Texel, the London-based specialist in credit and political risk insurance broking, is handing its top job to William Shaw (pictured). The deputy chief executive has spent more than two decades helping build the firm's global business. The group said on June 4 that Shaw would become chief executive, subject to regulatory approval.
The appointment caps a management handover that founder Andy Lennard set in train three years ago. Lennard, currently CEO and executive chairman, will stay on as executive chairman and as chairman of the company's charitable arm, the Texel Foundation.
Lennard founded Texel in 1997. The firm has since grown into an independent brokerage with more than 100 staff across offices in Brussels, London, New York, and Singapore. It arranges credit risk cover for financial institutions, corporates, development finance institutions, and multilateral development banks.
In 2025, the company moved to an employee ownership trust to protect its long-term independence and reward staff.
This model has helped Texel keep drawing senior brokers, among them former International Finance Corporation syndications specialist Josh McCann, who joined its London team as a director in September 2025.
The hires have come as banks, development finance institutions and institutional investors lean more heavily on credit and political risk cover to manage exposures and optimise capital, a market in which Texel works as an independent specialist rather than as part of a global consolidator such as Marsh, Aon, or WTW.
Shaw has been with Texel for more than 20 years. He joined the London office in 2003 before moving to the US in 2006 to set up the group's Americas business.
He went on to establish Texel's Asia-Pacific operation from Singapore in 2012 and returned to London as deputy CEO in July 2024.
Shaw's move to deputy CEO formed part of a broader reshuffle of Texel's senior team in mid-2024, which also saw Angela Chang become managing director of the group's Asia business. He had joined as one of the firm's earliest employees and led its corporate finance work in the company's early years.
“When we started the management transition three years ago, I said I would step down as CEO at the appropriate time,” Lennard said. He added that the timing matched a milestone for the company, the anniversary of its shift to employee ownership.
Lennard said Shaw was well regarded inside and outside the firm, and that being able to promote from within showed the depth of talent at Texel.
Shaw said he had watched the company grow from four people when he joined in 2003 to a global business. He pointed to Texel's approaching 30th anniversary and said he was looking forward to leading the firm into its next chapter.
