Former Catlin/Liberty leader to help cyber risk specialist expand across Europe

Cyber risk specialist Cogitanda has hired the founding director of Catlin Europe, as the company looks to expand its presence in the wider European market, as well as the UK.

Ronan Gerety (pictured) will join Cogitanda as chief insurance officer (CIO) and executive board member. Based in Cologne, he will be primarily responsible for international growth and further development of the cyber risk specialist's offerings.

Gerety, who started his career at the Lloyd's Market in London and with the Gerling Group, joins from industrial insurer Liberty Specialty Markets, where he held the role of general manager, with responsibility for Germany since 2018.

He was also responsible for building up the European business of the specialty insurer Catlin, where, as one of its founding directors, he supported the opening of 13 offices across nine European countries from 2004 until 2015 and was instrumental in expanding relationships with European brokers and driving the development of Catlin’s insurance products.

Founded in 2016, Cogitanda has offices across six locations in Germany, Austria and France, and over the coming years, it is aiming to grow its market share in Germany to around 10 per cent with a similar growth target for Europe in the medium term.

The company also plans to establish its UK presence in order to gain better access to London market insurance capacity.

"We are delighted to have gained such a renowned industry expert in Ronan Gerety to help drive and shape our ambitious and ongoing expansion," said Jörg Wälder, founder and CEO of the Cogitanda Group. "Having already become the quality and innovation leader in cyber risk management in Germany, we now want to establish Cogitanda as a European champion in this market segment as well."

Gerety commented: "Cogitanda has a very strong and experienced management team, impressive product know-how and a unique IT platform. We now want to build on these assets to greatly increase our footprint in Germany and across Europe."

"Despite Brexit, there is considerable new capacity and new players entering the London market who are very keen to write continental European insurance in such a future-oriented business line such as cyber, particularly when they can partner with an innovative player like Cogitanda, with its highly developed IT platform, its sophisticated Risk management and Claims handling services and its rapidly growing German and European customer base,” he added.

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