Accenture and GEB brings Blockchain Technology to Employee Benefits Industry

Accenture and Generali Employee Benefits announced blockchain solution for the employee benefits (EB) industry. The newly announced blockchain solution introduces smart contracts and automated reconciliation to the participants in the reinsurance process for captive or pooling services.

The announcement noted that the new solution will streamline GEB’s employee benefit operating model for captive services such as life, short and long-term disability, accident and healthcare insurance.

The use of blockchain technology brings in its inherent characteristics such as transparency, security, and trust adding value to captive or pooling services.

Executive Opinion

GEB’s Chief Executive Officer, Sergio Di Caro, said “This prototype represents a step forward for GEB and for the insurance industry. The use of blockchain technology allows for a truly connected ecosystem and a seamless partnership between clients, advisers, local insurers and Generali. Blockchain will change not only our Network but the employee benefits industry as we know it.”

Accenture’s Insurance practice Lead in Europe, Daniele Presutti, said: “Blockchain technology creates a more-connected ecosystem among stakeholders, allowing a reliable means of information exchange and streamlining previously complex, manual processes within insurance. We are pleased to work with Generali Employee Benefits to help revolutionise the employee benefits process for its customers.”

Blockchain Solution Rollout 

The blockchain solution was prototyped and demonstrated last year with Syngenta, a leading agriculture company, and local insurers in Spain, Switzerland, and Serbia. The successful demonstration resulted in lowering costs, saving time and improving data quality for all stakeholders. R3’s Corda enterprise blockchain technology was used in the solution which is also adopted by the Blockchain Insurance Industry Initiative (B3i), the RiskBlock Alliance and several other insurance sector players.

The rollout of the blockchain solution was made possible by this successful demonstration bringing genuine integration of systems, data, and processes to all stakeholders in the employee benefits sector.

The solution is supported by the Generali Group and inspired by B3i, a collaborative initiative of 15 global insurers and reinsurers that came together in late 2016 to explore and test the potential of blockchain in the industry, says the announcement.