Q&A with Sangram Vajre, Co-founder & Chief Evangelist at Terminus

MEDIA 7 | November 28, 2019

Ed Breault, Chief Marketing Officer at Aprimo is a marketer with over 18 years of industry experience. At Aprimo, Ed is responsible for the global brand and growth which includes all Paid/Owned/Earned media, Brand Experience, Product Marketing, Industry Marketing, Influencer Marketing, Strategic Communications, Content Marketing, Analyst Relations, Alliance Marketing, Public Relations, Events, Demand Generation and Account-Based Marketing. MEDIA 7: What’s your superpower? ED BREAULT: I would say it’s applying the full spectrum of art and science that is required in marketing today. Not just left or right brained, but whole-brained strategy. Being human yet data-driven and really understanding numbers and (the right) metrics to make connections to business drivers. Add storytelling to that, so I can effectively communicate to my team, the CEO and CFO as well as my Board of Directors on those metrics, and connecting all that we are doing in marketing to the mission of the business. Then quickly shifting gears to the art and creative aspects of marketing that are required to engage an audience and tell great commercial stories that take complex concepts and craft them in a way that is interesting for people to pay attention to. I have to be the ultimate point of truth for the brand. M7: At Aprimo, how have marketing leadership roles and responsibilities evolved over the past few years? EB: There are so many dimensions needed by marketing leaders today. There are several elements driving this evolution, it’s the new experience battlefront that is emerging and also marketers themselves driving changes. From a market perspective, there is a clear appetite for disruption and consumers are wanting more experiential elements to their buying experience and interactions with brands. Take a few direct to consumer disruptions like trialing products in-home, purchasing directly from a brand or even wanting to ensure that the producer’s trade practices are in line with the buyer’s or even a regulator’s for that matter. Then we want to try before we buy, and we emotionally care about the supply chain of products. Do we TRUST this brand to do business with them? Behind all of this is a story that needs to be told, and it is those marketers who know their audience well and make connections that will win the commercial game. Back to the marketer, there are so many diverse backgrounds that marketers bring now and I’m really intrigued by those who have unconventional backgrounds because they contribute something uniquely new to the field. I love hearing about the marketer’s journey.

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MEDIA 7 | November 21, 2019

Amy Barzdukas, EVP and Chief Marketing Officer at Poly is a marketing and communications leader with extensive experience in setting strategy, shifting perceptions, advising customers, digital marketing, revenue marketing, integrated marketing communications, and public relations in highly competitive product arenas. Amy is known for her ability to create and execute winning turnarounds on a global scale. MEDIA 7: What inspired you to get into marketing? AMY BARZDUKAS: I was always destined for marketing, even if I didn’t know it. As a child, I collected promotional brochures. I was fascinated by how the words and pictures were used to drive action. My first job was as an advertising copywriter, and I’ve never looked back. M7: How is Poly redefining the video conferencing experience for modern businesses? AB: We’re in an unprecedented time of change in our industry. Voice and video services are moving to the cloud, and companies are changing how they approach their communications needs. Poly is the largest provider of the devices – video conferencing, audio conferencing, headphones and desk phones – you use to connect to these services so you can collaborate with your colleagues. That uniquely positions us to shape the video conferencing experience, and we’re doing so in four ways. First, Poly has made both the Zoom Rooms and the Microsoft Teams video conferencing experience better than ever with our radically simple Poly Studio X video bars that deliver these experiences with no PC or Mac required. We’ve got decades of experience in understanding what makes meetings more human – for everyone in the room and those dialing in from other locations – and we’ve packed all of that into easy-to-install, easy-to-manage, and easy-to-use all-in-one powerhouses. Second, we are bringing the world of AV and video conferencing into the modern app economy. Our Studio X series and Poly G7500 video conferencing devices run a common platform that can be updated and enhanced through a series of regular software updates. This Poly platform, built on Android, can run applications like a smartphone does today. Third, Poly has introduced innovation that makes any video conference better. Our new Poly MeetingAI features use AI and machine learning to address the distractions that hit your senses in a meeting. We make it easier to hear what’s being said by blocking out the annoying noises that people make while talking, and we make it easier to see what’s going on in the room with the most advanced speaker tracking and framing, and our built-in production rules. Finally, we are pricing our solutions in a way that completely resets the calculations on what it costs to outfit a room. The Studio X30, for huddle room and smaller spaces, costs just about $2,100, including the Poly TC8 touch controller. All you add is the cloud service and a monitor, and you have a room up and running for under $2,500. That’s easily under the cost of other solutions and with better audio and video quality.

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Media 7 | May 17, 2021

Darcy Shapiro, Chief Operating Officer, Americas at Cover Genius is a leader in the Americas region of a global Insuretech company with a demonstrated history of working in many facets of the insurance and technology industries. She is skilled in product development and innovation, portfolio management, underwriting, claims management, process design, compliance, legal, partnerships, strategy and implementation.

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Core Insurance

PR Newswire | October 25, 2023

Higginbotham, the largest independent insurance, financial and HR services firm headquartered in Texas and one of the top firms in the country, has joined forces with Bourg Insurance, a long-term family business with deep ties to the South Louisiana community. As Higginbotham celebrates its 75th anniversary this year, Chairman and CEO Rusty Reid credits careful, strategic growth for the company's long-term success. Under Reid's guidance, the company seeks partners with sterling reputations in their local markets and strong cultural affinities. At Higginbotham, we place tremendous importance on family — which is how we view our team — and on service to our community, Reid said. If you're looking around for a similar family- and community-oriented business partner, you have to be looking at the Bourg family in South Louisiana. Bourg Insurance President Brad Bourg, who runs the business alongside his brother Brennan Bourg, brother-in-law Chuck Leblanc — and third brother Bert Bourg, who has long been an important part of the business but is now taking a well-earned retirement — elaborated, "Our father, Claude 'Toby' Bourg, Jr., started this company back in 1958, and our flagship office is still located in our family hometown of Donaldsonville, Louisiana. It's a matter of real pride to us that so many of our clients come from word of mouth, because they know who we are." "They know we believe in community involvement and that we're service-oriented, which are two things that really work together," Brennan Bourg, who serves as vice president, agreed. "When you're locally conscious and active in your community, you know how to provide the personalized service that your clients deserve." "Of course, that's what drew us to Higginbotham," said Chuck Leblanc, who also serves as vice president while running the commercial lines department and managing the Donaldsonville office. "It's that family and community culture. We were approached by plenty of other firms, but in the end, we unanimously agreed that Higginbotham was most closely aligned with our way of doing business." The Bourg brothers — Brad, Brennan and brother-in-law Chuck — also pointed out that they are looking forward to the opportunities the collaboration with Higginbotham will provide to their clients, as well as to their team, who will be eligible to take part in a top-tier employee ownership plan. "We've been a small business for years," Brad explained. "With Higginbotham, we'll have technology and support to move that forward, providing the same services but on a larger scale." "Access to markets, scalability, professionalism — and of course, a great brand," Brennan agreed. "Higginbotham brings so much to the table, and we're thrilled to be adding their name alongside ours." For Higginbotham, the partnership with Bourg Insurance fortifies our existing footprint within Louisiana and provides significant opportunity for continued growth. "Our company has deep ties in this area, being here as long as we have," Brad explained. "With this alliance, Higginbotham gets a nice footprint throughout South Louisiana." "And they get us," Chuck concluded. "We're not retiring! Quite the opposite. We're looking forward to the future with Higginbotham, serving our clients just as this business has for the past 65 years." About Bourg Insurance Founded in 1958 by Claude 'Toby' Bourg, Jr. and his wife Edith, Bourg Insurance is a personal and commercial property and casualty, life and health insurance agency located in Donaldsonville, Louisiana, with additional offices in Prairieville, Chauvin and Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Now a Higginbotham partner agency, Bourg Insurance is run by Toby and Edith's sons, Brad and Brennan, and son-in-law Chuck Leblanc, as a family- and community-oriented business with a strong emphasis on personal lines and small to middle market companies in the real estate, restaurant and construction sectors, among others. As an agency built on relationships and personal service, Bourg Insurance has won numerous Distinguished Agency awards. About Higginbotham Employee owned and customer inspired, Higginbotham is a single source solution for insurance, financial and HR services. The firm was established in 1948 and ranks by revenue as the nation's 21st largest independent insurance firm. Serving thousands of businesses and individuals through locations coast-to-coast, Higginbotham's approach to finding insurance, employee benefit and risk management solutions is more individual and less institutional. By understanding customer priorities, eliminating inefficiencies and committing to transparency, Higginbotham is a place that leads with values so value leads.

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Insurance Technology

PR Newswire | September 28, 2023

Expert.ai unveiled today its "Enterprise Language Model for Insurance" – ELMI, a cutting-edge innovation in domain trained language models, set to help insurers reach their process automation and digital transformation goals with the highest accuracy. By simplifying and powering the interaction with language data within the expert.ai Platform for Insurance, Insurers can access solutions that scale and take advantage of deep insurance domain expertise combined with the best and most cost-effective attributes of Large Language Models (LLMs) to automate core processes. Through the expert.ai Platform for Insurance, ELMI supports key capabilities, including: Generative Summarization: generate accurate summaries, condensing vast amounts of claim or policy information into concise insights, saving time and accelerating straight through processing or human review activities. Zero Shot Extraction: extract crucial insurance data from structured/unstructured, handwritten/typed, good quality/bad quality sources with accuracy and automatically normalize output formats and add medical annotations such as ICD 9/10 medical codes. Generative Q&A: answer questions quickly so underwriters and claims handlers can extract meaningful insights from proprietary case files by asking questions using natural language queries. Walt Mayo, expert.ai CEO, said: "Delivering on our commitment to innovation and higher level of efficiencies in the insurance sector, ELMI sets a new standard for AI-driven language solutions. As part of the expert.ai Platform for Insurance, ELMI equips insurers with the generative AI tools they need to automate the complex landscape of language-driven processes, while also offering substantial cost savings." Unlike general knowledge large language models, ELMI is: Trained for Insurance: Eliminating the cost and complexity of training language models, ELMI is engineered with a deep understanding of the insurance domain, providing insurers with generative AI capability ready to tackle underwriting and claims processing challenges. Built for the real-world: ELMI is integrated into expert.ai end-to-end insurance solutions to meet the practical challenges of AI at scale across insurance workflows from underwriting to claims. Expert.ai purpose-built approach addresses critical shortcomings of general-purpose language models and brings the power of generative AI to improve accuracy and reduce costs. Cost Optimized: When compared to hosted token-based models, ELMI offers a more cost-effective solution, reducing expenses related to usage, hosting, running, and maintenance, while still delivering superior performance and accuracy. Secure and Compliant: ELMI is designed to ensure compliance with the most stringent governance standards and does not share sensitive insurance data. Cloud-agnostic: Offering the flexibility to deploy on any cloud infrastructure or on-premises, ELMI deployments easily meet insurer's varying requirements. For inquiries, demonstrations, or more information about ELMI, please request a demo. About expert.ai Expert.ai is the leading enterprise AI company solving complex language challenges. Our solutions deliver key information for publishers, streamline operations for insurers, drive revelations for pharmaceutical giants, and enhance customer interactions within financial services – all while automating traditional labor-intensive methods. By combining deep domain expertise with the finest attributes of Large Language Models, Machine Learning, and Symbolic AI, we are at the leading edge of linguistic advancements in hybrid AI. With a global presence in Europe and North America, we proudly serve clients that include AXA XL, Zurich Insurance Group, Generali, Sanofi, EBSCO, The Associated Press, Bloomberg INDG, and Dow Jones. For more information, visit https://www.expert.ai/

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Core Insurance

PR Newswire | October 03, 2023

NSM Insurance Group, a global specialty insurance provider with more than $1.6B in premium across 25+ niche insurance programs, today announced the completion of its acquisition of Envisage International. Based in Neptune Beach, Fla., Envisage is a leading provider of global health and travel insurance plans for international students and cultural exchange participants around the world. "The travel insurance market is booming and will continue to grow at a rapid pace — with the industry predicted to reach $41B by 2027. We plan to seize this market opportunity and become a dominant player in the space," said Bill McKernan, President of NSM Insurance Group. "Envisage is a market leader in international education and cultural exchange insurance with a talented team, strong customer base, established revenue relationships and cutting-edge technology infrastructure. They are an enterprising addition to our portfolio as we look to build our footprint in the international health and travel insurance space." Envisage offers a wide range of international health and travel medical insurance products through its two brands, International Student Insurance (ISI) and Envisage Global Insurance (EGI). ISI serves colleges, universities, ESL programs, study abroad programs, students, teachers and scholars with A+ rated plans and best-in-class resources. EGI is the leading provider of group insurance plans to organizations in the J1 cultural exchange and global youth travel market, offering unparalleled service and custom-built technology to its clients around the world. "We're absolutely thrilled to join forces with NSM to help us continue to grow and scale the business," said Keith Clausen, President of Envisage International. "Over the last two decades, our dedicated and talented team has helped us grow into the force we are today, and we look forward to extending that growth with NSM. NSM has the prowess and proven track record to help ISI and EGI grow by expanding our distribution channels, further enhancing our technology platforms and expanding our global market reach." Over the past 33 years, NSM has developed a winning formula for building the industry's most successful and sustainable insurance programs, consistently outperforming competitors and driving industry-leading growth and profitability over the last four years. This latest acquisition complements NSM's robust portfolio of specialty insurance programs and brands for the commercial P&C industry and consumer insurance — backed by the company's state-of-the-art resources, including IT, operations, marketing, HR and finance. For more information about NSM or for investment opportunities, please visit nsminc.com. About NSM Insurance Group NSM Insurance Group is a global specialty insurance provider, exclusively focused on building successful insurance programs. For more than 30 years, NSM has been committed to delivering industry-specific insurance programs that help agents meet the unique needs of their customers and fuel market growth through innovative development, underwriting, distribution and claims expertise. The company has built more than $1.6 billion in premium across 25+ specialty insurance programs and brands around the world focused on collector cars; pets; social services and behavioral health; addiction treatment; coastal condominiums; towing and garage; trucking; sports and fitness; professional liability for contractors, architects and engineers; habitational; general contractors; medical stop loss and managed care; staffing; and workers' compensation. For more information on NSM, visit nsminc.com. About Envisage International Envisage International Corporation specializes in international health and travel insurance under its two key brands, International Student Insurance (ISI) and Envisage Global Insurance (EGI). With more than 20 years of experience, we take a consultative approach to helping our clients understand their insurance needs, creating customized solutions and providing support every step of the way. With offices in the United States, Mexico, China and Europe, Envisage is well placed to help organizations around the world with their international insurance needs. You can find more information about Envisage, ISI and EGI at envisageinternational.com

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