Lloyd’s approves new international syndicate with ‘refreshing’ business model

Re/insurance marketplace Lloyd’s of London has given ‘in-principle’ approval to a new international syndicate with a “refreshing and entirely different business model” as it seeks new and innovative ways to grow the market.

Nephila-backed MGA Volante has received approval from Lloyd’s to launch Syndicate 1699 for the 2022 year of account, with initial stamp capacity of £130 million. Volante will be managed by Lloyd’s third-party managing agent Asta.

The syndicate will bring business to Lloyd’s through Volante’s existing international network of nine local service companies, which will underwrite in eight classes across five continents. Volante’s MGA teams will continue to underwrite business separately using third-party capacity binders.

Volante expects its future growth will be driven by the expansion of existing portfolios and through teams offering products and services to niche and specialty market sectors supported by new cloud-based digital platforms offering fast and efficient access for brokers, enhanced portfolio management and minimised operating costs.

Talbir Bains (pictured), founder and chief executive officer of Volante Global, said: “We seek to create a new kind of international Lloyd’s vehicle within the Volante Group, one which champions Lloyd’s standards and upper quartile underwriting performance.

“Our ambition is to establish a fully aligned partnership between Lloyd’s and our existing local underwriting offices, which will be re-established as service companies to Volante Syndicate 1699.”

Bains added that Volante's parallel syndicate and MGA entities will form a unique organisation in Lloyd’s and the London Market.

“In less than four years, through the sponsorship of our strategic carrier partners, we have delivered a transformational MGA to the market,” he said. “We now seek to continue the development with the creation of an international syndicate at Lloyd’s, and we are very privileged to partner with Asta in this evolution of the Volante Group. We are grateful to the team at Guy Carpenter, our advisors in the process.”

Julian Tighe, Asta's chief executive officer, said: “As an MGA operation, Volante has been an outstanding performer, based on its refreshing and entirely different business model. When they came to us for advice on forming a Lloyd’s syndicate, we immediately saw how their approach and objectives would be beneficial to the market, to capital providers, and, with Volante’s innovative products and confident commission structure, to distribution partners too.”

“As Lloyd’s seeks new and innovative ways to grow the market, Volante brings not just a proven and practical technological approach, but also an organisational structure and ethos which will do just that. Asta is proud to stand alongside Volante in this exciting new venture,” Tighe concluded.

Did you get value from this story?  Sign up to our free daily newsletters and get stories like this sent straight to your inbox.