Where AlgoPolis comes from

Paul Bernardski founded AlgoPolis in June 2025. He is from Reims, grew up in Muizon, and had just completed three years of a dual bachelor's degree in history and political science at ICES. He was then studying for a dual bachelor's degree in law and economics in Nancy, along with Graduate Certificates in Digital Innovation from the University of Virginia, and writing for La Revue [DEMOS], where he was deputy editor-in-chief for France.

The association was entered in the Sirene register on August 14, 2025, under the name it still carries there: "Algopolis, conseil et innovation responsable en IA, ESG et politiques publiques" (consulting and responsible innovation in AI, ESG and public policy). The project fit in that name: artificial intelligence, corporate responsibility and public action, seen by someone who came from political science, law and economics.

In the fall of 2025, Paul started a master's in economic and social sciences at Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, and began Graduate Certificates in Business Economics & Public Policy at the University of Pennsylvania. Beneath the subjects of artificial intelligence and public policy, another question took up more and more room: who bears the risk when technology or government fails, and at what price.

The observatory's first articles show the shift. The first, on May 1, 2026, was still about artificial intelligence: the firm facing agentic AI. The second, two weeks later, read the CrowdStrike outage as an accumulation risk for reinsurers; the third dealt with silent cyber, the cyber cover that policies gave without naming it. In three publications, the subject had moved from technology to its insurance.

On July 17, 2026, the association adopted new bylaws, and the observatory set up thematic directorates whose heads were appointed the same day: law and regulation, economics and markets, operations, cyber and artificial intelligence, sustainability and public policy. The last one keeps a trace of the original purpose.

The name changed too. The association is now called "Algopolis, Observatoire en assurance des risques émergents, spéciaux et cyber" (observatory of insurance for emerging, specialty and cyber risks); the change has been accepted in the national directory of associations (RNA), kept by the prefecture of the Marne, and published in the Journal officiel. The word "conseil" (consulting) has left the name: in insurance, it suggests a duty to advise that the observatory does not perform, and its terms of use state in so many words that the association carries out no insurance intermediation.

Paul's path took the same turn. Since July 2026, he has chaired the Economic Affairs committee of Lorraine Junior Conseil; in August, he joined Neuflize OBC on a work-study contract, in performance management for its insurance brokerage business; in the fall, he began the master's in Money, Banking, Finance and Insurance at Paris 1, on the Insurance Strategies, Finance and Risks track.

That day, the course was set. Paul put it this way: "What I want to do is underwrite cyber risk or political risk." The name already carried both trades: algo, the algorithm and the model that serve cyber; polis, the Greek city, root of politics. Where they meet is AlgoPolis's central argument: the war exclusion, the attribution of an attack to a State and the sanction that makes a ransom unlawful are political risk written into a cyber contract.

Six days later, on September 27, the first underwriting note was published: a risk, a decision, its conditions and a review date. Paul signs these notes with his own name, and each one is reviewed later against what actually happened. Explaining well was no longer enough; the point was to decide, and to be open to contradiction by the facts.

An independent applied research observatory on insurance, reinsurance, cyber risk and political risk, published in French and English: articles, dated underwriting notes, a technical glossary, tools and an Academy. Its registered office is in Saint-Brice-Courcelles, in the Marne, on the edge of Reims, where its founder comes from.

If you come across the former name elsewhere, "conseil et innovation responsable en IA, ESG et politiques publiques", it is the same association: the INSEE Sirene register, separate from the prefecture's register, does not yet carry the new one. SIREN 109032185, RNA W513010783.

Other organizations carry a name close to ours; AlgoPolis, the insurance observatory, has no link with any of them.