Moving to one-to-one relationships: It's incredible to think about the impact and influence. Cisco predicts$14.4 trillion of value will be "at stake" over the next decade, driven by "connecting the unconnected" through the Internet of Everything (IoE). IoE triggers a 19 trillion dollar global opportunity based upon the growth statistics of more than a 7.2 billion population, with an average of 3.47 devices per person, yielding more than 25 billion IP connected devices all by 2015, growing to 50 billion by 2020. TED Talks keynote speaker, Rick Smolan, author of The Human Face of Big Data, comments, "It's like the earth is growing a nervous system."

How does this impact the insurance industry? On a one-to-one level, customer's cars, houses and human anatomy (e.g. Fit Bit) can all be connected; providing critical information about risk and rewards in real-time. In the distribution channels, it can change the way carriers, agents and brokers conduct business, both virtually and face to face.

The way we connect with each other has changedand the change has happened in a very short period of time. It's no longer just the gen-X'ers with the reflective blue faces looking down at their mobile devices. Today, all customers want to get answers in near real-time, pushing the need for new collaboration capabilities. At the forefront of this rapid growth is video telepresence. How can carriers embrace this new capability? All carriers already have a network infrastructure in place. Carriers can make it far more intelligent by deploying Cisco omnichannel solutions. Now, agents, brokers and CSR's can interact anytime on any device. This is doing business from the customer's point of view by using different ways and technologies to interact.

Securing Mission-Critical Channels:What underpins Cisco's ability to deliver all these services in a secure manner? We help ensure customer confidence and trust by improving productivity and protecting private and sensitive information, which are mission-critical business imperatives. Whether you're an agent, brokerage firm or insurance company, enhancing customer experience in an industry where many of the products are commodities is an essential goal for providing and maintaining a measure of differentiation and customer loyalty. Cisco's recent acquisition of SourceFire platforms, solutions and services protect critical infrastructure and sensitive data with industry-leading threat prevention. Now carriers can know they're in compliance with a multitude of regulatory requirements including GLBA, SOX, Solvency II (ORSA), HIPA and PCI DSS with key security controls, policy enforcement and intelligent automation.

The world around us is moving at an ever increasing technological pace. Connected things, powered by IoE, are changing the way carriers, agents and brokers conduct business, virtually and face-to-face. Having new developments in moving to one-to-one relationships via IoE, rich media applications, the way we connect over distribution channels and securing mission critical channels, should make insurance carriers want to evaluate their network infrastructure.

For more information about Cisco in Insurance visit our solutions page. Join the conversation on Twitter @CiscoFSI using#InternetOfEverything.