Connecting innovation to accelerate growth

In this interview, Matthieu Garnier, Group Head of Business Development & Innovation, outlines how Generali is strengthening its innovation capabilities to address evolving customer needs and drive sustainable growth across the Group.

You recently took on the role of Group Head of Business Development & Innovation, what has struck you most about the Group's ability to develop new business and innovate - and where do you see our greatest untapped potential?

What has impressed me most is the strength and breadth of our innovation ecosystem, which combines highly capable Business Units, a deep understanding of customer needs, and strong expertise across key areas such as assistance, health, climate, and digital protection.

Above all, I have seen a remarkable level of ambition across our markets. Teams are eager to collaborate, experiment, and scale solutions, united by a shared commitment to creating value for our customers.

Our greatest opportunity lies in bringing these strengths together. With greater alignment and collaboration across the Group, we can accelerate innovation and amplify its impact. Generali already has the capabilities, expertise, and ambition needed to succeed. The challenge, and the opportunity, is to connect them through a shared framework that enables innovation to scale more effectively across the Group and create lasting value for our customers.

Business development and innovation span a broad range of activities. Within Lifetime Partner 27: Driving Excellence, what are the two or three priorities you have set for your area, and how would you define success over the next 12 to 18 months?

Our priorities are fully aligned with the ambitions of Lifetime Partner 27 and our commitment to becoming simpler, more service‑oriented, and closer to customers.

We aim to establish a Group-wide innovation engine that unites the Innovation Studio, the Innovation Fund, the Innovation Network, M&A, and GV2.0 (Generali Ventures 2.0, Generali’s start-up investment programme) within a common framework for governance, decision-making, and execution.

We are also focused on four strategic priorities that translate our Group strategy into tangible action while addressing some of the most pressing protection gaps facing society today: longevity, climate adaptation, digital risks, and the evolution of distribution and customer journeys.

By concentrating our efforts in these areas, we can accelerate the development, transfer, and scaling of innovation across the Group. Innovation creates real value only when it can be scaled and our model is designed to ensure that solutions developed in one Business Unit can be adopted quickly and consistently by others.

Customer needs and market dynamics are shifting quickly, from demographic change and protection gaps to new expectations around digital experiences and service. Which of these shifts do you consider most decisive for Generali, and how can we translate them into opportunities for growth?

We selected these four priorities because they reflect the convergence of customer needs, our strategic ambitions, and some of the most significant protection gaps facing society today.

The most decisive shift is the growing insurability gap, namely the widening disconnect between emerging risks and the protection solutions available to address them. As climate, cyber, and longevity challenges intensify, customers are increasingly looking for solutions that help them anticipate, prevent, and manage risks, not simply recover from them. Our priorities reflect this shift:

• Longevity: helping people live longer, healthier, and more financially secure lives.
• Climate adaptation: developing solutions and services that help people, businesses, and communities become more resilient to climate-related risks before losses occur.
• Digital risks: helping customers protect their identities, data, and digital lives from an evolving landscape of cyber threats.
• Distribution and customer journeys: creating simpler, more personalised experiences that make protection easier to access, understand, and use.

By focusing on these areas, we can develop end‑to‑end services rather than standalone products, while creating solutions that can be scaled across markets.

Innovation is often measured by its ability to create tangible business impact. What do you see as the key ingredients for turning ideas into scalable outcomes and embedding innovation more effectively across the Group?

We need to keep a close eye on emerging trends and opportunities, and we need a coherent operating model. This is why we are building a Unified Innovation Engine, built around five simple but powerful components:

1. Innovation Studio: a venture-building platform that develops and tests MVPs within weeks.
2. Innovation Fund: providing disciplined, agile capital allocation to accelerate innovation.
3. Innovation Network: driving the adoption and scaling of successful solutions across Business Units
4. M&A: accelerating strategic growth through targeted acquisitions and partnerships.
5. GV2.0: providing direct access to deal flow and startup insights.

When these five components work together, innovation becomes faster, more predictable, business-driven, and easier to scale.

AI and data are at the top of every agenda. Looking beyond the headlines, where are you already seeing tangible value for our business, and what does it take to scale those successes across the Group?

AI creates value only when it solves a real business challenge. We are already seeing tangible benefits from AI-driven solutions for customers, partners, and our business.

Scaling these solutions depends on three factors: joint ownership between Group Innovation and the Business Units, ensuring shared accountability for decisions and outcomes; strong execution discipline, based on a common methodology, governance framework, and operating rhythm, where the Studio builds, the Innovation Fund validates, and the Network scales; and, above all, customer adoption. A solution only scales when it addresses a real need and creates measurable value for customers, Business Units, and partners.