A sustained pipeline of infrastructure, data centre, and energy transition work is drawing fresh underwriting investment into UK construction. Pen Underwriting has made four appointments to its construction and casualty practice and extended its regional reach into Birmingham, Liphook, and London.
Dawn Strong joins Pen Underwriting's Liphook office as senior casualty underwriter. She started her career on the broking side before moving into underwriting and brings more than 20 years of commercial insurance experience. She joins from Zurich Insurance, where she spent three years as trading underwriter.
Ravi Banger joins the managing general agent's Birmingham office as casualty underwriter. He brings more than a decade of specialist liability underwriting experience, with a background that began in customer services and claims. He joins from NFU Mutual, where he was corporate insurance liability underwriter. He also previously worked at Zurich, LV, Wesleyan, and Direct Line Group.
In London, Ollie Jochimsen joins as casualty underwriter. He joins from Lloyd's broker Bridge Specialty International and brings casualty risk experience alongside a working knowledge of what brokers need from specialist lines underwriters. Josh Murphy also joins the London team as assistant underwriter.
Paul Murphy, managing director of construction and casualty at Pen Underwriting, said the pace of growth makes continued investment in people necessary. "Every specialist underwriting business with ambitious growth plans needs to keep investing in people to ensure broker response times, access to decision-making underwriters and the ability to offer competitive and appropriate risk solutions keep pace with business expansion," he said.
Murphy said Pen Underwriting's construction footprint spans a wide range of trades, from high-risk builds to general contractors. Its casualty team also extends beyond construction into retail, manufacturing, and other commercial lines.
A January 2026 Forum of Insurance Lawyers (FOIL) report noted the UK government's 10-year infrastructure strategy commits over £725 billion in public funding to transport, housing, and utilities. UK data centre spend is projected to rise fivefold to £10 billion a year by the end of the decade. Those project volumes are driving demand for liability capacity that the London market alone cannot absorb.
The scale of the pipeline is reshaping insurer appetite. New project types such as battery storage facilities and hyperscale data centres bring concentrated and long-duration risks that require specialist casualty underwriting. Standard commercial lines cover is not designed for that risk profile, and insurers are recalibrating appetite and staffing in response.
For brokers placing smaller and mid-market construction risks, the appointments offer direct access to decision-making underwriters in Birmingham and Hampshire outside the traditional London route. The construction casualty segment has attracted a growing number of new entrants as project volumes drive demand. In that environment, specialist underwriting experience and direct broker access have become practical differentiators.
