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Insurance is a maze. Don’t get lost. Mark Geoghegan asks directions from all the top people in the Global Insurance and Reinsurance Industry
Episodes
Tuesday Aug 30, 2022
Tuesday Aug 30, 2022
Today’s guest is a former Microsoft, CIA and Goldman Sachs employee who, perhaps unsurprisingly, has found his way to somewhere very close to the top of the Cyber Insurance tree in the past few years.
With a billion dollars in run-rate GWP after just five years, major VC funding, aggressive international expansion plans and now a newly-acquired US admitted carrier, Coalition and its CEO Joshua Motta have quite a story to tell.
With his deep cyber security background it was likely that Coalition was going to build something very different from incumbent insurers and indeed the firm’s offering is much more of a joined-up full service than many of its competitors.
As Joshua puts it, Coalition “owns the repair shop” and that helps an awful lot with risk engineering and loss mitigation. And so far the results have been excellent.
The grand tour of the Coalition modus operandi is really interesting but it is when the conversation spreads to more weighty industry topics that I think this podcast really takes off.
Joshua has some really strong views about how fears around systemic risk in cyber have been overblown and how to unlock the capacity that cyber will need if it is to continue its fast growth without hitting capacity constraints.
Now you may say that he would say that, but now that Coalition is funding more of its own underwriting, Joshua is clearly happy to put his money where his mouth is. Coalition is also putting some of its own modelling work out on open source to help others get comfortable with its view of risk.
I definitely recommend a listen for anyone nervous about committing capital to cyber reinsurance for fear of earth-shattering systemic risk – the counter-arguments made here are pretty convincing.
LINKS
Here is the announcement about Coalition buying Admitted lines carrier Digital Affect Insurance Company
This coincided with our podcast recording and as you will hear, it was definitely news to me. With hindsight I should have probed a lot more. Next time!
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Friday Aug 26, 2022
Friday Aug 26, 2022
Today we are going to be doing something completely different.
We’re not going to talk about insurance.
Regular listeners will know that AdvantageGo has been a great supporter of the Voice of Insurance since the early days of the podcast.
But you might not have known that this excellent technology company is also an important backer of UK military charity, ABF The Soldiers’ Charity.
AdvantageGo is an associate Sponsor of The Soldiers’ Charity’s Annual fundraiser, the Lord Mayor’s Big Curry lunch at the Guildhall in London, which is a fixture attended and supported by many in the London Insurance market.
It’s the Soldiers’ Charity’s work we want to showcase here, particularly a highly successful programme the charity funds in the field of pain management.
So I’m going to introduce two services veterans, Russ Kirby (pictured bottom right) and Bernie O’Toole (top right) who have both been through the programme.
Russ is a Navy veteran and Bernie was in the Army.
You may find parts of their accounts distressing, but I would encourage you to continue because you will be rewarded with a great story of empowerment and optimism.
The pain management programme has given them their lives back and you will feel their positive energy as they recount drastically reducing the painkillers, or dispensing with them entirely and regaining the confidence and optimism to look forward to productive and satisfying future lives.
As Bernie says – the programme works and it’s worth its weight in gold.
NOTES
For worldwide listeners, B&Q is a major UK DIY store.
LINKS
If you want to get more closely involved with ABF The Soldiers' Charity, please contact Katy Wildman on kwildman@soldierscharity.org
or email lmbc@soldierscharity.org
Please donate if you can here:
The Lord Mayor’s Big Curry Lunch website: https://events.soldierscharity.org/event/lmpjbc-2022?lightbox=/event/lmpjbc-2022/donate
Or here:
ABF The Soldiers’ Charity website: https://soldierscharity.org/donate/make-donation/
SSAFA is the Armed Forces charity.
Russ also mentions other UK Armed Services charities The Poppy Factory and Help for Heroes
Russ’s private business is called Russ Mounts Stuff
We thank AdvantageGo for organising this very special podcast:
https://www.advantagego.com/
Tuesday Aug 23, 2022
Tuesday Aug 23, 2022
Today’s guest is someone I’m delighted to be welcoming back to the podcast after just under two years.
Back then he was the relatively new CEO at Hannover Re and some of my questioning probed what sort of things he might do differently from his predecessors.
Now into his fourth year in charge and Jean-Jacques Henchoz is the seasoned boss of a reinsurer that has not skipped a beat since its leadership transition.
Very strong growth has continued and results have been excellent.
In the first question in this podcast I dared ask if Hannover Re’s growth streak could continue now that the already 3rd largest reinsurance group in the world is far closer to the number two spot than the number four is to it.
The answer was a very frank “yes for now” and that set the tone for everything that was to follow.
I learned a lot about a huge range of topics, including views on the Ukraine war, Florida, resurgent inflation and the prospects for Cyber ILS.
I also discovered how the strong growth environment has created the conditions that have made Covid reinsurance disputes far fewer in number than we thought they might have been two years ago.
Jean-Jacques is clearly at the top of his game and I couldn’t recommend this episode more highly as not only a crystal-clear view into the reinsurance industry’s standout performer of the past fifteen years, but a really useful primer for the autumn conference season and the testing end of year renewals to come.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Sunday Aug 07, 2022
Sunday Aug 07, 2022
Today’s guest is Sean McGovern CEO, UK & Lloyd’s at AXA XL.
Sean was first on the show a year and a half ago when he was less than a year into his first industry CEO role.
When we last spoke he was in the middle of a root-and-branch remediation of AXA XL’s book, the severity of which had taken many by surprise.
As a senior Lloyd’s executive and spokesperson Sean had been in the public eye for many years, so everyone knew he would be able to handle that side of the job.
But if anyone had any doubts about his ability to lead a tough underwriting turnaround, they were dispelled as AXA XL’s Syndicate 2003 posted a vintage 75% combined ratio in 2021 – that’s a 59-point improvement on the previous year.
I think the difference between the two podcasts is palpable. Here is a confident and forward-looking executive with growth on his mind in all areas of his business.
As a result this is a really positive discussion with one of Lloyd’s largest players about today’s opportunities as well as the major issues affecting the London Market as a whole.
I can highly recommend a listen.
NOTES
A couple of abbreviations:
AIRMIC stands for the Association of Insurance and Risk Managers in Industry and Commerce and is the UK’s Risk Manager trade body.
NZIA stands for the Net-Zero Insurance Alliance, a global industry body which has been convened by the UN.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Friday Jul 29, 2022
Friday Jul 29, 2022
Today’s guest is the sort of reinsurance broker I’d want out broking for me in this tough and difficult to call market.
Simon Hedley CEO of Acrisure Re Group is a real broker’s broker. What you see is what you get. By his own admission he is someone not averse to rolling up his sleeves and getting out into the market.
He is really down to earth and straight talking. But don’t let this demeanour confuse you – just because he doesn’t talk in management speak it doesn’t mean he doesn’t think deeply about the market and strategy.
He’s as sharp as a razor and can see the big strategic picture. He is also really good at explaining his vision in language that people like you and me can understand.
Acrisure Re is in a really interesting position. It’s owned by a massive and growing US retail broking network and a big part of its role is to connect up capital and analytics with the distribution and technological muscle of its parent.
It’s also at the forefront of the current boom in hybrid carriers and MGAs because it is a major supplier of reinsurance capital to support this expansive sector.
All this means our talk gives you everything you need to know about the capital and reinsurance markets and how their changing moods can affect everything else along the insurance value chain.
NOTES:
A few JV abbreviations in this one. A JV is a Joint Venture.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Tuesday Jul 26, 2022
Tuesday Jul 26, 2022
Today’s guest is Clive Buesnel CEO of Tysers.
Tysers is one of the oldest broking brands at Lloyd’s, with a history going back 200 years.
But the Tysers of today is the product of a lot of recent M&A activity involving the UK arm of Integro and London Wholesaler RFIB, all of which has agreed to be acquired by Australasian broking group AUB.
Clive’s background is not as a broker, but as a financial services professional who has spent a career serving the insurance market.
He is disarmingly open about this and immediately describes his role as one of an enabler who allows his brokers to be brilliant.
And in a market where investment in technology and multi-skilled teams finding new ways of doing business are key to unlocking value, everything that Clive says makes enormous sense.
As management and broking are recognised as two separate skills and as brokers become much larger and far more complex entities, far fewer of the brokers of the future are likely to be run by career brokers.
But business acumen and technical ability aside, it is Clive’s energy that comes across in this podcast.
Tysers is a firm that has been through a lot, but with integration complete and an ambitious new owner behind the group, the overriding impression is of an energised business excited to get to grips with new insurance problems.
Clive is concise and direct and that means we cover a large number of topics and detail in a relatively short time. After a listen you should get a really clear idea of how Tysers will develop as a broker in the coming years.
See if you find his enthusiasm as infectious as I did.
NOTES
The AUB takeover of Tysers is pending regulatory approval.
iMRC does indeed stand for the Intelligent Market Reform Contract, that is to say the latest digital iteration of the London Market placing Slip.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Tuesday Jul 19, 2022
Tuesday Jul 19, 2022
Today’s guest is Waleed Jabsheh President at International General Insurance (IGI)
Waleed and IGI have a really interesting story to tell.
IGI is the twenty-year growth story of a very small regional insurance business founded in Jordan that over time has fully internationalised, re-domiciled to Bermuda and is now present in the major international insurance hubs.
It is A-rated by AM Best and S&P and now employs around three hundred staff writing 25 lines.
It produces underwriting profits that would be the envy of all but the very best players in our business.
Finally, the business listed on the Nasdaq two years ago.
Were this a company with different origins I think we would be quicker to celebrate its achievements. But at the moment the market is sceptical.
But as I’m guessing Waleed would probably put it – we are who we are and it is what it is.
This interview gives a strong idea of what makes this close-knit business tick.
Waleed is meticulous and thoughtful in his responses and is excellent company.
Here is a firm with a patient strategy that is happy to stay out of the limelight and quietly get on with its business with the confidence that at some point it will eventually get more attention and win greater recognition.
It makes for a very interesting thirty minutes.
NOTES
When Waleed refers to ‘here’ he means London, which is where we did the interview.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Friday Jul 15, 2022
Friday Jul 15, 2022
Today’s guest is Miles Wuller, President and CEO of Ryan Specialty Underwriting Managers, the underwriting arm of Ryan Specialty.
As such Miles is responsible for more than 20 MGUs, offering more than 150 lines of business and employing around 550 staff in 27 offices who wrote $2.4bn of Gross Premium in 2021.
This means he has a fantastic view of the market and where all its pressure points are to be found.
A listen to this podcast will definitely get you right up to speed with all the cut and thrust of US and international specialist lines.
But Miles is also a great business builder and manager and in our chat we really get to the heart of the Ryan Specialty modus operandi.
For instance, how does Miles keep an incredibly diverse business with multiple brands, housing a huge variety of underwriting entrepreneurs within a core strategic Ryan Specialty identity and culture?
Very few executives have to maintain and incentivise innovation and creativity on such a scale while at the same time keeping on top of all the compliance and reporting demands of a major unit of a fast-growing public company.
Miles exudes a calm competence at every turn and it is abundantly clear that he thinks really deeply about the industry.
For instance his thoughts on the effects of inflation on the sector, cyber insurance, his business’s relationship with technology, and the burgeoning hybrid carrier phenomenon are highly insightful. And that’s just to mention four topics among many more.
Suffice to say that I learnt an awful lot during this interview and I think that you will too.
NOTES:
A couple of property abbreviations:
TIV=Total Insured Values. SOV=Statement of Values
Also a request. If anyone can tell me any significant difference between a Managing General Agent (MGA) and a Managing General Underwriter (MGU), please let me know. After 30 years of head-scratching, I think they are completely interchangeable transatlantic versions of each other.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Tuesday Jul 12, 2022
Tuesday Jul 12, 2022
It's been two years since I had the CEO of Oneglobal Mike Reynolds on the show.
Back then he had just joined and was articulating a vision to build a global specialty broker under the newly-created Oneglobal banner.
They always say that no battleplan survives to the first shots of war, so I was really keen to find out how the business had executed on its plan and how it may have iterated its vision in that time.
In that 24-month period the specialist broking world has seen more than its fair share of M&A activity and I wanted to put that into context.
I found Mike on top form and incredibly candid and lucid about the market and exactly where he sees Oneglobal fitting into it. He outlined the business’s organic build and how some of the firm’s early investments are starting to pay off.
Our chat contains some great discussions, not least about sky-high broker valuations and intermediaries’ sometimes difficult relationships with the public markets,
But we also spoke about ESG, culture change, technological reform and team-building in broking culture, to name just very few.
Brokers are often run by visionaries who need someone else to come and make the vision work to the best of its potential.
Mike brings a CEO’s strong vision but tempered with a CFO’s practical experience and in our sector that is quite a rare phenomenon.
That’s why I commend this episode to anyone who really wants to learn how to build a specialty broker in today’s market.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Tuesday Jul 05, 2022
Tuesday Jul 05, 2022
Jonathan Zaffino, President of Ascot Group is one of the industry’s great thinkers
Ascot is one of the Lloyd’s Market’s most successful underwriting outfits of the last 20 years and Jonathan is leading that group’s expansion into the key US market.
But his style of expansion is not an aggressive kind that pursues growth by taking big bets.
It is a far more nuanced and subtle approach and one that recognises some of the big secular changes that have taken place in the insurance market over the last two decades.
Behind the detail in our discussion lots of big themes are lurking.
I enjoy how our conversation can start with specifics on trends in areas such as delegated authority but quickly change gear and end up encompassing much loftier themes such as the disaggregation of the insurance value chain as a whole and the advent of new far more mercurial forms of capital provision.
Ascot is a business with a strong identity and market presence and we talk about how the firm is looking to distil and preserve that culture as it grows, evolves and seeks new ownership in a fast-changing market.
Listening back the most common word Jonathan uses in this podcast is Candidly.
And that is apparent all the way through our discussion. This is what he really thinks about the challenges and opportunities in the market today.
Learning what the market’s finest minds really think about the world is what this podcast is all about, so I can highly recommend this episode to anyone seeking inspiration and enlightenment.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Friday Jun 24, 2022
Friday Jun 24, 2022
Today’s guest is someone I first met almost thirty years ago.
In the intervening time he has had a glittering career, most of which has been on the underwriting side of the fence with senior roles at QBE, Brit and most recently at Gallagher’s Pen Underwriting MGA.
But now Jonathan Turner is the CEO at Gallagher Specialty UK, he is firmly on the broking side of the box for the first time in his career.
In this lively podcast we get to the heart of what is a really vigorous and fascinating market.
A market which is managing to be both very hard and very competitive at the same time, depending hugely on line of business and territory.
This is also a newly confident market that is in growth mode and not lacking in capital resources in any meaningful way.
Gallagher was an early mover in the long wave of London Market wholesale broking consolidation, the highwater mark of which we have been seeing lately, and we discuss how this phenomenon has affected market dynamics.
We also reflect on what an underwriter’s experience can bring to running a broker, along with the prospects for market modernisation, not just in technology but in cultural and behavioural change too.
Jon’s really smart and is very straight talking throughout our encounter.
As a consequence, there are an awful lot of really good things packed into a relatively short period of time.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank this Episode’s advertising supporter Oxbow Partners
https://oxbowpartners.com/
Tuesday May 24, 2022
Tuesday May 24, 2022
Innovation. We keep reading about it. We keep getting harangued at conferences to do more of it.
We also keep getting told that Innovation is really hard to do in insurance.
But is it? After all, innovation used to happen perfectly naturally and organically in the past.
It’s only in the last decade that we have started to take the business of innovation seriously and given it its own department and made people responsible and accountable for making it happen.
What have we learnt so far?
Meet today’s guest, Tom Hoad. Tom is Head of Innovation at Tokio Marine Kiln (TMK) and has been in the role since late 2015.
That’s a lot of accumulated knowledge about how to go about implanting new ideas into insurance.
Tom is bursting with energy and enthusiasm and this podcast packs a huge amount of learning into a very short time.
We start the conversation by running through one of TMK’s latest product launches in the clean energy space. This is a really great sounding idea and is what brought Tom to my attention again recently and reminded me to get him on the show.
But soon the discussion develops into a really broad one that harnesses all that Tom has learnt about the art and science of bringing exciting new insurance products to market.
It’s full of mind-expanding and very useful bits of knowledge that Tom has learnt from six-and-a-half years at the bleeding edge.
Anyone who wants to improve their innovation hit rate will find this a fascinating and really useful listen.
NOTES
I let BAU slip through the Abbreviation filter. This stands for Business As Usual.
We talk at the beginning about the Altelium battery warranty insurance deal. Here is the announcement in full
We also mention Parametrix cloud outage insurance.
The Episode with George Beattie of Beazley is Number 117. I’d recommend listening to these two episodes in conjunction with each other.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
Tuesday May 17, 2022
Tuesday May 17, 2022
Today’s guest is someone very respected in the industry but who hasn’t spent much time in the limelight – until recently that is.
Ariel Re’s CEO Ryan Mather now represents part of the significant new capital that has come into the sector since the global market turn accelerated in the last couple of years.
Ariel Re is a specialist looking to be an expert and add value wherever it decides to deploy its capital. It is also highly diverse with divisions insuring clean energy, cyber and professional lines as well as operating in the more traditional property cat arena.
What seems to set it apart is a willingness to move towards risks that others are running away from. This obviously takes an open mind and the confidence to invest in the sort of expertise that will give the firm the comfort to issue terms where others won’t.
That all points to a business and a leadership team that is very much out of the ordinary.
I think this podcast will give you a good idea of how Ariel Re sets about this difficult task and help you start to get to know someone whose industry profile is likely to rise significantly in coming years.
Ryan is clearly very smart but he’s far from being dry or academic.
He’s very amiable and refreshing company and I can highly recommend a listen
NOTES
One abbreviation that slipped through is SBF, which is Lloyd's shorthand for Syndicate Business Forecast, and an essential part of the market's planning process.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank our advertiser Anaplan and Conor Donohoe and Daniel Ellis for coming on the show to explain what Anaplan's platform does for the insurance sector.
Email contacts:
conor.donohoe@anaplan.com
daniel.ellis@mentattechnology.co.uk
Tuesday May 10, 2022
Tuesday May 10, 2022
Today’s guest is one of the elder statemen of the Cyber insurance market and a returning guest to the show.
Way back in Episode 10 of the Voice of Insurance AXIS’s Global Head of Cyber Dan Trueman made a prediction that the Cyber market was on the cusp of big change and that Cyber insurance would never be sold more cheaply than it was back then.
Two years and 111 Episodes later and the hard Cyber market that followed Dan’s comments has rarely been out of the news.
I’d use today’s episode as a really good example of the difference between a podcast and a recorded interview.
That’s because, instead of being just a series of questions and answers, this encounter is very much a conversation, and a lively one at that!
Anyone looking for an update on the highly-pressurised cyber space should look no further.
We talk about the re-pricing the sector has gone through and when this might end, loss trends and what cyber criminals are getting up to as well as advances in modelling systemic risk and the potential for unlocking the capital the class is definitely going to need if it is going to meet rising demand without starting to hit supply constraints.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank our advertiser Anaplan and Conor Donohoe and Daniel Ellis for coming on the show to explain what Anaplan's platform does for the insurance sector.
Email contacts:
conor.donohoe@anaplan.com
daniel.ellis@mentattechnology.co.uk
Tuesday May 03, 2022
Tuesday May 03, 2022
Today’s guest runs a very large Lloyd’s business that in the past seven years has perhaps been the poster child for many of the problems in the London market as a whole.
This is a previously star business that lost its way.
It has had to retrench, contract and remediate to re-discover itself in the past three years.
Johan Slabbert is the CEO of MS Amlin and has been at the Lloyd’s carrier for two years and in the CEO role for 18 months.
He is a seasoned executive, into his third decade of experience and gives the impression of someone who is a very solid and safe pair of hands.
He is also very likeable, very transparent and exudes trustworthiness.
Our discussion is very frank and sometimes almost blunt. I find this really healthy, and feel lucky that we can have this conversation at all.
Now that MS Amlin is beginning to emerge from darker times and has posted a profit for the first time in many years, Johan permits himself an occasional glance towards potentially better prospects ahead.
But the roots are very firmly planted in the ground.
As a consequence I don’t think you will hear a more honest assessment of the state of the market and the opportunities and challenges it presents anywhere else.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank our advertiser Anaplan and Conor Donohoe and Daniel Ellis for coming on the show to explain what Anaplan's platform does for the insurance sector.
Email contacts:
conor.donohoe@anaplan.com
daniel.ellis@mentattechnology.co.uk
Friday Apr 29, 2022
Friday Apr 29, 2022
Today’s episode brings together a trio of London Market leaders.
Sheila Cameron is the CEO of the Lloyd’s Market Association (the LMA) and was the guest on the very first Episode of the Voice of Insurance.
Clyde Bernstein is the Head of Broking Technology at WTW, as well as being its Head of Broking in Great Britain. Clyde appeared in Episode 63, which was all about the broker of the future.
Completing the line-up is someone who I have wanted to get on the show for a long time as he is a strong, really well-known exceptionally bright and eloquent executive who always has an interesting view of the market.
Paul Jardine is an Actuary, the former Chief Actuary and Commutations Director of Lloyd’s run-off vehicle Equitas and was one of Stephen Catlin’s top executives for over 15 years.
He currently has multiple interests, the most prominent of which is that of Non-executive Chairman of Lloyd’s turnkey Managing Agency Asta.
But what unites my three guests is that they are all members of the recently formed Data Council, chaired by Sheila, which has been brought together by overarching London trade body the London Market Group (LMG) to drive the digitisation of the Market.
This episode gets to the heart of what the Data Council is and what it is tasked with doing
It also dissects the Council’s first major achievement which has been to codify the Core Data Record (or CDR) which will be the building block for making London Market contracts fully computable.
Sheila, Clyde and Paul are a lively group and this podcast is a really good way to get up to speed for anyone who may sometimes find the reform process in the London Market difficult to follow.
Enjoy the Podcast
NOTES and THANKS
Sheila used an abbreviation, the GRLC, which I should have clarified at the time. This stands for global digital insurance data standards body ACORD’s Global Reinsurance and Large Commercial standard.
There is also a mention of the Rushlikon Initiative, which is a longstanding global standards and process efficiency drive backed by ACORD, WTW, Swiss Re and many other major market participants.
We thank today’s sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
Tuesday Apr 26, 2022
Tuesday Apr 26, 2022
Today’s guest is someone I have been meaning to get on the show since this podcast started over two years ago.
That’s because he is one of the smartest and most eloquent executives anywhere in the sector.
We overuse the word pioneer but Michael Millette has made a career out of innovating at the highest end of our business.
He and a handful of others created the ILS market out of nothing in the mid-1990s.
Then after two incredibly successful decades at Goldman Sachs, in 2016 he launched Hudson Structured Capital Management.
Hudson Structured is a pretty unique business because it is combining alternative asset management and finance with venture capital.
I can’t think of another business in insurance with such eclectic tastes. It can get involved in the sector from so many angles and at so many points in the value chain.
It’s fascinating and very liberating.
Mike has an incredibly broad and deep understanding of the insurance and reinsurance sector, all the way up from the first dollar of personal lines premium to the last cat bond bought by a long-term investor.
He is also fun and outspoken and is never afraid to take an unambiguous view on topics.
In this podcast we cover a huge variety of subject matter, from the mid-year cat renewals to ABC which is Mike’s shorthand for ‘All But Cat”!
For me he’s one of those people who make you feel like your IQ just went up a few points after you have spent some time in their company.
So I won’t come between you and enlightenment any longer.
Enjoy the podcast
NOTES
I let one abbreviation get through the interview unexplained. That was CR/I, which is short for Catastrophe Reinsurance.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank our advertiser Anaplan and Conor Donohoe and Daniel Ellis for coming on the show to explain what Anaplan's platform does for the insurance sector.
Email contacts:
conor.donohoe@anaplan.com
daniel.ellis@mentattechnology.co.uk
The views expressed reflect the current views of Hudson Structured Capital Management Ltd. (“HSCM”) as of the date hereof and HSCM undertakes no responsibility to advise you of any changes. Neither the podcast nor any of the information contained herein constitutes an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any security or instrument in or to participate in any trading strategy or investment vehicle.
Past performance is not indicative of future results. There can be no assurance that any objectives can be achieved or are realistic in any given market condition.
This podcast may contain forward-looking statements; such statements are subject to various risks and uncertainties. Forward-looking statements reflect our views as of such date with respect to possible future events. Actual results could differ -- perhaps materially -- from those in the forward-looking statements.
For more information about HSCM, including risks and other disclosures, please refer to www.hscm.com.
Friday Apr 22, 2022
Friday Apr 22, 2022
Wow.
Wow is not a word we use very much in insurance. But this special episode is full of moments where the perfectly logical response is to say “Wow!”
For instance:
Did you know the insurance industry had a fast-growing fleet of private satellites at its disposal, capable of giving 100% global coverage? Wow.
Did you know those satellites can see in the dark and through cloud, smoke and dust? Wow.
Did you know they orbit the earth multiple times a day, giving you near real-time information and they can also make incredibly accurate measurements down to the millimetre? Wow.
Did you know that the physical and intellectual property behind this network has been developed and is owned by ICEYE itself? Wow.
Over the past couple of decades we have become used to applying satellite imagery in property insurance. We also all knew that satellite technology had come a long way because of miniaturisation and a massive reduction in cost.
But until now I don’t think we had realised quite how far things had progressed and what possibilities this could open up for the insurance sector.
Today I am talking to Global Head of Insurance Stephen Lathrope about micro-satellite and data and insurance insights and solutions business ICEYE and its plans for the industry.
A few minutes into our chat and it is clear that the applications for this new tech are almost limitless and ICEYE has only just begun scratching the surface of what is possible.
Persistent monitoring of static objects is one clear application and the use cases for flood and many parametric covers also stand out. Windstorm, wildfire, hail and tsunami are also on the list.
But it quickly emerges that it is the blending of ICEYE’s extraordinary satellite data with other data sources, forecasts, maps and models that is going to add the most value.
That’s where you come in. It’s fairly obvious from a listen that I really enjoyed my time chatting to Stephen.
So I think you should Listen to the podcast for the sheer pleasure of it and let some of the wow moments sink in.
Then in time let all the ideas for new products percolate up to the surface and then get in touch with ICEYE and tell them how you would use their technology.
Because the final link in the chain is the insurance industry itself.
Enjoy the podcast.
NOTES AND LINKS
Learn more about ICEYE's Solutions here, or download their latest Flood Briefings here
ICEYE has a webinar series starting soon, explaining the value of SAR Technology. Sign Up here
And any late 1970’s low-budget Brit Sci-Fi fans, just Google ‘Blake’s 7’ and see what Stephen and I were talking about!
Tuesday Apr 12, 2022
Tuesday Apr 12, 2022
In this podcast I’m talking to the top broking CEO in the most interesting segment of the insurance market anywhere in the world.
Scott Purviance is the CEO of Amwins, the largest of the big three US wholesale insurance brokers. Because of this he has the best view of the trends affecting the world’s largest insurance market.
And because wholesale is such an responsive escape valve for the market, any pricing, coverage or capacity pressures are immediately picked up by his organisation. His business also connects directly to the wider international markets and is a major producer of income for all concerned.
Scott is relaxed, charming, and engaging. He’s also really smart and has an ability to both analyse and articulate the long-term trends that are affecting the market.
In this interview we dissect all the hotspots and crunch points in the US and get a sense of where things might be heading.
We also discuss the fast-growing `hybrid carrier phenomenon, broker M&A and why he doesn’t see Amwins stock heading for the public markets any time soon.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank our advertiser Anaplan and Conor Donohoe and Daniel Ellis for coming on the show to explain what Anaplan's platform does for the insurance sector.
Email contacts:
conor.donohoe@anaplan.com
daniel.ellis@mentattechnology.co.uk
Tuesday Apr 05, 2022
Tuesday Apr 05, 2022
Today I’m talking to Vicky Carter, a very senior reinsurance broking executive with a glittering career.
As well as chairing Capital Solutions, International at Guy Carpenter, Vicky is a Member of The Council of Lloyd's and is a Lloyd's Deputy Chairman.
But we aren’t going to be talking about her day job intermediating between the insurance community and the reinsurance and capital markets and helping to guide and represent 1 Lime Street.
That’s because for over a decade Vicky has also been directly involved in Guy Carpenter, MMC and the wider market’s youth development programmes.
This work has culminated in the very high-profile Rising Professionals series of events in London.
As the first post-pandemic edition is fast approaching I decided to focus this interview on what our industry has learned from the pandemic and what plans and strategies there are to get young people’s careers back on track now that the world is tentatively returning back to face-to-face working.
Were there any positives from the accidental work-from-home revolution caused by Covid?
And how has insurance fared versus other sectors in the Great Resignation that has followed in its wake?
Vicky is one of the market’s great communicators and this is a typically enjoyable and frank encounter, that doesn’t duck any of the big questions.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo
For enquiries about the MMC Rising Professionals event contact: mmcrpforum@events-uk.com
Vicky was last on the podcast back in Episode 37 in August 2020
Tuesday Mar 29, 2022
Tuesday Mar 29, 2022
Today’s guest is someone with a really difficult and really important job. You could say that the future prosperity of the insurance market is a big part of his remit.
We keep fretting about how hard it is, and how it seems to be getting harder still, to innovate in our industry and how if we don’t do it fast enough we are all going to become irrelevant.
Well, Head of Incubation Underwriting at Beazley and Co-chair of the Lloyd’s Product Launchpad George Beattie is both inspiring and eloquent and listening to him should make you feel a bit more positive about the industry’s long-term prospects.
The structures he is part of both within and outside his own organisation have been designed to make innovation easier by very deliberately removing the disincentives that currently exist for it to happen.
After all, who wants to risk their bonus on a new idea that by definition doesn’t come with years of claims data or actuarially-approved pricing models attached to it?
It turns out the problem is absolutely not a lack of original ideas and far more a lack of time and resource to do all the best ones justice.
Listen on for a fascinating and uplifting episode.
NOTES and LINKS:
I refer to the Episode with Relm Insurance. That’s Episode 113
Lloyd’s Product Launchpad
The IVF venture with Gaia is also backed by Chaucer
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo
Tuesday Mar 22, 2022
Tuesday Mar 22, 2022
Today’s guest is a major reinsurance broking CEO at the top of his game.
A quarter has passed since the completion of the purchase of Willis Re by Gallagher and the integration of the 3rd largest reinsurance broker in the world into Gallagher Re.
Global CEO James Kent is clearly buzzing with energy and enthusiasm for the job in hand and the prospects that new ownership and investment are going to open up for his business.
In this podcast we talk about how Willis Re managed to hold itself together during the interminable Aon-Willis merger saga, the state of the reinsurance market and the new business’s ambitious growth plans.
I have known James for many years and think this encounter is a great snapshot of a team leader who has come through a trial and is absolutely delighted to be out on the other side and very much looking forward to the future.
NOTES:
A couple of abbreviations. KRW is of course the infamous trio of 2005 Hurricanes, Katrina, Rita and Wilma. UNL is Ultimate Net Loss and in this context is a synonym for an indemnity-type contract as opposed to a parametrically-triggered one.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
Tuesday Mar 15, 2022
Tuesday Mar 15, 2022
Parametric insurance has been with us for quite a while now, so it is an idea that most of us have become familiar with.
We can all see its advantages, particularly when it comes to almost instantaneous claims payments with practically zero adjustment cost.
But until recently it has been a hyper specialist corner of the market, often restricted to very large very high value contracts such as cat bonds.
This is because it is only now that the cost of technology has come down significantly enough and the availability of accurate information sources has become wide enough to make these often bespoke products relevant at the commercial lines, and even personal lines, levels.
There are lots of small specialist parametric players out there but today’s guests have seen this opportunity and really grabbed it with both hands.
Tanguy Touffut, CEO and co-founder and Violaine Raybaud, Head of business development at parametric specialist MGA Descartes Underwriting don’t do anything by half measures and the business comes fresh from an eye-popping $120mn fund raise.
But that $120mn is not for capital to underwrite with – it is for an enormous investment in people, technology and global locations.
And that’s why I asked them to come on the show. Because for an investment of this size to work, the opportunity will have to be of the once-in-a-lifetime sort.
Tanguy and Violaine clearly believe so and it is great to hear such passion about the prospects for application of parametric solutions in a vast global market like commercial lines.
LINKS:
Here is the link to the $120mn funding announcement that I mentioned:
https://www.descartesunderwriting.com/descartes-underwriting-raises-120-million-to-become-a-category-leader-in-corporate-insurance-worldwide/
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Mar 08, 2022
Tuesday Mar 08, 2022
Today’s guest is a true pioneer in insurance and also in insurtech.
In fact Richard Leftley, Executive Vice President of MIC Global has had about fifteen years head start on many of the other others in that game.
As a trailblazer in microinsurance in the developing world, where premiums per customer can often be measured in $single digits, Richard learned right away that without a digital-first approach you are going to get swamped by the expense ratio and you won’t have a viable product.
As technology and robust data sources have advanced so the microinsurance opportunity is finally coming into its own.
But what’s particularly exciting is that it turns out the hard operational lessons learned from that tech first, very high volume, low individual premium microinsurance experience are transferable to the high-growth emerging embedded insurance applications in the gig economies of today’s most developed countries.
And now that MIC Global has been given in-principle approval for a syndicate in a box at Lloyd’s it seems poised to benefit from strong growth in both of these incredibly different worlds.
Richard is passionate and eloquent and really knows his business inside and out. There is a lot you can learn from him and I can highly recommend a listen today.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Mar 01, 2022
Tuesday Mar 01, 2022
Sometimes you just have to give credit where credit is due.
Most of the guests on The Voice of Insurance are long-term CEOs of large companies. They are all major players in the market and I don’t need any special reason to talk to them.
But today’s guest is on the show, not because he runs a market-moving global insurance business, but because I think he has done something completely out of the ordinary that deserves closer attention.
Relm is a remarkable business because it has responded to a moment of disfunction by creating something entirely new.
Seeing a total absence of insurance industry response to the emerging Cryptocurrency phenomenon Joe Ziolkowski, Relm’s co founder and CEO has built the first Crypto insurer with a licence from a recognised international jurisdiction and an A rating.
The result is that Relm is a business that can underwrite in Cryptocurrency limits, pay claims and crucially hold assets in Crypto on its own solvent, rated and regulated balance sheet.
I doubt that Relm will be the last of the native Crypto insurers, but the story of what Joe has achieved so far is a fascinating one.
And it’s not just Crypto – this business’s culture seems to be to seek out genuinely uncharted areas of opportunity. For this reason insurance for the nascent cannabis and psychedelic sectors are also areas of focus.
You don’t need to understand all the ins and outs of these markets to see that there is enormous unmet demand for insurance in these fast-growing new verticals
For that reason I would highly recommend a listen.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Feb 22, 2022
Tuesday Feb 22, 2022
Today’s guest is a broking veteran known across the London Market and beyond.
Alastair Swift is Head of Corporate Risk and Broking for Global Lines of Business at WTW as well as CEO of Willis Limited.
Recently new WTW CEO Carl Hess has spoken about his desire for the group to get some of its swagger back and I think this interview could mark the beginning of that process for the firm.
Following the damaging twists and turns of the Aon merger saga of the past two years and the eventual sale of Willis Re to Gallagher, it was refreshing to hear someone senior at the newly rebranded WTW come out fighting and start focusing on the future at the global broker and advisor.
Alastair didn’t duck any of my questions, in fact quite the opposite.
I know every podcast introduction says that what follows is must-listen stuff
but this really is a must-listen episode!
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Feb 15, 2022
Tuesday Feb 15, 2022
Today’s guest is one of the people behind the scenes who help make the insurance market tick.
With a background in finance and operations, he has made a career of helping businesses become successful and stay successful, but hasn’t necessarily taken much of the credit for doing so.
Now that Rinku Patel is a CEO – running London-based MGA platform Pine Walk Capital, his profile is considerably higher.
But the nature of the business that Pine Walk is in continues to put others in the limelight because the purpose of this firm is to free up underwriters to do what they do best.
And that’s why I am really glad to be able to put him in the spotlight today.
The MGA space is a fascinating corner of the market at the moment and Pine Walk is at the heart of a movement to professionalise all aspects of this segment.
Rinku is the embodiment of a no-nonsense leader and this interview clarifies the vision and purpose of Pine Walk and the nature of its relationship with its parent Fidelis beyond doubt. Rinku is straight-talking and always comes immediately to the point in hand.
If dealings with him in his day job are anything like as direct and effective as in this interview, I can highly recommend engaging with him.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Feb 08, 2022
Tuesday Feb 08, 2022
Today’s guest is from one of the highest profile firms from the group of pioneering US insurtechs that emerged in the middle of the last decade.
Hippo Insurance, along with many of its trailblazing peers, is now a public company.
But despite the transparency this brings, it’s easy to look at Hippo and become confused by a whirl of alliances, structures and news announcements.
One analyst recently complained that it looked like Hippo was throwing different strategies against the wall and seeing which ones would stick.
In the light of this podcast that doesn’t seem fair.
Today’s guest would counter that Wall Street hasn’t really got its head around the variety in the newly-arrived insurtech sector and currently tends to put them all in the same bucket.
Hippo’s President Rick McCathron joined the business five years ago.
With almost 30 years’ P&C experience, Rick has insurance running through his veins and is incredibly focused on what Hippo’s mission is and how he is setting out to achieve that.
Insurance people can relate to him and he is excellent company.
Listen on and any lingering doubts about this firm’s clarity of purpose will melt away.
NOTES
Rick mentions the 'CAC to LTV' ratio. This stands for customer acquisition cost to lifetime value. ie a measure of how effective your marketing/acquisition spend is.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Friday Feb 04, 2022
Friday Feb 04, 2022
Corvus Insurance is a young business that is moving so fast that to those of us looking in from the outside could be forgiven for seeing something of a blur.
For instance, should we look at this business as a specialist cyber underwriter or should we see a cyber technology provider or indeed a much broader data-driven insurtech company that is class-agnostic?
The answer is probably a blend of all three.
That’s why it’s so valuable to speak to someone of the calibre of Madhu Tadikonda, Corvus’s President.
As a tech entrepreneur who then rose rapidly to become AIG’s Global Chief Underwriting Officer, Madhu has had a stellar insurance career of his own before joining up with Corvus last year.
In this really lively podcast I get Madhu to explain all of the moving parts within Corvus and distil the common themes.
In doing so we get a front-row view of the challenges and opportunities facing the cyber market, run through the rationale behind Corvus’s recent acquisition of cyber MGA Tarian Underwriting and look into what other classes are catching this progressive business’s eye.
I’d say what really makes Corvus tick is a real affinity for the fastest growing insurance classes where client need, demand and opportunity are greatest.
This is then coupled with the realisation that the most important risks of the future are becoming much more dynamic and that the most successful underwriters of tomorrow are going to have to be much faster learners than their predecessors and be much more engaged and helpful to their customers.
Almost paradoxically Corvus looks very much like an ultra-traditional insurance business…
except that its way of going about things is anything but!
It’s fascinating stuff.
LINKS
https://www.corvusinsurance.com
Tuesday Feb 01, 2022
Tuesday Feb 01, 2022
The idea at the heart of the voice of insurance is to give everyone access to the most senior and influential leaders in the industry.
I want to democatise the sorts of insights that until recently were only available to the privileged few.
Today is one of those days when the mission is properly fulfilled because my guest is a very strong leader at one of the London Market’s best success stories of the last 30 years and someone who has almost always been in the room when the key decisions affecting the market have been taken over that period.
Bronek Masojada is smart and direct and as Chief executive of Hiscox has built that business into a high-quality insurance franchise with global reach.
Now he has stepped down from that major Chief Executive role this interview reflects on what has driven and continues to drive him and examines some of the pivotal moments in the past decades in which he has played a leading role.
But we don’t dwell on the past for long and using his position as Chair of London Market electronic placing platform PPL we focus on his vision for a digitally-native global London Market, the challenges of market modernisation and the skills needed by the top underwriters of the future.
We also get a feel for what sort of future roles might appeal to one of the London Market’s stars.
But more importantly by listening in today you’ll get a great feel for what sort of person and what kind of leader Bronek is and get the benefit of all his hard-earned experience.
NOTES, ABBREVIATIONS AND THANKS
Bronek mentioned early London electronic trading initiative EPS. EPS stood for Electronic Placing Support.
In addition to PPL Bronek mentioned he is Chair of East End Community Foundation
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Jan 25, 2022
Tuesday Jan 25, 2022
Today’s guest is a really strong, highly successful well-known and well-respected presence in the market. He is someone great to know because he knows almost everyone, including the most powerful capital providers behind the scenes.
He is a real broker’s broker with a career spanning 45 years, culminating as CEO of Willis Re. And he has all the broker’s charm and craft accumulated over that period.
He is also passionate and wears his heart on his sleeve.
A consistent theme he has pursued in his career is a belief in the importance of enabling the renewal of the specialty insurance business in general and the Lloyd’s market in particular by giving entrepreneurs the opportunities and support they need to innovate and to refresh the sector.
And in the venture he founded four and a half years ago he has made it his business to do just that.
John Cavanagh is the chairman of Lloyd’s incubator, underwriter and investor Beat Capital Partners and in this interview we get right to the heart of what Beat is all about.
In this podcast we find out the biggest secular trends in specialty insurance and how Beat is on a mission to ride and grow with them to its advantage
We are most lucky to get the benefit of a lifetime of market knowledge and understanding delivered in a completely no-nonsense way.
You can hear the conviction coming out of every sentence – I challenge you not to find John’s insights hugely useful for your own business.
There’s something about the combination of strong passionate leadership and positivity that is really infectious.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Jan 18, 2022
Tuesday Jan 18, 2022
Today’s podcast is a really lively one.
As I was listening back I found that there are parts of this recording that are almost breathless.
That’s entirely down to the energy levels of who I am interviewing.
When I met David Walsh (Group CEO, picture left) and Graeme Newman (CEO, picture right) of London-headquartered MGA CFC Underwriting they were still buzzing after a significant fundraise that has given their business a valuation of roughly three and a half billion dollars on a multiple that makes CFC look more like a tech company than an insurer.
To put this into context, this valuation is 10 times the what it was in the last investment round just over four years ago and probably more than double when they were first on the show just over a year ago.
David and Graeme had also just come through a calendar year in which they had posted 50% GWP growth and in which they had set up a Lloyd’s Syndicate to support their underwriting, which is projected to breach the $1bn GWP barrier in 2022.
We talk about the pair’s ambitious growth plans in the ultra-dynamic and dislocated cyber insurance space and how they feel the market is bifurcating between those carriers that are doubling down on the product and really grappling with the ransomware epidemic and those that frankly are not.
But perhaps more interesting than the all the valuable details, in this podcast we get a deep view into this duo’s growth mindset and their firm’s almost unique relationship with technology that makes it one of the industry’s very few native insurtechs.
From what follows if anything the business’s growth looks likely to accelerate more from here.
NOTES:
I mention an interesting report on systemic cyber loss costs. This indeed came from CFC itself and was attributed to CFC's head of Cyber, James Burns, speaking at his company's Cyber Forum in December 2021. It was reported by the Insurance Insider: (Subscription needed) https://www.insuranceinsider.com/article/29eg3lhzopfx8r3rvr2f4/cfc-real-life-systemic-cyber-events-challenging-model-assumptions?utm_content=189971317&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&hss_channel=tw-129610827
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Jan 11, 2022
Tuesday Jan 11, 2022
Lucy Clarke is a dream interviewee.
Of course, her position as President of Marsh Specialty and Global Placement, Marsh gives her a view of the market that only a very few peers would be able to rival, but it is her smart, no-nonsense and direct personality that immediately stands out.
Given the global market is in such an agitated and interesting state, this makes for a really compelling and enlightening podcast.
Lucy is a breath of fresh air and a really lively and charismatic interviewee.
If I was a client I would love to have her fighting my corner with underwriters.
I am really glad to get her on the show and highly recommend this episode to anyone wishing to navigate the late stages of this extremely challenging hard global insurance market.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Friday Jan 07, 2022
Friday Jan 07, 2022
Today’s interview is one of the most all encompassing I have ever done.
That’s all because of the interviewee and his research team who have just produced one of the most comprehensive 1st of January renewal reports I have ever read.
The 2022 renewals have been much more interesting than usual with reinsurers undertaking a fundamental rethink of how they view Property Cat alongside taking a view on casualty trends, Covid and the long-term likely effects of both the social and economic forms inflation.
Meanwhile Cyber insurance has been undergoing a huge dislocation and a wholesale re-rating and we have also had the effects of the class of 2020 and record industry capital levels to take into account.
For this reason I was delighted to catch up with David Flandro Head of Analytics at Howden’s HX unit to try and make sense of it all.
David is one of the smartest analysts dedicated to the insurance world and he is also a great communicator and great fun to spend time with.
The report is out now and I would highly recommend a read to accompany your listen here
There are some things that only a well-constructed graph can explain!
LINKS
Howden 1.1.22 renewal report Times are a-changin’:
https://www.howdengroupholdings.com/assets/documents/howden-times-are-a-changin-report.pdf
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Dec 14, 2021
Tuesday Dec 14, 2021
Todays’ guest is David Ibeson the CEO of Apollo Syndicate Management.
David is a Lloyd’s veteran with over twenty-five years in the market, twenty of which he has spent in the CEO role at Lloyd’s managing agencies.
In an era when so many bemoan the lack of strong personalities, David is an exception that proves the rule.
David is also another extreme rarity – that’s because he is a qualified actuary but one who is also a born communicator.
In this podcast we examine David’s view of the market and Apollo’s strategy within it.
From our chat it soon emerges that Apollo is as exceptional as David.
That’s because whilst Apollo is in many ways quite a traditional Lloyd’s business, the risks it is looking to take on and the products it is looking to develop are anything but.
Here we discuss everything from Nat Cat appetites to the sharing economy and the prospects for algorithmic underwriting – all with a huge amount of energy and good humour.
NOTE:
In the podcast I mention David’s ‘other hat’ that he wears at Howden group’s international MGA Dual. That is a reference to David being the Chairman of Dual.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Dec 07, 2021
Tuesday Dec 07, 2021
Historically in our business fast growth has been a red flag and a sign that something might be wrong.
The fastest growth has often been followed by a period of significant underperformance later on as the chickens come home to roost.
But there are some major exceptions to that rule and today I’m speaking to one of them.
Beazley has been one of the most successful, innovative and fast-growing specialty companies of the past two decades. Adrian Cox has been part of that journey over the same period and has just taken over the CEO role.
In this podcast we get right into Adrian’s vision for what the next twenty years might be like.
Growth is definitely a big part of the story. But in this lively interview you really get to know what Adrian is like and how he thinks.
This is an organisation that has a tendency to run towards problems, not away from them and in doing so bakes growth into the business.
After all, if you can solve the toughest problems you can get well paid to do so and that is my overriding impression from this encounter.
As Beazley gets bigger it has greater resources to deploy on solving more sophisticated problems in more areas and should be able to continue to grow at impressive rates, even as it becomes quite a large business.
The only brake on growth would be if we suddenly started running out of new problems to solve – and we already know that that is not going to happen any time soon.
In our talk, amongst other things Adrian runs us through Cyber market dislocation and how that might be resolved, the logic behind Beazley’s ESG syndicate and the opportunities and threats of algorithmic underwriting.
He does all of this with infectious enthusiasm and a smile on his face.
I am really pleased with how this episode has turned out.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Nov 30, 2021
Tuesday Nov 30, 2021
Today’s guest is John Fowle the CEO of Chaucer.
John’s in an enviable position. He has a very large long-term backer in the form of new owner China Re that is effectively providing almost unlimited permanent capital to his business.
Chaucer’s new ownership brings the ability to write almost anything as well as access to the vast Chinese-backed Belt and Road global investment initiative
But just because you can do something, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you should.
This interview turned into a really open and fun discussion.
John’s thoughtful and good humoured personality shines throughout this podcast as I probe him on everything from how ESG and algorithms are going to change underwriting to where Chaucer’s plans to be China Re’s international P&C insurance and reinsurance growth engine will take them.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Nov 23, 2021
Tuesday Nov 23, 2021
Todays’ guest is a formidable professional with whom I have been sparring on and off for the last 16 years.
But most of the time that sparring would have gone on behind the scenes and not while notebooks were open, or indeed, the microphones switched on.
That’s because Caroline Wagstaff, who has just been confirmed in post as the permanent CEO of cross-industry body the London Market Group (LMG), has spent her career working on the media relations and strategies of top players in the industry.
In this interview we run through what the LMG is all about and what its top priorities are.
We talk about lobbying government departments and regulators and selling the benefits of the London Market to brokers, customers and future talent from around the world.
There is also a lot of detail around the recent success the LMG has had in getting the UK Government to give regulators an obligation to consider the impact of regulatory activity on the globally competitive position of the market.
Caroline says that a big part of this job is about corralling all the hugely varied and often disparate parts of the market together under common banners.
This job needs a very strong character to bring all the different players together.
Listen to this and I think you’ll see straight away why the LMG board felt Caroline was going to be a good fit for the role.
I always enjoy spending time with Caroline because she is so direct and there is no ambiguity – I think you will too.
NOTES
I refer to The LMG 5-point plan early in the podcast and I think I should have introduced it a bit better, so here it is in all its glory:
https://lmg.london/news/lmg-launches-5-point-plan-to-help-seize-new-global-trade-opportunities/
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Nov 16, 2021
Tuesday Nov 16, 2021
Today’s guest is Sian Fisher.
Sian has had an illustrious career in international insurance and this has culminated in a 6-year period as CEO of the UK’s well-renowned professional standards and qualifications body the Chartered Insurance Institute (the CII).
Sian is a strong and vocal female leader in our sector and in her tenure has been a dynamic and effective agent of change at this venerable trade body. I think it’s fair to say that she has shaken things up in this time.
Now her departure has been announced I caught up with her to reflect on her modernising work ,the highs and lows of running a high-profile organisation through Brexit and then Covid and her vision for keeping a hitherto very traditional institution relevant in the 21st century.
We also discuss things that with hindsight she might have done differently and what the future might hold for this highly experienced senior executive.
Sian is great to talk to – she thinks and communicates clearly, she’s eloquent, she’s never shy and she’s always direct.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Nov 09, 2021
Tuesday Nov 09, 2021
Mark Wheeler is a Lloyd’s market person through and through. In this interview he even refers to himself as a “Lloyd’s groupie”
That’s why it was great to meet him face to face in his London office within 100 metres of the Lloyd’s building.
We went deeply into what his new venture Mosaic is really all about.
The vision is original and the plan is incredibly ambitious.
Mosaic is trying to bring the core advantages of London syndication and very detailed specialty know-how much closer to clients around the world through localised international distribution.
That’s quite an undertaking.
Listening back Mark is clearly in his element and our knockabout conversation is a testament to that.
There were no taboo subjects.
Mark’s last words of the interview were “we’ve covered a lot of ground, it’s thought-provoking and I really appreciate it”
I agree with Mark.
Let’s see whether you do too.
NOTES:
Mark refers to “G and A” a couple of times. I’m pretty sure he is talking about general and administrative expenses – i.e. the part of the expense ratio that is in the control of the carrier, as opposed to acquisition costs, which are external.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Nov 02, 2021
Tuesday Nov 02, 2021
There are two types of journalist – there are those who really don’t like or trust anyone they write about and then there are those that are the opposite and seem to like everyone.
I am one of the latter – my natural bias is to get a positive vibe from most of the people I interview.
Because of this I make sure I try and balance this inbuilt positivity with a reality check from others around me.
But now I don’t work in a large business any more it’ll be you the listener who has to help me out.
I’m only mentioning all of this because I found today’s guest off the charts in the likeability stakes.
Richard Watson is the co-founder and CEO of Inigo Insurance – a specialty insurance and reinsurance start-up at Lloyd’s.
The business is growing rapidly in this transitioning market and is looking to build something highly focused that seeks to deploy the best new thinking and analysis to big-ticket specialty risk.
In this discussion we get right to the heart of what it is like to be building a differentiated new Lloyd’s franchise in the 2021 market, Lloyd’s market reform and the applications of algorithms and other smart technologies.
Richard is a London Market veteran and his 33 years at Lloyd’s Blue-chip Hiscox culminated with an 8-year stint as its Chief Underwriting officer, so his views carry a lot of weight.
We also examine Richard’s ideas on how to create a new business that attracts smart, curious and fun people and makes them want to stay.
Richard gives the impression of someone having the time of their life making the most of a rare opportunity to put a career’s learning into practice.
I had a great time – but then I always do – so it’s over to you to tell me anything I’m missing.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Friday Oct 29, 2021
Friday Oct 29, 2021
It really matters what today’s guest thinks. This is because he has one of the biggest and most influential underwriting and insurance and reinsurance management jobs in the world.
Stefan Golling serves on Munich Re's Board of Management and until recently was its Chief Underwriter.
He also looks after Global Clients, the North America Division and oversees HSB and American Modern as well as the Lloyd’s and Bermuda markets.
What I enjoy about talking to Stefan is his disarming frankness. He speaks very clearly for someone in such an elevated position in our industry.
In our chat we cover everything anyone would want to know ahead of the first of January 2022 renewals.
Up until now many have described reinsurers as a relatively benign influence, content to ride on the coat-tails of their cedants as they remediated their books and brought pricing back into line.
Now I’ll leave you to decide if this is just a little bravado on Stefan’s part ahead of upcoming renewal negotiations, but from this encounter I would expect to see reinsurers digging in a little more than they have been up until now.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Oct 26, 2021
Tuesday Oct 26, 2021
Patrick Tiernan Chief of Markets at Lloyd’s has the broadest job description of almost anyone in insurance.
He is responsible for whole abstract ideas such as ‘Underwriting’ and ‘Distribution’ at a vast global insurance marketplace which can make it sometimes hard to know where to start.
My job as a journalist is to take the abstract and turn it into something really specific and so listening back to today’s interview I must admit I was sometimes a bit annoyed with myself for not diving into every secondary and tertiary line of questioning that our discussion was throwing up.
But then I decided to stop beating myself up.
There was so much to talk about.
With unlimited time we could have done a series of at least five separate podcasts.
The unanswered questions are there to be asked next time in subsequent encounters. Always leave them wanting more…
But what this interview is - is a really useful walk around one of the biggest jobs in insurance and an introduction to the person tasked with taking that role on.
We get to know a little of what makes him tick and there is enough here to get a feel for what sort of reign Patrick’s is going to be over number 1 Lime Street, London, in the coming years.
Patrick is incredibly accessible and transparent and comes across as a very level-headed, logical, thoughtful and reasonable person.
It is clear he has already listened to what the market wants and thought very deeply about what needs to change to keep Lloyd’s relevant, influential and competitive in the future.
He isn’t top-down or dictatorial and with perhaps the exception of when he talks about sustainable underwriting profitability across the cycle, he doesn’t seem in any way dogmatic.
He’s also a great communicator and his delivery is laden with considerable Irish wit and charm. It is very hard not to like him.
As a first portrait it’s a broad-brush one, but I think listening to this podcast will give you a good idea of the big picture
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) and Bolton Associates for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
https://www.bolton-associates.co.uk/
Friday Oct 22, 2021
Friday Oct 22, 2021
I love catching up with Robert Lumley (Top) and Stephen Brittain (Bottom) from the Insurtech Gateway because whenever we do we always have a really fascinating conversation.
But I found recording today’s podcast not just fascinating but actually inspiring and energising.
First of all a huge amount has been going on since we last spoke and the pace and maturity of insurtech investment is accelerating.
So at the beginning of the podcast we spend a little time catching up with where the regulated Insurtech Gateway Incubator and Venture Capital Fund is with its growing and maturing portfolio of investment companies.
Then in the second part we start to examine insurtech’s role in improving the world’s resilience to natural catastrophe.
We hear a lot of talk about resilience in the sector and much of it is really well meaning but often lacking in effective vision.
For example at any big insurance conference we will hear very senior leaders talking about how we must close the protection gap. That’s something we can all agree on – but we rarely hear any of those same leaders sell their vision of how exactly we are going to do it.
And that’s why I found this podcast so uplifting.
Technology has a lot of the answers to many of the world’s problems and so does insurance. Yet we have often been going about things the wrong way. Instead of solving real problems for real people we have tended to try and find new ways of selling them insurance products.
Today you’ll learn about a new model that is far more customer led.
Ordinary people don’t wake up every day thinking “I must buy more insurance today” but they do worry that if there is a major storm or flood they will go bust.
Insurtech is filling the gap by solving these client problems increasingly cheaply and efficiently and then bringing the insurance in behind, not the other way around.
What’s more, 15 years ago, when the idea of microinsurance was first gaining currency, there was a sense that it wasn’t really supposed to make money for insurers – that it was an extension of Corporate Social Responsibility or international aid budgets.
But of course loss-making businesses are not sustainable and they are definitely not scalable.
These days insurtechs are coming with a sensible profit motive, acknowledging that everyone in the value chain has to get value and has to make money otherwise the protection gap is never going to be filled.
That’s what is so exciting – it’s a much more mature idea and of course one that will help create potentially trillions of dollars in brand new accretive premium for the global insurance market.
Listen on for some inspiring ideas
Tuesday Oct 19, 2021
Tuesday Oct 19, 2021
Today’s guest is one of those people I always enjoy spending time talking to and was really looking forward to having on the show.
I first met him when he was running Scor’s North American P&C operations when he would often appear at Insurance conferences I was chairing in New York.
Back then Jean-Paul Conoscente was unfailingly charming, calm and very straightforward and open in his approach and always a great asset to any media event.
Some time has passed since my last encounter with him, and in that time he has been promoted to CEO of Scor Global P&C and elevated to the executive committee.
So I am really pleased to report that he is still as friendly and approachable as he ever used to be.
In this podcast we talk about pretty much everything that is affecting the reinsurance market today and in the run-up to the 1.1 renewals.
And from loss trends and price rises, reserving and price adequacy to covid disputes and insurtech, Jean-Paul gives a straight and honest answer to every single question I ask him.
Listen on and you’ll see what I mean.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Oct 12, 2021
Tuesday Oct 12, 2021
It’s a long time since legacy was a dusty dead end of the insurance industry where old underwriters went to eke out the remains of their days before retirement.
And at the same time it’s been a long time since the era when fronting was seen as a bit of a dirty secret of the industry.
These days both segments have matured and taken up their rightful place in the insurance ecosystem.
But it’s rare to meet someone so well qualified and quite so dynamic driving a business that is in both of these spaces.
William Spiegel the Executive Chairman of R&Q is someone with an impeccable resumé as an investor in some blue-chip start-ups in our sector over the past two decades.
And because of that he brings a fresh and very insightful perspective to our industry.
I was really interested to find out why someone like him has decided to come and work on the inside of a mature business at this time.
The answers are all here in the podcast as William describes two fascinating and uncorrelated high-growth profitable business opportunities in our sector.
William is full of energy and drive and it runs all the way through the podcast.
I never thought these segments could sound exciting but William tells a compelling story and the combination of his ruthless business logic and his infectious enthusiasm is a winning one.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Oct 05, 2021
Tuesday Oct 05, 2021
Today’s podcast is crackling with energy. When I listened back to the recording it was unmistakable.
The reason is obvious – the subject matter we are discussing is Gallagher’s imminent takeover of Willis Re.
This is the biggest thing to happen in reinsurance broking since Aon bought Benfield back in 2008 and here I spend some time with an ebullient pair of senior executives, clearly ecstatic about how the deal is going to transform the Gallagher group and fulfil its long-held ambition to build a genuinely global reinsurance broker.
Talking to Gallagher Europe Middle East and Asia CEO Simon Matson (Picture Left) and Tom Wakefield the CEO of Gallagher Re (Picture Right) was a lot of fun.
In the next half an hour or so you will get a good idea of how Gallagher plans to welcome, integrate and invest in the newly formed business in the coming years.
We also talk in depth about the dynamics of the global reinsurance market itself, both in the short term, looking at the upcoming renewal season and strategically in the very long term.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
Tuesday Sep 28, 2021
Tuesday Sep 28, 2021
I have met Andreas Berger at various times in the last 15 years and he has been consistently impressive every time I have met him.
It was therefore no surprise when in 2019 Swiss Re came calling with a major task to fix its consistently misfiring and loss-making Corporate Solutions, or CorSo, business unit.
Two years later and the turnaround at CorSo has been remarkable.
I think if you listen here you can see how Andreas has been able to do it.
He does what good managers are supposed to do – he brings technical excellence but doesn’t get bogged down in it; he understands the importance of correct management structures but doesn’t come across like a consultant and he gets tech and data but isn’t a technocrat.
Most importantly he is also really transparent and honest about where things have gone wrong and knows how important it is to make remedial decisions quickly and get on with executing them.
But the key factor overarching all of this is that he is a charismatic communicator who does all of the above with a smile on his face and the ability to bring staff, brokers and clients along with him for the journey.
As you can imagine these ingredients make for a really good podcast, where we get stuck into everything CorSo and all the big challenges facing the industry today.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) and Free Partners for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
https://freepartners.com/
Tuesday Sep 21, 2021
Tuesday Sep 21, 2021
Bob Kimmel the CEO of K2 insurance services came on my radar and that of most other London-based insurance folk when last year his US-based MGA group picked up the remnants of what had been the Pioneer group of MGAs to form K2 International.
K2 owns a major collection of MGAs in the US, writes over a billion dollars in premium and is highly acquisitive both of talent, new agencies and other ancillary insurance businesses
I didn’t know Bob personally and researching K2 ahead of our London meeting I suppose I came into this podcast with lots of preconceptions about what the CEO of such a fast-growing and aggressively expansive US-headquartered group would be like.
I was completely wrong.
Bob is clearly very ambitious for K2 but he is also very easygoing and charming as well as being disarming about how steep the learning curve has been for him, a former reinsurance broker, moving much closer to the end insurance customer in the decade since K2’s formation.
New MGA start-ups and acquisitions, a potential Lloyd’s syndicate in the offing and a conscious hunt for talent in specific classes – Bob’s in-tray is absolutely overflowing and in this interview he discusses all aspects of MGA management in a disarmingly open way.
I really enjoyed my time with Bob and I think you will too.
LINKS
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo - enabling an enterprise view of exposure:
https://www.advantagego.com/
We also thank Claims Direct Access (CDA) and Free Partners for their support today:
https://www.claimsdirectaccess.com/
https://freepartners.com/
Friday Sep 17, 2021
Friday Sep 17, 2021
Today’s podcast is something a little different because instead of talking about our market from the inside we will be looking at it through the eyes of insurance professionals who access our products and services from the outside.
What do our customers really think of us and what are they looking for when they come into the international insurance and reinsurance markets looking to do business?
Michał Chmielewski Deputy Chairman (left) and Tomasz Libront President (right) have built Smartt Re into a significant independent reinsurance broker in the highly competitive and fast-growing Polish market.
Their report card on the London and International insurance markets makes for really interesting listening as well as their description of the huge opportunities as well as the significant challenges facing the largest market in Central and Eastern Europe.
Michal and Tomasz are very open and frank about their experience and some of the observations are frankly eye-opening,
so for anyone looking to learn what makes an independent local broker in emerging markets tick and what they are really looking for in an international partner this should be required listening.