Kahane Yehuda, Prof.

Short Biography

Prof. Kahane is active in both the academic and business areas. He is a professor in the Faculty of Management, and the Porter School of Environmental Studies, Tel-Aviv University. He is the inductee of the prestigious 2011 John S. Bickley Founder's Award: a Gold Medal for Excellence, for his significant, pioneering and lasting contribution to the theory, practice and education in the insurance and risk management world. The award was conferred on him by the International Insurance Society, in Toronto. He was also  awarded in November 2011 by the Israeli insurance industry for his life time achievements in the area, at the annual Adif Conference on Social Security and Pension .

Over more than 40 years, Dr. Kahane has taught at universities around the Globe, including the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the University of Florida, the University of Toronto, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Texas at Austin, and numerous other institutions. He established and directed the CLU (Israel) program. He was the founding dean of the first BA in Insurance program in Israel (The Academic School of Insurance, now Netanya Academic College). In addition, he organized and lectured in hundreds of seminars and conferences and presented a large number of courses around the world. He has served on the boards of the major academic journals in insurance.

Dr. Kahane, the author of several books and numerous articles, was ranked among the most prolific researchers in insurance (JRI, June 1990). The recent book , Risk Management for Enterprises and Individuals , 2009 (coauthored with E. Baranoff and P. Brockett, Flat World Knowledge) is becoming the leading textbook in the area. His studies in risk management, and his practical business experience, led him to realize the importance and urgency of the environmental risks issues, therefore he is extending his efforts mainly to this direction. In the late 1960s he was among the pioneers that applied multiple regressions for insurance rate-making. In the early 1970s he developed the concept of balancing assets and liabilities of financial intermediaries, in works that are still quoted 30 years later. These studies laid the foundations of theories of insurance rate making, solvency, insurance- regulation, and to the vast area which is now known as ERM - Enterprise Risk Management. He has major contributions to the theory and practice of loss reserving, agriculture and crop insurance, and the use of data mining in insurance. He was the pioneer of technological forecasting and "futurology" in Israel in the 1960s.

Prof Kahane has also a rich entrepreneurial experience. He is a co-founder, director, and major shareholder in Ituran Location and Control, traded on NASDAQ (ITRN) and on the major list of TASE. He is highly involved in the formation and management of start-up companies in a variety of advanced and high-tech areas, specializing in seed money investments. He owns the Weizman Hi-Tech Incubator, and is a co-owner of Capital Point Ltd. (traded on TASE) which owns Ofakim and Kazrin technological incubators. He was a co-initiator of the concept of "new" balanced pension funds in Israel, and was the co-founder and co-owner of the first fund that became the fourth largest in Israel. In addition he is involved in many voluntary activities (e.g., Chairman of the Association of Visually Impaired People in Sharon District, the PIBF - Palestinian International Business Forum, The Israel - Brazil Chamber of commerce, etc.).

He started his business career in a large multinational corporation, and in the management of various businesses. In addition he served as a consultant on risk management, insurance and actuarial and financial topics to the government, large organizations, and major companies both in Israel and internationally. Dr. Kahane has served on the Israeli Insurance Council and on several government committees on a variety of insurance topics.

Dr. Kahane earned a B.A. in Economics and Statistics,1965, an M.A. in Business Administration, cum laude, 1967 andPh.D. in Finance, 1973 from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.He is a life and non-life actuary.

He has served as an associate editor of the leading journals on risk and insurance. He has taught courses in technological forecasting (the first teacher of this subject in Israel), finance, insurance, risk management and actuarial topics. His research focus is on the portfolio implications for insurance, rate-making, automobile insurance, natural hazards, pension and life insurance, reserving, and environmental risks.