The Swiss Insurance Association is well prepared for the challenges of the future

Bern, 23 June 2010 – The SIA held its 80th Annual General Meeting in Bern on 23 June 2010. The delegates of the SIA elected a new member to the Board: Daniel Schmutz, who will be CEO of Helsana from July 2010, replaces Manfred Manser, also from Helsana.

The delegates voted unanimously in favour of an amendment to the Articles of Association. This is a consequence of the SIA’s strategic repositioning, which was decided on by the Board in January 2010 and will also entail an adjustment to the association’s structure. The repositioning involves concentrating on a few, clearly defined strategic points of focus and separating the services the association will provide in the future into basic services and additional services.

In his address, Chairman Erich Walser remarked that the Swiss insurance industry had again demonstrated its ability to withstand a crisis in the past year and was one of the mainstays of the Swiss economy. Walser emphasised that Swiss insurance was an international hallmark of the highest quality: «It conveys core Swiss values such as reliability, security, capital strength, efficiency and expertise.» He went on to say that insurers were well equipped to deal with the diverse challenges they will face in the future, such as the trend towards over-regulation and the intensification of international competition between business centres.

Guest speakers were Jean-Daniel Gerber, State Secretary, Director of the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) and Director of the Foreign Economic Affairs Directorate, who spoke on the topic of «Market access in the EU for Swiss financial services providers», and Prof. Georg Kohler, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Zurich, whose talk was entitled «Solidarity, control and personal pension provision – can freedom be insured?».

• 2009/2010 Annual Report