Insurance giant Generali announced plans to join the Blockchain Insurance Initiative (B3i) this morning.
The B3i is a global consortium of leading insurance and reinsurance companies collaborating on testing blockchain powered solutions.
Steve Hales, Head of Connected Insurance at Generali Group, said; “We are excited to join this new initiative and look forward to playing an active part in it. The Blockchain initiative is particularly important in insurance where the secure and efficient exchange of information can benefit from disruptive technology that could eventually lead to game-changing applications.”
Members of the initiative will sign reinsurance contracts with each other and exchange data in a first-time large-scale exploration of how the distributed ledger technology could improve operating efficiencies for the industry.
Paolo Ribotta, Head of Generali Global Corporate & Commercial, said the company has been investing in digitalisation to enhance multinational lines of business; “our customers in all industries are exploring and investing in distributed ledgers and smart contract technology to achieve end to end synergies, integration and efficiency.
“We want to continue to speak their language, helping them to drive their business adding value beyond the policy in a simpler and smarter way.”
In addition to this cross-sector collaborating body, the B3i has also announced it is considering establishing an operating entity, that could provide some form of clearing or exchange like services.
Reinsurancene.ws has previously provided an analysis on this proposed clearing house, stating that while it’s debatable whether re/insurance industry incumbents are best placed to create such an entity, any progress that enhances and brings closer industry wide adoption of blockchain, proper standards, transactional simplicity, execution speed, and, through blockchain’s ledger technology, transparency and record-keeping, can only be a good thing for the market.
