Residents of Mexico City will tell you that the best spot to take in a view of the city is from the rotating restaurant on top of the World Trade Center, a 52-story high rise in the central part of the city. Others will tell you not to bother, unless enough wind has risen to disperse the smog. What I can tell you from my visit to this area is that the Mexican consumer is as mobile-obsessed as any in the world. Latin America is affected by the same digital trends that are driving insurance innovation and transformation in all markets.
It is this forward-looking attitude that drove Quadient to host our first roundtable event in Mexico City. Focusing on digital transformation for both insurers and financial services, the goal of this event is not only to discuss what trends are affecting the Mexican financial markets, but to see how those trends are affecting the day-to-day lives of what was until a few years ago a very sleepy industry. International competition, new technologies and new entrants are all driving Mexican companies into the same customer-focused transformation that is underway in markets as diverse as the United States and China.
Latin America as a whole is both under-banked and under-insured, with some estimating that only one third of vehicles in Mexico City are insured. This massive new market represents an opportunity and a challenge. Can companies really serve these new digital-first consumers with legacy technology and processes? Will a move to risk-avoidance rather than risk-response push these companies to modernize systems, or is the cost of traditional legacy modernization too high? These are the questions that will drive the industry in the next five years. I am looking forward to seeing how this turns out.