Market Moves - 12 March 2015

Insurers

Sterling Insurance Group
Sterling Insurance Group has hired Pauline Palmer as a regional development manager for the West Midlands and South Wales region. Palmer has joined from broker network Purple Partnership, and prior to this, she worked at online insurance marketplace Powerplace, having previously worked as a personal lines broker.

Zurich
Steven Zuanella has joined Zurich in the newly-created role of chief digital officer while Simon Gratton has been appointed as interim chief data officer. Zuanella joins from Bupa where he was group digital director. He has held previous digital, e-commerce and strategic roles with Prudential Assurance and Barclays Bank.
He will lead a senior cross-functional team to develop an overarching digital strategy and future roadmap. Gratton was previously at Capgemini, and he will be responsible for defining the strategy for management information, data management and analytics for Zurich’s UKGI division.

Brokers

Hood Group
Hood Group has appointed Jonathan Beaven as head of finance. An ACMA-qualified accountant, Beaven joins Hood Group from the Whitehouse Leisure Group where he spent 10 years as group financial controller managing the finance, IT and HR functions. Before this he spent four years as finance manager for HML Marketing, then a subsidiary of Cox Insurance Group. Beaven’s earlier career was spent in the city working with Plcs including Cable and Wireless and Dow Jones.

Robertson Taylor
Richard Arnold has joined Robertson Taylor, the insurance broker specialising in the live entertainment industry, as head of private client services in the UK. Arnold brings more than 20 years of experience in this sector and joins the business from R K Harrison, where he held the position of account director overseeing London and South East Teams. At Robertson Taylor, he will have responsibility for building the business’s existing private client division, and handling high-net-worth individuals from across the global entertainment industry.

MGA

CFC
Specialist lines underwriting agency CFC has added Jamie Bouloux to its corporate cyber practice. He joins the business from AIG where he was head of cyber and technology liability for Europe, Middle East and Africa. In his new role at CFC, Bouloux will be responsible for driving the development of its large corporate cyber product on a global basis.

Loss adjusters

Cunningham Lindsey
Cunningham Lindsey has hired Leo Gibbons as director of the global specialty markets team. He has over 30 years’ experience in the financial services sector, having worked in the international banking market and at Sedgwick, Hiscox, Novae Insurance and Giles Insurance Brokers. Gibbons is also a founder of Insurance Corporate Advisory Limited, an advisory firm specialising in corporate finance transactions in the insurance sector.

Service providers

Xchanging
Xchanging has appointed Gilles Bonvarlet as non-executive director. He previously held senior roles as chief operating officer of Talbot Holdings and managing director of XL London Market and Brockbank. He has also served as a non-executive member of the Lloyd’s Market Board.

Investment companies

Insight Investment
European investment manager Insight Investment has bolstered its insurance business with the appointment of Heneg Parthenay as head of insurance. Parthenay has more than 14 years’ experience working for multi-national companies in the insurance and investment management industries. He joins from BNY Mellon Investment Management EMEA, where he was chief operating officer and head of insurance. Previously he was strategy and mergers and acquisitions director at Aviva Investors.

This article was published in the 12 March edition of Post magazine.