In today's highly competitive world with its increasingly restrictive regulatory framework, the need to put customers at the heart of insurance industry concerns has become a major challenge.

At its Fifth European Symposium held at Versailles on November 9 and 10, BNP Paribas Cardif invited its partners to identify opportunities for developing customer value. The theme for this year's event was Value for money, Money for value.

In a dynamic and open to sharing environment, the symposium provided delegates with a forum in which to consider and discuss issues that will prove decisive for the development of their industry:

• defining customer value, which, over and above financial services, can take the form of commitment, service quality, support or even transparency, and discussing these issues by swapping experiences with professionals from a wide range of backgrounds, ranging from the services sector and automotive industry to savings and online brokerage)
• considering how regulatory reforms can be used as opportunities for developing customer value in bancassurance (consumer protection reforms, as well as prudential reforms)
• swapping experiences with partners representing the various BNP Paribas Cardif distribution channels to identify customer value creation levers in bancassurance

The event brought together experts and leading figures from a very diverse range of backgrounds, as well as insurance product distribution players, including:

Dr. Dirk Schmidt-Gallas, Managing Partner, Simon-Kucher & Partners (Germany)
Claire Bonniol, Managing Director, Académie du Service, (France)
Ulrich Lenz, Head of Online and Social Media Marketing, BMW (Germany)
Kai Friedrich, Deputy CEO, Cortal Consors (Germany)
John Wilkinson, Head of Protection and Investments, Nationwide (United Kingdom)
Cristian Wolleter, Chief Executive Officer, Banco Estado Corredores de Seguros (Chile)
Umberto Filotto, Professor of Banking Management and Retail Banking - University of   Rome "Tor Vergata", secretary-general Assofin and professor of Banking and Insurance SDA Bocconi School of Management
Jean Lemierre, Advisor to the Chairman, BNP Paribas (France)
Olav Jones, Deputy Director General, CEA (Belgium)
Maria Dolores Pescador, Head of Public Policy for Private Banking, Asset Management and Insurance, Grupo Santander (Spain)
Anna Lisa Tazartès, Marketing and Operations Director, Ge Capital (UK)