MONTREAL, March 20, 2024 – We’re pleased to welcome Lyne Mercier to Koïos Intelligence as our new VP of Insurance Solutions and Head of US Sales!

Lyne’s journey started in the insurance claims sector, where she honed her knowledge of the industry’s intricacies. Over the years, she transitioned into technology, leveraging her expertise to navigate the evolving landscape of Insurtech. She played an integral role in driving sales at Symbility (now Corelogic) while fostering innovation. She demonstrated a relentless commitment to excellence and a positive attitude that fueled her drive to succeed at Verisk as a North American – Account Executive. With a proven track record of exceeding expectations and a reputation as a trusted advisor, she is poised to continue making an impact in the ever-evolving landscape of Insurtech.

“I’m pleased to join the Koïos team as VP of insurance solutions & Head of US Sales to support our clients, enabling automation, optimizing workflows and developing effective customer engagement strategies.” – Lyne Mercier, VP of Insurance Solutions and Head of US Sales

We’re thrilled to have Lyne on board and look forward to the remarkable achievements ahead.

About Koïos Intelligence

Founded in 2017, Koïos Intelligence’s mission is to empower the insurance and financial industry with the next generation of intelligent and customized systems that are supported by Artificial Intelligence, statistics and operational research. Combining the knowledge of our lead experts in Insurance, Finance and Artificial Intelligence, Koïos is developing new technologies that redefine the interactions between insurers, brokers and customers.

MONTREAL, January 24, 2024 (Newswire.com) – Mohamed Hanini, founder, CEO, and CTO of Koïos Intelligence, is pleased to announce the appointment of Charles Dugas as Executive Vice President.

“I’ve known Charles for 20 years and am excited to have him join our leadership team. Charles brings a unique blend of industry experience as well as machine learning and AI expertise, which makes him perfectly suited to drive the development and growth of our virtual AI factory.” – M. Hanini

Charles comes with over 20 years of experience in the insurance industry, starting in 2001 with the launch of ApSTAT Technologies, which he co-founded with three partners, including Yoshua Bengio. Between 2004 and 2010, Charles taught actuarial science, statistics, and finance at the University of Montréal where he met Hanini. In 2011, he joined the Enterprise Analytics function of Aviva Canada to deliver analytical solutions for various applications in both personal and commercial lines. He then joined Element AI in 2017 to lead the development of solutions and products for the insurance industry, working with insurers and business partners globally. Joining EY in 2020, he led the first Canadian MGA implementation of Guidewire and delivered solutions and advisory services in data, analytics, and AI. Charles also previously worked at FICO, Mercer, and Swiss Re. He holds a B.Sc. in actuarial science, an M.Sc.A. in electrical engineering, and a Ph.D. in computer science.

“I’m very pleased to join Koïos, a company I’ve seen grow and mature from inception and with great values of integrity and respect, a reflection of Mohamed’s own. The Olivo platform has now been proven in the market with a dozen live clients currently benefiting from substantial efficiency gains and growing volumes of business. I’m excited to be part of the next leg of expansion into new markets, supported by a series of new product capabilities.” – C. Dugas

About Koïos Intelligence

Founded in 2017, Koïos Intelligence’s mission is to empower the insurance and financial industry with the next generation of intelligent and customized systems that are supported by Artificial Intelligence, statistics and operational research. Combining the knowledge of our lead experts in Insurance, Finance and Artificial Intelligence, Koïos is developing new technologies that redefine the interactions between insurers, brokers and customers.

Montreal, May 3, 2023 – Koïos Intelligence, a Quebec-based start-up that provides insurance professionals with a conversational assistant powered by artificial intelligence (AI), announced today to have concluded a $6.5 million financing round with the participation of Propulia Capital, Canada Economic Development, Export Development Canada, Caisse Desjardins des Technologies and other private investors, who are convinced that natural language processing is poised to revolutionize the operations of organizations. This financing includes equity and other financial instruments such as debt instruments and call options.

This new investment will allow Koïos to rapidly expand into new markets, while continuing to develop its virtual assistant, making it easier than ever for insurers to do business.

“Our growth has been significant since the company’s launch and this round of financing will allow us to further solidify our business strategy. In the medium term, our goal is to become the first conversational assistant in the insurance industry in Canada and the United States, revolutionizing the way people shop for insurance coverage,” said Mohamed Hanini, President, CEO and CTO of Koïos Intelligence.

Revolutionizing the way people shop for insurance policies and update insurance contracts

By combining insights from experts in insurance, finance, and AI, Koïos identified a disconnect between the way brokers currently sell insurance, and the way consumers want to buy it. In fact, in 2022, the overwhelming majority of insurance sales were still done over the phone or in person and required an average of over an hour. However, new generations of consumers have increasingly sophisticated expectations and, according to a survey conducted by Koïos Intelligence, 75% of them expect a response from an agent in less than 5 minutes. Moreover, 65% of consumers prefer online platforms to call centers when shopping for insurance. 

Koïos’ Olivo conversational assistant is AI-powered and acts as a virtual intermediary between the insurance broker and the consumer, allowing the consumer to shop for different coverage options, and even complete insurance purchases, all while asking the virtual assistant questions. Olivo is interconnected with leading insurance industry systems such as Applied and the Centre for Study of Insurance Operations (CSIO). These integrations allow Koïos Intelligence to be part of the insurance value chain and to retain clients such as PMA Insurance, Tardif Group Insurance, Intact’s partners in the Virage Group, and Rogers Insurance, one of the largest insurance brokers in Canada. This connectivity streamlines the pre-purchase, purchase and post-purchase processes for all types of insurance products through data automation.

The standardization of processes allows for greater efficiency throughout the value chain, a 30% reduction in administrative costs for insurance brokers or agents, and a potential 400% increase in sale conversion rates. In parallel, Olivo offers consumers fast and personalized service, available 24/7 in the language of their choice with a 30% shorter waiting time than if they had to contact a call centre. 

Olivo uses multimodal AI, a type of artificial intelligence in which multiple channels of information transmission (text, voice, image) are used to train interlocking algorithms to better understand consumer interactions.

“In the near future, the nature of the activities of insurance agents and brokers will evolve towards more personalized advice, along with a drastic reduction in data entry, since virtual assistants can do this job very well,” says Mohamed Hanini on Olivo’s role.

“We are pleased to support and welcome a visionary company like Koïos into our ecosystem of start-ups, offering an innovative solution that improves the experience of all parties involved in the entire value chain,” says Geneviève Biron, Founder and Managing Director of Propulia Capital, who became a close advisor to Koïos’s Board of Directors.

About Koïos Intelligence

Founded in 2017, Koïos Intelligence’s mission is to empower the insurance and financial industry with the next generation of intelligent and customized systems that are supported by Artificial Intelligence, statistics and operational research. Combining the knowledge of our lead experts in Insurance, Finance and Artificial Intelligence, Koïos is developing new technologies that redefine the interactions between insurers, brokers and customers.

Koïos Intelligence is proud to welcome Nicolas Audibert as Head of Financial Services. In this role, Nicolas will develop Koïos’ strategy in key pillars such as commercial development opportunities and R&D.

Nicolas brings two decades of experience in leading Financial services teams as Risk Manager and Consultant in the banking industry, and he has led significant multi-million IT transformation programs as a Senior Business Architect. 

“We have worked hard enough and creatively in a way that allowed us to operationalize artificial intelligence and Natural Language Processing to be a future technology leader in the insurance and banking industry. In order to strengthen our footprint, we should invest in the finetuning of the business processes implemented in our platform to streamline the deployment of our platform among our Enterprise partners. Nicolas, having a lot of experience in major transformation initiatives, will help our multidisciplinary team on major projects,” says M. Hanini, founder, CEO & CTO.

Indeed, launching a voice-recognition virtual assistant to manage the business processes of a conservative industry such as the insurance industry is a daunting challenge. After rolling out the app to multiple customers, Koïos could tell that today’s users are in favor of such a change.

“Ten years ago, as a Risk Manager in the banking industry, I realized that business processes and IT systems’ weaknesses were far more costly and risky than financial risks themselves. These issues can lead to poor quality indicators and adverse decisions. As a consequence, I started acting as a business architect in ambitious business processes and IT systems transformation programs in the banking industry. Ten years later, I am deeply convinced that recent technological capabilities improvements, including Artificial Intelligence, will revolutionise business processes efficiency. For all these reasons, I feel very fortunate to join one of the most dynamic and promising Fintech Natural Language Processing focused and to have the opportunity to build the new generation of business solutions for insurance, banking and financial industries in general,” says Nicolas Audibert, Head of Financial Services.

Koïos Intelligence improves the insurance value chain across conversational AI. Their platform Olivo is built for insurance customers with the purpose of eliminating waiting time, reducing operational costs and offering an unprecedented customer experience. Based on Natural Language Processing and the state-of-the-art Artificial Intelligence, Olivo is made to respond to new customer expectations in today’s digital world.

About Koïos Intelligence

Founded in 2017, Koïos Intelligence’s mission is to empower the insurance and financial industry with the next generation of intelligent and customized systems that are supported by Artificial Intelligence, statistics and operational research. Combining the knowledge of our lead experts in Insurance, Finance and Artificial Intelligence, Koïos is developing new technologies that redefine the interactions between insurers, brokers and customers.

Overwhelmed emergency hospital hotlines. Shortages of doctors and nurses. No sector of the health care industry is being spared against the current pandemic, forcing it to quickly adapt in order to support the exponential emergencies.

• Baidu, a Chinese company developed a thermal sensor to detect, screen and single out individuals with high fever, with a margin of error within 0.05 degrees Celsius;
• Wuchang Smart Field Hospital in Wuhan has 14 robots as part of its medical staff who can disinfect, deliver medicine and track patients’ temperature changes;
• Providence St. Joseph Health System in Seattle is using a coronavirus chatbot tool to quickly assess potential symptoms instead of overwhelming the hotlines. So far, it’s had over 40,000 chat sessions since going live.

The power of AI is being seen before our very eyes. Unlike human intelligence, artificial intelligence can support near infinite queries, which is exactly what is needed during a pandemic with sudden and explosive surges in demand.

Financial services are certainly not being spared. Call centers are working around the clock to serve worried customers and business owners regarding loan defaults, mortgage rescheduling, and credit card fee payments, usually resulting in several hours of waiting time. Insurance companies are another industry struggling to deal with the pandemic and its resulting lockdowns: over-stretched customer service, staff shortages and insurance brokers unable to meet prospects face-to-face are just a few of the headaches to deal with.

So how can virtual chatbots help the insurance industry under unprecedented challenges?

Conversational AI is built with the purpose of offering customers optimal experience and enabling agents to work more effectively. High-quality chatbots are capable of:

• Reducing operations costs by 30%;
• Streamlining the pre-sale and the sale processes;
• Accelerating the underwriting and claim processes;
• Eliminating the waiting time completely.

However, most interactions with major chatbots in the insurance industry are robotic, outdated and sometimes even frustrating. As it turns out, chatbots are quite similar to humans, where they need to be trained and educated first, before becoming experts in a field. Only then can a virtual assistant accurately assess a customer’s needs.

The state-of-the-art technology supporting the bots is known as Natural Language Processing which has recently attained levels of human-like performance by applying deep learning (DL) and reinforcement learning (RL) algorithms in the NLP field. Olivo chatbot, powered and built by Koios Intelligence is an example.

We are now observing promising results, as large amounts of conversational data become available for training Deep Learning architectures. In technical terms, this means machine learning models effectively encode into words (latent semantic real vectors). The attention mechanisms in Deep Learning improved the contextual dimension, which enhance the classification of intent, as well as a prediction of the response, which results in significantly increasing the accuracy of a dialogue system.

The current crisis is now forcing entire industries, who have barely changed in decades to quickly adapt, and virtual chatbots seem to be a top contender in the game. However, despite their undeniable advantages, there should always be proper training beforehand and the right human/AI balance to ensure the most effective result.