HONG KONG and SHANGHAI, March 6, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Brand Finance (the "Organizer"), a world-renowned brand consultancy, has recently published "Insurance 100 2018", a ranking of the world's 100 most valuable insurance brands. Ping An Insurance (Group) Company of China, Ltd. (hereafter "Ping An" or the "Group", HKEx: 2318; SSE: 601318) ranks as the world's most valuable insurance brand for the second consecutive year in the global insurance sector. Ping An's brand value soared 60% from USD16,324 million in 2017 to USD26,155 million in 2018.

Brand Finance measured the company's brand value in three areas: brand investment (e.g. products and promotional inputs), brand equity (e.g. customer satisfaction, employee score, credit rating in finance and analyst recommendation, as well as inputs such as score on environmental, community and governance commitment) and brand performance (e.g. historic revenue, historic margin and forecast revenue growth). Ping An achieved excellent results in all three aspects.

Ping An established a two-pronged strategy of "Finance + Technology" in 2017. The strategy helped Ping An increase efficiency, reduce costs, improve experience, enhance risk prevention and improve its services quality through innovation of products, services and technology. It also helped the Group continue to apply mature innovative technologies in an increasingly diversified scenarios, to generate core technologies for output and continuously expand its scope of services.

Based on the five core technologies (biometrics, big data, artificial intelligence, blockchain and cloud computing), Ping An's subsidiaries have introduced various innovative technology services with three major scenarios including customers and users' health, travel and wealth since last year. Leveraging Ping An's "Technological Innovation" and "Speed of Services", the Group has provided users with smart services and an engaging experience. For example, Ping An Property & Casualty debuted the "510 Ultra-speed On-Site City Inspection" and "One-click Arrangement" services in the global industry. All Ping An's customers above the prefecture-level cities can enjoy the experience of completing the entire claims process within 5 to 10 minutes if the on-site inspection of the traffic accident occurs in the daytime. Meanwhile, Ping An Life launched the "AI Customer Services" to intelligently identify customers and their needs, such as online applications for insurance claim settlements, insurance policy information confirmation and beneficiary changes, in order to effectively resolve the issues of slow authentication and settlement in traditional life insurance businesses. In 2017, Ping An's NPS (Net Promoter Score) increased by 28 p.p. to 36% when compared with its debut in 2014.

In recent years, leveraging the competitive advantages in technologies, talents, capital resources, scenarios and data, Ping An draws on the world's leading technological innovations and applications to cooperate with various provinces on the construction of smart cities. The Company assists with government affairs, education, housing properties and environmental protection in order to closely help the government in enhancing the ability of administrative management and the social livelihood across the country, while the Group constantly improves the quality of products and services.

Benefitting from the improvement of services quality and the application of innovative technologies, Ping An has maintained a rapid and healthy development over the years. In the past 15 years, Ping An's total assets, total revenue and net profit maintained a compound growth rate of nearly 30%. Its market capitalization and its brand ranked first among global insurance companies, which reflects the wide recognition of the capital market in its strategy and business value.

In recent years, Ping An actively responded to the national policy of poverty alleviation, giving back to society and national development. Riding on the Group's 30th anniversary, Ping An officially launched the public welfare project, known as the "Three-village Project", in which it has invested RMB10 billion. The "Village Officer Program", "Village Doctor Program" and "Village Teacher Program" make up the three facets of this poverty-reduction, health-enhancement and education-improvement program. The goal of the program is to improve life during this new era in China and build a beautiful countryside.

The Organizer thinks economic pressures have made competition in the sector fierce and this is pushing innovation to drive success. Companies have to boost their business development with innovation, exemplified by Ping An's dominance. Even though it's a challenging environment, Ping An's core market in China remained more dynamic than more established Western markets. Meanwhile, Ping An also gained huge success in core business growth and products cross-selling. In addition, the Group also places high importance on brand development and strategy planning. Ping An is the first Chinese financial firm to deploy a NPS model to track customer feedback and brand loyalty. Brand Finance's CEO David Haigh said, "Ping An's brand is safe and well as the Company celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. The brand's growing market share and excellent financial results speak for themselves."

Ping An expresses its gratitude for its 30 years of development to the opportunities brought by the rapid economic growth and reform of China, as well as the support from the community, shareholders and customers. While celebrating its 30th anniversary, Ping An will focus on "30：Know You Better" and "Embracing the Future With a Thankful Heart" as the main themes to launch activities for the community and customers; and actively promote the "Three-village Project" to support the urbanization of villages. In the era of smart technology, Ping An will adhere to the strategy of "Finance + Technology" to continue enhancing the innovations of FinTech and HealthTech, and actively participating in the construction of smart cities, fulfilling community responsibility and making the life of citizens better.

Brand Finance is the world's leading independent branded business valuation and strategy consultancy. Every year it values several thousand brands across the world. Its annual "Global 500 Most Valuable Brands" and "Global 100 Most Valuable Insurance Brands" are the only rankings to be accredited as ISO compliant brand valuations and are highly authoritative across the globe. In "Insurance 100 2018", the Top 5 companies on the list are Ping An, Allianz, China Life, AXA and AIA.

SOURCE Ping An Insurance (Group) Company of China, Ltd.