Industry veteran and Convex founder Stephen Catlin took home the Lifetime Achievement award at last night’s Insurance Insider Honours, recognising his achievements over a more than 50-year career in the London market.
Those achievements included his role in shepherding his eponymous business towards becoming a global insurance company and a London market juggernaut and later, co-founding and growing the Bermuda-London carrier Convex to over $4bn in premium.
The award also sought to recognize his heavy involvement in Equitas right up to the 2000s, being a Lloyd’s Franchise Board and Council member, and being the founding chairman of the Insurance Development Forum.
“In reality, this testimony goes to the team at Catlin, and to the current team at Convex. Without their support, hard work and dedication, I would not be stood here tonight,” Catlin said.
He added: “If we're going to be relevant as an industry, we should be, we need to be, we have to be relevant to our client’s needs. As we all know, our client's needs in the last two years and in the future are changing. We in the industry have the responsibility to understand their needs and try and help them through those needs.”
This year’s Insurance Insider Honours saw around 530 (re)insurance market professionals descend on The Brewery, London, to celebrate the achievements of the market.
Warren Downey, CEO of Specialist Risk Group, won the outstanding contributor for distribution.
The award was made in light of both his achievements at JLT Group and SRG, which has thrived under his leadership since his joining in 2015. This culminated this year in landing a stand-out investment deal with private equity house Warburg Pincus and Singaporean sovereign wealth fund Temasek, which valued the company at over £1bn.
The outstanding contributor to underwriting award was given to Sierra Signorelli. The award recognised her career achievements at Zurich including helping to make a commercial lines business that had misfired into a reliable source of low-volatility profitability for the group, as well as returning the $26bn-premium unit to growth.
She has also been a consistent voice in the industry pushing the sector to focus not just on selling clients protection, but helping them build resilience.
This year’s CFO of the year award went to Mark Craig of Howden, which recognised his contribution to the firm’s invest-heavy-to-grow-fast approach in supplying major yearly infusions of debt and equity.
Since 2021, the group has embarked on a series of major M&A deals representing a step change in its deal-making. Craig has also been instrumental in securing the latest $7bn re-financing deal which gave it £1.1bn of incremental new debt to further fuel the expansion of the firm.
Beazley won carrier of the year. The award recognized the strength of their expertise-led underwriting and claims management.
The broker of the year award was given to Miller, in light of their impressive growth over the past few years. The award also recognized their investment in AI and quality service.
Congratulations to all this year’s winners, who are listed below.
Insurance Insider Honours 2024 winners
Broker of the Year – In partnership with Arch Insurance
Miller
Broking Innovation of the Year
Price Forbes Re – Parametric Reinsurance, Price Forbes Re and Africa Specialty Risks Re
Carrier of the Year – In partnership with InsurX
Beazley
Campaign of the Year
The London Market Group - Talent Campaign
Highly commended – Howden, the Howden rebrand 2023
Claims Service Award
Markel International
Diversity & Inclusion Award
LIIBA and their DEI programme
Highly commended - John Turner-Smith’s work with Aon and Lloyd’s on the Rugby 7s women’s team
Employer of the Year
McGill and Partners
ESG Initiative of the Year
Romero Insurance Brokers – Road to Sustainability
Highly commended - Uris Group, UGL Sustainability Programme
InsurTech Product of the Year – In partnership with Tokio Marine Kiln
Loadsure
Highly commended - Ki
M&A Transaction of the Year
Dale Underwriting Partners – strategic partnership with CVC
Highly commended - Westfield Specialty acquires Argo Syndicate 1200
MGA of the Year
Rokstone
Highly commended - NBS Underwriting
Operational Innovation of the Year
Axa XL – Immersive Solutions
Highly commended - Canopius
Underwriting Innovation of the Year
CFC for their Secondary Transactions and transaction liability team
Women in Insurance Award - In partnership with DXC
MS Amlin – Women in Leadership
Young Broker of the Year – In partnership with Munich Re Specialty
Martha Brown from Texel
Young Claims Professional of the Year
Olivia Bradley from Tokio Marine Kiln
Young Underwriter of the Year – In partnership with MS Amlin
Rob Page from CFC
Highly commended - Toby Smith from K2
CFO of the Year – In partnership with Lloyd’s Bank
Mark Craig, CFO at Howden Group
Outstanding Contributor of the Year, Distribution – In partnership with Allied World
Warren Downey, group CEO for Specialist Risk Group
Outstanding Contributor of the Year, Risk
Sierra Signorelli, CEO Commercial Insurance at Zurich
Lifetime Achievement Award
Stephen Catlin