Our Insurtech21 conference theme is appropriately titled: Insurtech Think Again. The “mainstreaming” of insurtech and the fancy apps are now close to a decade old and, with a great hand up from the COVID-19 pandemic, there is a lot to “Think Again” about.
When working on this, one of the great myths about technology, going digital and innovation kept popping up in my mind, especially the regular comment from my kids, OK Boomer, when I comment on things technology or online.
Well I said, pushing my spectacles aside while closing Twitter, Instagram and Youtube on my phone. Having just driven home listening to Eminem via iTunes, I was in the mood to clean out my closet. So I let them have it:
It was the Boomers who brought you the personal computer, the laptop, the cellphone. We birthed this baby, and it was no mean feat. Hell, I was there with the arrival of the Bic pen, Microfish (with a hundred miniature pages on a single postcard), and the Fax machine. I carried around my first steel encased, 15kg personal computer, creating nothing but a plain text document with all but 4kb RAM.
I had to figure out what a word processor was, when Wordstar and Wordperfect made their appearance, Google it. (By the way, Google is a Boomer innovation). Microsoft, Apple, Alibaba and Amazon are all Boomer inventions.
We are as adaptable as they come and we are great at dumping stuff once we create better things. From Floppies to Stiffies, external hard drives to memory sticks. We created the 8-Track Car stereo, dumped it for cassette decks and multi component stereos. Then we flipped from CD’s to iPods and Bluetooth, iTunes and Spotify. We may be nostalgic about many of these relics, but we spend thousands on the latest. State of the art electronic toys.
Now marry the above with the fat wallets of Boomers, and even Generation X, and ignore them at your peril when starting that next unicorn in your garage. That is why we are taking delegates back to the drawing board to Think Again about insurance technology and the future of insurance in the digital environment.
This year we structured eight Round Tables where 24 presenters from various industry stakeholders will debate amongst others:
Searching for the soul of the industry
- When Ecosystems Collide – Opportunities Abound
- Alternative Distribution goes mainstream
- How should we approach digital transformation to ensure holistic and sustainable benefits?
- Bite size insurance – A future of choice
27 and 28 July from 09h00 to 13h30 on a screen very close to you. www.Insurtechconference.co.za
