Speakers and Moderators

Doug Grant

Partner, Insurance-Canada.ca

Session: Welcome & Introduction

Doug Grant has been helping the insurance industry in Canada make effective use of technology for many years. From a business-impact and application perspective, he has helped individual companies and cross-industry groups in both Property & Casualty and Life insurance.

The progress of technology from the the basement computer room to the desk-top terminal and PC, to portable laptops to smartphones and tablets and now BYOD has been a fascinating journey. Processes extended to business partners through connected systems has continued to improve efficiency and timeliness.

The web brought the customer directly into the equation. Social functions have enabled new levels of connectedness, triggering the current focus on customer experience and engagement, which can paradoxically both enhance loyalty and increase freedom of choice.

Doug is a founding partner in Insurance-Canada.ca, a leading Canadian Insurance resource centre for consumer and insurance professional alike. He organizes and hosts regularly scheduled Insurance-Canada.ca conferences and other events.

Farnoud Kazemzadeh, PhD

An entrepreneur, engineer, astrophysicist, inventor, professional basketball referee, and co-founder and CEO of Elucid Labs, Farnoud is an internationally recognized leading expert in optics and photonics specializing in interferometry, spectroscopy, holography, and microscopy. As an engineer/astrophysicist, he has placed instruments on various telescopes, planetary probes, and the International Space Station.

As a serial entrepreneur, Farnoud has successfully lead the design and development of high-performance optical devices at several startups. Farnoud is now leading Elucid Labs, bringing to market technology for personalized precision medicine for detection, diagnostics, targeted therapeutics, and treatment planning.

He is an Adjunct Professor at University of Waterloo where he teaches undergraduate classes, supervise students, and generally satisfies his desire to be involved in pure scientific research. Farnoud holds 10 patents, has authored over 50 academic publications, and has been recognized with various academic excellence awards.

Andrew Lo

As President and CEO, Andrew Lo leads corporate development initiatives for Kanetix Ltd., Canada's largest online marketplace for insurance and financial services. He is also a Business Strategy Advisor for Ryerson University's DMZ helping to develop entrepreneurs and startup companies at Canada's largest startup incubator.

Andrew has many years of experience as a business and technology leader for FinTech companies such as Filogix and D+H, and has developed organizations from startups into industry shaping ventures with over 4,000 employees.

Dave Lund

Dave is a strategic, results-driven, corporate leader with over 20 years' experience driving business, technology, and process improvement. He is a proven innovator who designs and implements impactful and efficient infrastructural change, benefiting internal and external stakeholders. With the rate of change accelerating every day Dave engages, motivates, and leads teams to success with empowerment and transparency. As complex as our related businesses have become he looks to simplify, to deliver improved and innovative product and service.

He is currently responsible for Operations and Claims Operations for P&C Lines of Business throughout Canada. Accountability for inter-business, financial operations, client & partner services, claims related services, support services, shared services, and ensuring alignment with internal and external stakeholders are some of his areas of oversight and direction. As technical and systems liaison for business and claims operations, connectivity and engagement to various InsurTech actions is a natural path. Directing various continuous improvement projects supporting underwriting, claims, and back-office stakeholders to provide tactile services and value to shareholders and partners support Dave's drive to modernize and improve.

Nick leads McKinsey's insurance analytics practice in Canada. He was previously a leader within Ingenuity, McKinsey’s global insurance analytics service line, leading Ingenuity’s Canadian operations as well as the distribution & customer engagement domains across North America.

Nick has 5+ years experience leading a broad range of applied advanced analytics programs for commercial property, life, and P&C carriers. In his current role he works closely with carriers to build AI and machine learning solutions & implement them to create sustainable improvements to core business problems.

Prior to joining McKinsey in Toronto, Nick led the analytics team for a specialty life insurer in South Africa focused on providing life cover to those living with HIV and diabetes.

Sven Roehl

Sven Roehl is co-founder of Cookhouse Lab – the first co-creation InsurTech lab. He is also Executive Vice President of the IT consulting firm msg global solutions Canada Inc. and Head of Insurance Innovation of msg Group with more than 6,500 employees in 25 countries.

During his 15-year digital innovation journey in Financial Services, Sven has been responsible for numerous digital innovations in areas such as IoT, customer engagement and analytics. He inspired and helped many organizations around the globe to design digital products to interact with people in new and innovative ways.

Sven co-founded his first IT company specialized on IoT in Germany in 2004, before he joined msg global as director of UK & Ireland in 2011. In 2016 he moved from London, UK to Toronto, Canada. During this time, Sven set up the global innovation services of msg providing digital innovation consulting for many corporate organizations and their innovation labs.

Patrick Vice

Patrick has more than 25 years of experience enabling technology and electronic commerce in the insurance and risk management communities. Patrick is a Founding Partner of Insurance-Canada.ca, Inc., the premier source for Canadian information on insurance & technology.

Patrick currently serves as Insurance-Canada.ca's Director of Products and Services, and sits on the company's Advisory Board. He edits the Intersection, Insurance-Canada.ca's blog, produces and hosts on-line and in-person events, and develops bespoke offerings for Insurance-Canada.ca's clients.

Throughout his career, Patrick has held senior management positions with insurance companies, distributors, consulting firms, and technology solution providers. He serves on boards and committees of various industry associations.

Patrick authors articles for leading trade publications and has spoken at insurance and technology conferences in Canada, the US, UK, Europe, and Bermuda.

Bobbi and Patrick Vice enjoy living and working in the heart of downtown Toronto, Canada.

Benjamin Von Euw

Benjamin Von Euw has spent 10+ years supporting buisinesses transformation with technologies. As an enterprise architect, he was involved in many projects and Proofs of Concept, including decision automation and voice personal assistant.
While our industry is being reshaped and business models are reinvented, Benjamin looks behind the buzzwords – such as cloud, BI, AI, and blockchain – and focuses on business value in terms of automation, decentralisation, and user experience improvements.

Benjamin is co-author of The InsurTech Book.

Natalie Whaley

Natalie Whaley is the Operations Manager for the Canadian Personal Accident division of AIG Insurance Company of Canada. She is responsible for oversight of procedures, functions and coordination of technology, and operational strategy across the Personal Accident division, as well as managing the development of various strategic initiatives within Personal Accident, Consumer Insurance, and the wider AIG organization.

Throughout her tenure within Personal Accident Operations, Natalie has been heavily involved with AIG's Innovation Strategy within Canada and the United States. She has developed and launched and acted as a consultant on many product offerings, web based solutions, and marketing and advertising campaigns that have been launched in the Canadian and US markets.

As the Chair of the AIG Young Professionals Canada Employee Resource Group, Natalie is passionate about the career development of employees beginning their careers in the Insurance Industry. She has provided the Young Professionals membership base with unique opportunities for mentorship, executive exposure, community engagement and network experiences to help them grow in their careers.

Brent Williams

As Director of Product Management for Aeryon Lab’s Commercial Sector, Brent Williams is accountable for defining and executing the Commercial segment strategy including sUAS airframe and integrated platform, technology, value chain, partnerships, go-to-market and pricing for all verticals globally.

Brent has extensive experience in North American energy and utility markets with expertise in SaaS operations, product management and strategic consulting in smart energy grid technology, operations and analytics. During his career he has helped Utilities adapt to complex regulatory, operational and technological initiatives.

Prior to joining Aeryon, Brent was the Director of Operational Analytics for Black & Veatch. Brent lives with his family in Burlington, Ontario where he still enjoys hockey in the Burlington Old Timers league. Brent Williams began his career as a Submetering Product Analyst with Ontario Hydro.