Ex-GCube, Lockton execs launch new specialty broker Nardac to 'disrupt' market

New specialty risk consulting, wholesale and reinsurance broker Nardac Insurance Services has opened for business — seeking to "disrupt" the traditional re/insurance marketplace with innovative and specialised solutions, and bridge the gap between asset investment and renewables.

Nardac is co-founded by Jatin Sharma, Brandon Statton and Bill Kost, with additional senior hires expected to join the firm in 2021.

Sharma is the former president of Tokio Marine HCC-owned specialist renewable energy insurer GCube Underwriting.

Kost recently left Lockton, where he headed a specialist due diligence team supporting global energy and infrastructure transactions, to join the new venture.

Statton joins from engineering and construction contractor Bechtel, where he led infrastructure, planning, and development from the firm’s global headquarters in Virginia.

The specialist insurance broker will focus on the renewable energy, conventional power, infrastructure and transport sectors, which it believes are "long overdue for innovative and creative products".

The broker highlighted that the existing products lack the flexibility to adapt to new and emerging risks.

Nardac said it will seek to address this challenge with the formulation of new products for traditional and renewable power generation owners and operators with assets valued in excess of $1 billion, and large complex infrastructure projects, including offshore wind developments, in Europe, the US, and Asia.

“The wholesale insurance market is long overdue for some higher caliber operators, product innovation, and a client-centric, flexible service delivery," said Sharma.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has greatly exacerbated the urgent need for new solutions over the last six months, and as we push further into this hardening market, it will be the innovators that truly listen to and creatively meet clients’ needs who will ultimately succeed.”

He further explained that “as Governments and institutional investors worldwide look to a post-COVID green recovery, the investment we’ll see in large renewable infrastructure in the coming decades will be of a scale previously unimaginable. It is imperative, therefore, that we ensure that we support this rapid pace of development through robust asset protection, where the vast majority of retail broker advisory, products and supporting capital currently falls woefully short.

“At Nardac, our objective will be to invigorate the areas of the energy and infrastructure markets that have either been neglected through product development, leaving clients with limited cover and reducing project scope, or where evolving natural peril risks impacted them in unanticipated and unforeseen ways.

“We’re ready to deploy some highly specialised products and look forward to partnering with new clients on their most challenging and exciting projects and portfolios in development, construction, and operation,” Sharma concluded.