British Insurance Award success.
At a glittering Royal Albert Hall ceremony hosted by Katherine Ryan and attended by 1,500 fellow insurance game-changers, we were proud to have our technology achievements celebrated. We know tech and data-driven decision-making fuels our success and are delighted our colleagues, the people whose judgments thrive in our tech-rich environment, have been recognised.
The innovation and dedication of our inspirational colleagues meant we’d been shortlisted in a total of four categories including the tech prize; the other classes were Customer Experience, Personal Lines Insurer of the Year and the Best Large Insurance Employer. A huge honour.
Focus, the proprietary tech platform we’ve developed, means we can use rich data to evolve unique commercial opportunities compared to businesses who rely on off-the-shelf tech solutions. Focus now handles 10-15 million events every day and integrates seamlessly with our data science platform. Together, they’re increasingly powering differentiated insights and leveraging AI, advanced analytics, real-time and automated selection capabilities. That’s why we call ourselves innovators in data as well as a fast-growing insurance company.
Our Chief Executive, Michael Lee, said: “We were delighted to win the Technology Award. 1st Central is the UK’s original and most successful Insurtech: we’ve invested £100m over the past decade to develop proprietary technology and data platforms. Those platforms are the backbone of the business’s agile approach and enable us to take advantage of market opportunities quickly, drive administrative efficiencies and deliver better outcomes for our customers and partners. Our technology is one of the reasons we were able to double our profits to £111m last year.
A huge thank you to the whole team at 1st Central – this award reflects your hard work and dedication.”
Launched in 1995, the British Insurance Awards are the largest business-to-business award scheme in the country. Established to recognise insurance excellence in all sectors of the market, they attract hundreds of entries every year. Against such a big field of talent, our achievement is therefore truly significant.
Data isn’t only for the experts. Skilfully optimising our data and technology’s a big part of our strategy and, in the environment we’re creating, data’s for all our people, whatever their role. In our data culture, we want people to feel safe to ask questions, challenge the status quo and explore the possibilities data can bring to their roles, whatever that looks like. This community is central to our Data and Analytics strategy; it supports our wider goal of delivering faster, smarter, and fairer services for our customers and partners and an exceptional colleague experience. It seems to be working.