We personally hate purpose built conference rooms and therefore decided to use the awesome Westergasfabriek venue, a former industrial complex close to the vibrant city center of Amsterdam. When people walk in, many say ‘Wow, this looks like a UFO’. And they’re right; the whole idea behind DIA is to show that the future is already happening today.

What is your biggest expectation from this year’s event?

Ha ha – the biggest expectation is that many unexpected things will happen because DIA sparks so many ideas. At DIA Amsterdam in May 2017 we had Kasko, Picsure, Sentiance and Surify among the 50 insurtechs that presented their solutions on stage. After getting acquainted at DIA, Kasko and Picure decided to team up, and so did Sentiance and Surify. For us this was the discovery of a new trend, ‘Innovation Multiplied’. insurtechs working closely together, combining their ideas to come up with something that is even more innovative. The great thing about DIA is you never know what to expect!

KASKO (London, UK) supports insurance companies by offering an API-powered agile insurance product platform that sits in between digital customer touchpoints and your legacy IT, taking internal IT off the critical path to product launch. Picsure (Munich, Germany) creates smart AI solutions for the insurance industry, in particular for object recognition, fraud detection and identity checking. KASKO and Picsure teamed up to create an innovative watch insurance product for Swiss insurer Baloise.

Sentiance (Antwerp, Belgium) is a data science company turning IOT sensor data into rich insights about people’s behavior and real-time context. These insights enable insurance companies to understand how customers go through their everyday lives, discover and anticipate the moments that matter most, and adapt their engagement to real-world behavior and real-time context.
Sureify Labs (Silicon Valley, USA) created a platform that engages a customer over their lifetime. Their Lifetime Platform is a set of cloud-based software applications that allow insurers to digitally engage with their policyholders via web, mobile and various personal health and device data sources. The platform drives customer loyalty, brand recognition and better customer experience.
After winning the DIAmond Award earlier 2017 Sentiance won again at DIA Munich through their collaboration with Sureify. They demonstrated the wizardry of the Sentiance technology that extrapolates behavior insights from a diversity of mobile-user data, and then showed the full circle that Sureify provides by turning these insights into buying signals and engagement opportunities.

Don’t miss out on your yearly shot of inspiration. Register Now!