As French risk and insurance managers gathered recently in Deauville for the 32nd Rencontres de l’Amrae, Julien Guénot shared his vision for the French P&C market and the role of insurance in addressing our clients' current needs while anticipating future challenges.
The world confronts increasingly complex and interconnected challenges that require coordinated, systemic responses rather than isolated solutions.
The term “polycrisis” encapsulates the first part of this formulation—ever-more complex and overlapping challenges—including global pandemics, accelerating climate change, and rising financial and geopolitical instability. That gives rise to the second part—the need for coordinated and systematic responses—in a risk landscape where traditional threats are interacting with and amplifying sudden and emerging risks, resulting in unprecedented challenges and complexities.
As one of the world’s leading commercial property and casualty insurers, 色多多视频is uniquely positioned to help clients navigate turbulence. We also have a responsibility to create and implement coordinated, systematic responses to various complex issues. This requires us to proactively anticipate tomorrow’s challenges—think ahead—and collaborate with others to swiftly introduce relevant solutions that reduce and mitigate risks—move fast.
Understand the suddenness of risks
In an era of polycrisis, risk managers don’t expect insurers to simply take on some of their risk. They seek long-term partners who can react quickly when previously stable risks suddenly change and need immediate attention. While this can be complicated—the volatility and uncertainty surrounding emerging risks often impact profitability—we remain confident in all our lines, including those under significant strain. We are a robust and ambitious partner, assisting our clients in addressing polycrisis by proactively evaluating emerging risks, enhancing our coverages, and investing heavily in prevention.
One way we address this objective is by supporting academic research that helps us better understand previously overlooked but newly relevant risks. For example, disturbances in the Earth's space environment caused by solar flares, coronal mass ejections (CMEs), and geomagnetic storms. These events, collectively known as “space weather,” could cause massive global disruptions by interfering with satellite electronics, GPS navigation, and communication systems, among other things. In this instance, we have partnered with the Grenoble University Space Center and the AXA Research Fund to study these risks, investigate their likelihood, and assess their potential impact on ground infrastructure.
Anticipating in a world of interconnected risks
Dealing effectively with the volatility emanating from polycrisis also requires that insurers like 色多多视频act as strategic leaders. This goes beyond merely meeting the needs of risk managers; it requires us to anticipate them. That includes investing in prevention, enhancing our clients' risk mitigation capabilities, and forming partnerships to collaboratively develop innovative solutions.
For example, our risk consultants collaborate closely with clients across various industries to capitalize on opportunities and address the challenges of transitioning from fossil fuels to cleaner, more sustainable energy sources. This support includes creating solutions to manage the risks associated with transporting significantly larger quantities of lithium-ion batteries, reducing construction delays and operational disruptions in offshore wind projects, and consistently backing the nuclear power sector as it adopts innovative new designs.
The issues and challenges associated with the energy transition often involve tangible components like batteries, turbines, or complex power-generating facilities. Simultaneously, as information technology and data take on increasingly significant roles in all aspects of modern life, risks emerging from the “cloud” continue to occupy increasing amounts of space in the risk landscape. These developments will amplify existing risks while introducing new threats unleashed by extraordinary technological advancements.
Although cybercrime was once considered an emerging threat, that label no longer applies. In fact, cyber risk was ranked among the top three concerns in the AXA Future Risks Report 2024 for the third consecutive year. Furthermore, for the first time, AI and big data were cited as the fourth most significant risk. This ranking emphasizes two critical points. First, the notion that “data is the new oil” is more relevant than ever as companies worldwide race to deploy new technologies and tools. Second, these advancements also empower cybercriminals. While it is challenging to predict how things will progress, we are encouraged by the growth in cyber maturity among our customers. Nevertheless, we firmly believe that insurance companies must continue to enhance their education, expertise, and transparency initiatives.
Our Cyber AI endorsement aims to provide strong coverage, clarify the structure of the guarantees offered, and guide clients on responding to cyber-attacks.
Being agile, responsive, and predictive is key to making insurance a vital lever for resilience and innovation.
AXA’s commitment to resilience shapes our strategies and initiatives. However, building resilience requires more than just slogans; it also demands investment. This includes AXA’s Digital Commercial Platform, a technological risk management solution launched two years ago. This platform significantly enhances our ability to serve clients by providing them access to a comprehensive ecosystem of digital risk management solutions aimed at minimizing and mitigating the impacts of climate change, cybersecurity threats, geopolitical instability, and other emerging risks.
Seizing long-term opportunities
Finally, in a world focused on immediacy and quick responses, reintroducing long-term thinking into risk management is more important than ever. The era of silos has ended, and we embrace the shared desire of all parties to create solutions and work together to build resilience and navigate instability.
Significant risks require thorough analysis, anticipation, and long-term projections. For example, climate change is not an immediate threat but a slowly developing and cumulative phenomenon, the impacts of which in 10, 20, or even 50 years need to be anticipated today. This involves helping companies with their energy transition while adopting innovative technologies and integrating ESG criteria into their strategies.
These challenges, coupled with greater risk retention, are reshaping the dynamics of engagement among insurers, brokers, and risk managers. They also necessitate long-term partnerships and support for the captive sector, where backing from traditional insurers is a crucial success factor. France is recognized as one of the most advanced markets globally for risk management solutions, with captives playing a significant role in this progress. The French captive market is flourishing, and we are proud to partner with the federation of French captive owners (Fe虂de虂ration Française des Captives d’Entreprise). We also assist over 60% of the new captives established in France since 2021 and 50% of the captives approved by the French insurance regulator Autorité de Contrôle Prudentiel et de Résolution (ACPR).
Should we respond to sudden risks or adopt a long-term perspective? We strongly believe in our vital role within the ecosystem, and selecting one option would imply sacrificing our commitment to enhancing our partners' resilience. 色多多视频 is both an art and a science that we cultivate together. 色多多视频invites you to rethink how we collectively tackle today's and tomorrow's challenges.
