Frank Jons: chromatic explosions!
He could have ended up as a partner in an auditing firm, but a job interview convinced him to follow his true calling: painting. Interview.
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Jean Elia (SOGELIFE): Anticipation and transformation
2024 has seen a strong start for SOGELIFE, which achieved a record-breaking influx of premium in the first quarter. Managing Director Jean Elia details the firm's twin focuses: Addressing the complex demands of its client base and creating innovative digital services to navigate the future.
How does SOGELIFE adapt to Luxembourg's fast evolving life insurance market?
SOGELIFE capitalises on two principal advantages: the robustness of a large entity and the flexibility of a smaller entity. Benefiting from considerable financial stability, primarily due to support from our parent company, Societe Generale Assurances, we celebrated significant growth in 2023, a trend that continued into early 2024. Offering some of the most competitive products in the industry, SOGELIFE has earned the recognition of partners and the trust of clients. We were firm in our conviction that we would emerge stronger and more resilient from the challenges of 2022 and 2023, which stemmed from the Ukraine crisis and abrupt interest rate hikes. By preparing through stress testing and scenario analysis for rising interest rates, we’ve enjoyed the fruits of strategic foresight.
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How are you approaching the digital transformation?
Digital innovation at SOGELIFE is a three-pronged strategy aimed at revolutionising the insurance sector. First, we aim to provide a premium experience for our clients (HNWI et UHNWI) and partners through intuitive and innovative solutions. Our digital portal, PREMIUM, exemplifies this with its user-centric design, offering intuitive solutions and 100% digital underwriting. Additionally, MySogelife enhances transparency and simplicity for wealth management and international clients by providing 24/7 policy oversight, performance tracking, and access to essential documents. Second, we emphasise operational efficiency, streamlining processes through automation to allow our team to focus on high-value, impactful work. This approach not only retains talent we believe, but also fosters a culture of innovation and initiative. Lastly, we aim to enhance our value proposition digitally, reinforcing our status as a leading insurer. This digital transformation underpins our business model, ensuring that SOGELIFE remains at the forefront of the industry.
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“We strive to maintain the agile mindset that has spurred our success over 28 years and to become more digital and even more responsible.”
What is your current major project?
In 2023, SOGELIFE took significant steps towards enhancing its services and customer experience. In April, we achieved the internalisation of securities accounting, allowing for more frequent revaluation of internal funds and providing customers with almost real-time data access. May marked the completion of our fully digital subscription process, incorporating electronic signatures. In 2024, our “D-light 2.0” programme aims to elevate our partners' experience via three phases: "Sense" to update our understanding of our partners and clients’ needs and pain points, "Dream" for co-creating the premium experience, and "Act" to turn these ideas into reality. This, while also embarking on a comprehensive programme to streamline back-office processes, ensuring quicker response times and faster processing for our partners.
How do you envision SOGELIFE’s future?
We strive to sustain the agile mindset that has spurred our success over 28 years. We’re committed to becoming stronger and even more agile, ready to seize opportunities presented by the current landscape. Viewing constraints as opportunities allowed us to craft a new offer on the euro fund for instance, which tackled the rising interest rates, reassured our customers and earned their loyalty. This exemplifies SOGELIFE’s agile and proactive approach, poised to continue in the years ahead. Furthermore, we envision SOGELIFE’s future to be more digital and more responsible.