We met for the first time in the past century, in 1981, during the International Six Days Enduro. We then followed our separate paths, which had a few commonalities. Franck has been a visionary when it comes to insurance products for two-wheeled motor vehicles. Having come up with a specific premium structure for a few of his friends who enjoyed enduro, 50 years later there's 800,000 of them... I call that progress! This accomplishment is connected with his passion for the sport, the way he establishes support and communication networks centered on the riders they choose as ambassadors of the brand AMV. Among them, I can single out Stéphane Peterhansel, “Monsieur Dakar”, 14-time record winner in the motorcycle and car categories. And more recently they've supported the early career of Fabio Quartararo, a revelation in MotoGP. His choices have always demonstrated forethought. Franck is a loyal man, a quality that seems scarcer in the world today. He is also a great company leader riding the waves of modernity.

If I had to say anything about Franck, I’d begin by telling you that you’ll seldom have the chance to meet anybody as engaging, or a visionary quite like him. I met him at the Dakar over twenty years ago and, between then and now, we’ve shared a number of extraordinary moments and circumstances. When we got acquainted he was sharing adventures with an exceptional group of motor sports aficionados. I especially recall his rapport with two larger-than-life personalities, like Jean-Claude Olivier, a very good friend of his, and also Claude Michy, a genius with whom Franck participated in major projects. But if you go back to the beginning of his career, you see Franck both as a driver and an entrepreneur. Two paths and two ways to succeed at what he did, and most people don't even realize that he participated in the 24h Paris racing event and brought home victories in teams that included Stéphane Peterhansel among 20 others. I must say that Franck has always been at my side for special occasions, notably when I enjoyed my two wins at the Dakar — the first one on a motorcycle in 2004, and ten years later in the car category. And it gives me great pleasure to have been the first person, the first athlete to bear the AMV logo in Spain when the Iberian venture was in its inception and we didn't even have AMV offices in our country. Franck's proposal, becoming a brand ambassador for a brand taking its first steps, was a masterstroke that benefited the both of us. A few months later, I won my first Dakar prize while representing AMV, in association with Repsol, and this was an unexpected yet impactful launch, as it was the very first time a Spanish driver got a Dakar win. Franck's vision is prodigious and his presence, invaluable. I've had the privilege of benefiting from his daily monitoring of the track throughout Dakar 2014, where I won in the car category. Franck is everywhere, and capable of successfully managing a great organization while thoroughly planning his next moto or bike adventure.

Franck is an extraordinary man who came to insurance following family tradition, but he would have been successful in any other sector. Passionate about motor sports, but above all an adept weaver of authentic human relationships, Franck represents the 21st-century gentleman, at once capable of grasping nuanced societal matters and their complex interconnections and the great stakes in the world of business and economics. As committed to his own company as he is to the rest of the entrepreneurial community in France, he always spares some time helping younger generations save time. I met him 30 years ago now, when I myself was about thirty. He would be twenty years my senior. The man I met was immersed in his profession and eager to train me in the ways of insurance, mostly coach me as to the expectations of industrial clients. I remember when I was engrossed in technical details and he would remind me of the spirit of the contract, of its character as expression of a partnership, without which it can't maintain a relationship over the long term. In that vein, eager to pass his company down to his son, he's never neglected an opportunity to patiently introduce Grégory to the world of major brokers and fine businesses. No matter what role or responsibility I undertook at AXA, I’ve always seen in Franck a man looking to do good and filled with the kind of confidence that our profession requires. His firm, and all those he's aided, be they customer or partner, they owe him a great deal.

AMV is a company that conveys a true feeling of closeness, whether you're dealing with Franck or anybody else who works with him. For me, that's what sets it apart from other businesses and humanizes it. When I signed with AMV, I was making my start as a driver. I had the good fortune of finding a steadfast sponsor who remained with me for my whole career. Franck followed us more than once to the Morocco and Dakar rallies. Out in the desert, I thought of this entire company behind him, and he'd left it back in France so he could be at my side. It's hard to find that human touch with companies of a scale comparable to AMV’s. There are sponsors who will take you very far because, among all the other great names, they saw something in you. That's what happened between me and AMV.

I first met Franck when he came to London with his wife Corinne and Grégory in the early 1980s to spend some time at my old firm Sedgwick (now Marsh). We got on very well and it was a pleasure to introduce Franck to the London insurance market and Lloyd’s of London. His time in London was not long enough but established the friendships that always flourish in the insurance market and also on a personal basis with me and my family. This was the beginning of his emergence as a major player in the market. Filhet-Allard was well known as a family-owned broker with a strong reputation. What Franck has succeeded in doing with his ability, charm and business and sporting connections is to build a unique brand. It is innovative and hugely successful. The fact that Franck has been able to achieve this during a time of unprecedented global expansion is testimony to his unique ability to see an opportunity and seize it. We congratulate him on his achievements and thank him for all he has contributed. Most importantly we value our friendship.

As my career evolved I was fortunate to meet the founders of exceptional companies, a sizable number of CAC 40 bosses, and directors of family-owned investment holding companies ranking among the most vibrant in Europe or North America. Every single one had larger-than-life personalities and they fascinated me. They all are quite different, and precious few entrepreneurs eventually transcend each of these categories and create corporate groups able to survive across generations. It is clear to me that Franck Allard has excelled as an entrepreneur by the mere fact of creating AMV, whose business model is ground-breaking in a somewhat conservative and standard-bound trade as is insurance broking, a business his family had engaged in for generations. Franck is abundantly gifted with enthusiasm, clear-sightedness, perseverance and pragmatism, qualities indispensable to any major entrepreneur. But he is likely possessed with the warmth and humanity without which no ambitious project would motivate staff and delight customers. As all his peers do, he is rightly wary of the functional complexity of major corporate groups which makes you forget the two drivers in value creation: your team and the market. Under the second category, which is about managing diverse companies of considerable size, company heads must of necessity give time to the human and humane, financial and legal structuring of their group. Franck has accepted this, unlike many other entrepreneurs in the first category, who’ve not been able to keep up with their company as it grew, and thus led it to extinction or absorption by larger players. At present, Franck has put in place all of the more abstract management tools and strengthened function teams (finance, customer relations, IT) required to keep the Filhet-Allard group on its course. Finally, having worked with him professionally for almost two decades, I have seen him develop a concern for the future of the family company. As always, Franck has tackled this challenge, which is difficult and often painful for an entrepreneur, with clear-sightedness and pragmatism. With his son Grégory, he defined familial succession and hired a new generation of managers to head the group's major business lines. He’s advanced evolution in the familial ownership structure and the articles of association that ensure consistency. He now ponders the proper functioning of the link between family shareholders and operational management of the company, what people now call "governance", 24 which guarantees the sustainability of his group. In doing so, Franck Allard offers proof of the qualities necessary to the third category of directors I’ve mentioned, a rare thing, and entirely worthy of our admiration.