Kevin Kelley, chief executive, Ironshore


“ I encourage more of a multifaceted relationship— it is something that sets us apart from our peers.”


what you write. And the more selective you are, the more profi table you can be—providing you pick the right accounts, of course.


“The trick is to see lots of submissions. I fi rmly believe that. If we


see, say, 50 percent more business, we can be more selective and very conservative about what we write. Our hit ratio could be under 5 percent for new business, but if we are selecting well and seeing lots of business, that is fi ne. If the market is showing us more business there will always be opportunities.”


He does not overcomplicate this process. He says it is about knocking on


doors. Ironshore is in 15 cities in the US now as well as Toronto, Bermuda, London, Lloyd’s and, most recently, Dublin. “It is about knocking on doors and fi nding synergies,” he says.


He is tactical, however, when it comes to relationships with brokers—who


also play a critical part in Ironshore’s success and the submissions it sees. He encourages his regional team leaders to have a holistic relationship with brokers regionally to ensure they are aware of all the product lines Ironshore writes. He says this approach is in stark contrast to the way many insurers operate.


“Some companies have a silo mentality where they might have a good


relationship with one broker on a certain product line but never cross- pollinate or share contacts with other departments. I encourage more of a multifaceted relationship—it is something that sets us apart from our peers. Our typical regional offi ce might have six or seven product lines, and our team leaders are there to ensure a relationship with brokers across all of those.”


Its product lines have grown substantially since Kelley took over. Shortly


after joining, he formed an environmental unit, an excess liability business and launched Iron-Starr Excess, a joint venture with CV Starr, his former boss Hank Greenberg’s company, which writes catastrophic excess casualty insurance from a Bermuda domicile.


Those announcements were followed by the launch of a programme facility, an energy unit, a life science business, an aviation business, a space and satellite business—which it has also launched in partnership with CV Starr—and a personal lines division designed to underwrite high- value homes worth more than $1 million. Ironshore’s US operations now consist of IronPro, IronHealth, IronBuilt and IronSelect, which serve the professional liability, healthcare liability, construction and excess casualty specialty market sectors, respectively.


But these products represent the tip of the iceberg when you look in more


detail at the company’s activities in this period. It seems to be constantly innovating in terms of the products that it offers, making announcements on new products in different sectors such as the medical sector, agriculture, oil and gas, and the construction industries. It has entered into a number of strategic alliances with trade bodies and trade organisations as well as other risk carriers with expertise beyond its own.


Just one example of this new product innovation was unveiled in March when it launched Ironshore AgriProtection, an agriculture industry-led


30 | INTELLIGENT INSURER | Summer 2011


umbrella policy that targets commercial agribusiness entities. It offers coverage for a range of issues including herbicide, pesticide, fertiliser application, misdelivery of liquid products and failure to supply. It even covers things such as transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (mad cow disease) on an individual account basis.


This rapid growth of business lines has necessarily been matched by


a growth in personnel within Ironshore. Its headcount has more than doubled, but that has also needed to be underpinned by regular signings of senior executives with expertise in the lines it is moving into. As the company has grown, it has also recruited more talent at a strategic level too.


Some of the more recent recruits include Donald Harkey, an industry


veteran of 35 years, who leads the political risk unit for Ironshore Europe, based in Dublin; Daniel Owen, who joins as senior vice president of its global property builders risk unit; and Stephen Stewart, as vice president of a new specialty casualty division of Ironshore Canada to underwrite insurance coverages for general liability, as well as umbrella and excess liability programmes.


These new recruits are supported by the vast experience of the company’s


senior executives, many of whom cut their teeth at AIG. These include Shaun Kelly, the president of Ironshore Inc, who was previously the chief operating offi cer of Lexington Insurance Company; Joseph Boren, the CEO of Ironshore Environmental, who was formerly chairman and chief executive of AIG Environmental; Tim McAuliffe, the president of Ironshore Specialty Casualty, who was formerly the president of AIG Excess Casualty; and Mark Wheeler, the CEO of Ironshore International, the main operating subsidiary of the company’s Pembroke Managing Agency at Lloyd’s. This division is increasingly important given the launch of Ironshore Europe. Wheeler was previously the underwriting director of Pembroke Managing Agency.


Kelley sees this experience it is recruiting as strategically important for


another reason: he believes the insurance business is built on relationships and trust. “When all is said and done, this business is based on a promise, and clients need to feel comfortable you will keep a promise. Because of my background and that of some of the other executives, we have an association with AIG. But that can help build credibility. And they also understand that what we are building here at Ironshore is unique.”


But this expansion of Ironshore’s product lines is now being increasingly complemented by its growing geographical presence and global expansion plans—something that will take its multifaceted nature to a new level again. Its most recent move was to open an offi ce in Dublin, which was launched in January and assigned its own rating—of ‘A-’ by A.M. Best— in April. But as is clear from Kelley’s comments post his trip to China, the company’s expansion plans do not end there. His quest to see more submissions will take him anywhere he needs to go.


“We are seeking diversifi cation now,” Kelley says. “It is all about seeing


new business. Dublin will allow us to catch names that we don’t see at Lloyd’s or in London. It will give us greater fl exibility to target European


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