You received an email from Karine Caulfield about an innovation project and are surprised to discover that she is actually… an avatar!

We can definitely understand your astonishment (and your questions) at this surprising way of communicating on our part.

• Why do we use an avatar?
  For the first contact, Karine allows us to present an identical face to all contributors, but also to protect the identity of the people in charge of sending emails.
• Why is it a woman?
  The external relations / communication department is managed by two female employees and they wanted to be represented by a female avatar.
• Why not clearly state in the email that Karine is an avatar?
  As humans, we tend to think that if we respond to an avatar, we’ll never get a response back, but at UMI, there is a dedicated team behind Karine making sure we get back to you!