Chairman’s Statement

Generali’s 2016 results affirmed our insurance company’s prominence on the insurance market in the Czech Republic. Having achieved our planned indicators, we rank among the top four most successful insurers.

Our growth momentum outclassed the market in selected segments. We are one of the fastest growing insurance companies, especially in motor insurance, thanks in part to those agents, dealerships and used-car dealers who work with us and who are making major strides in this area of insurance. Improvements in the quality of new business generated by external partners, especially in life insurance, have been aided considerably by long-term targets. While other business partners also contribute to our new-business plans, it continues to be the case that our own steadfast sales service is the cornerstone of our success and the rock on which we can rely. If we are to send the market a clear signal that we will remain a force to be reckoned with as we move forward, this internal sales service needs to pursue the challenge of new-business and personnel growth this year.

The Generali brand profile on the Czech market is that of a professional, innovative and trustworthy insurance company offering smart, simple solutions. This is derived from the Generali Group’s global strategy with its unswerving focus on customers and their needs.
We strive to view and build insurance products as a service. This helps us to deliver solutions that reflect the individuality of our clients. Our victory in the Most Customer-Friendly Life Insurance Company category and second place in the Best Life Insurance Company category in a competition run by the newspaper Hospodářské noviny show that we are on the right track.

Generally speaking, the often precipitous legislative developments generate more stringent conditions for our business, but they also yield new opportunities and new risks that need to be covered. This opens up avenues for us to introduce new products. One example would be the insurance of cash registers designed for the electronic central registration of sales, which we were the first insurer on the market to offer.

Important steps in building brand awareness have included a television campaign pitching Generali as an insurance company for customers with an active lifestyle, and, first and foremost, our partnership with the Czech ice-hockey. As this sport enjoys huge popularity in the Czech Republic, I am very pleased that we have been able to enter the rink and make Czech ice-hockey one of our key sponsorship and marketing activities. Ice-hockey must be played with the heart and with a fine sense of fair play. This is in tune with the way we do business because it is exactly how we, too, approach our customers. We also share the same values with the historic Czech football club AC Sparta Prague, which is another of our long-standing partners.

We conduct ourselves responsibly and, through our foundation, we support socially beneficial activities. Our annual contribution to the needy runs into millions of crowns, and that is before we take into account the hours of Company-paid volunteer activities put in by our employees. Our most high-profile work in this field includes our support of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the Scent Barriers Project to reduce the number of collisions between motor vehicles and wild animals, our collaboration with BESIP, and the Výmoly.cz project to monitor the state of the roads, which has featured as a representative example in the Generali Group’s CSR Report on several occasions.

On behalf of the Company’s management, I thank all of our employees, insurance agents, brokers and business partners for being so instrumental in Generali’s 2016 results. Likewise, I extend my gratitude to all of our customers for trusting us to look after their insurance needs.

Our company is an insurer who, while traditional, is able to react to the changing world around us. I wish Generali another other thriving year in its rich history. Our long-running results show that top-notch services tailored to our customers and business partners are the right way to make customers and shareholders happy and are the best possible incentive to drive us forward in our work.
 
Yours faithfully,

Pavel Mencl
Chairman