Speaking at the inauguration ceremony for the company's new headquarters, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Eric Lombard announced that BNP Paribas's insurance unit has adopted the new name BNP Paribas Cardif.

Until the present, the insurance business had used three brand names: "BNP Paribas Assurance", the corporate brand; "Cardif", the commercial brand for product distribution via external partners; and "BNP Paribas", the commercial brand for product distribution via the retail banking network in France.

This name change is the fruit of an in-depth analysis following a qualitative study of the image of the existing brands conducted in 2010, covering 100 of the company's most representative partners in Europe, Latin America and Asia.

The results confirmed the need to unify the different components in the corporate identity under the BNP Paribas Cardif brand. The BNP Paribas Assurance name enjoyed only relative awareness and recognition and was not easily associated with the Cardif brand, making it difficult to effectively promote the company. BNP Paribas Cardif was identified as the best solution to express a unified corporate positioning.

BNP Paribas Cardif combines the solidity, power and attractiveness expressed by the BNP Paribas banking group, plus the recognized expertise associated with Cardif. The new BNP Paribas Cardif brand name capitalizes on complementary components that are synonymous with value, and representative of the company.

During his remarks at the headquarters inaugural ceremony, Eric Lombard said: "This is a very important year in the development of our company. We have unified and rationalized our brand structure and inaugurated our new headquarters, both strong signs of a cohesive enterprise. The creation of BNP Paribas Cardif also reflects the fundamental importance of our business mission-insuring individuals, their families and their property-and our objective of being one of the top ten insurance companies in Europe."