Optio Group, the independent specialty MGA, has completed its acquisition of Gardian Marine Limited after receiving all necessary regulatory approvals. The deal was first announced in March.
London-based Gardian Marine, backed by Lloyd's and A-rated insurer capacity, specialises in marine builders' risk insurance, ship repairers and liability, voyage and towage insurance, and bespoke ancillary products. It is led by co-founders Guy Tyler and Edward Morgan, who both remain with the business. The acquisition extends Optio's marine offering, which now spans hull, cargo, war and shipbuilding risks.
Tyler and Morgan previously served as directors at WTW, with Tyler overseeing International Hull & Machinery and Morgan leading Special Risks. Together they bring 28 years of combined experience in builders' risks for shipyards and vessel owners.
The acquisition lands against a backdrop of accelerating growth in delegated authority business at Lloyd's, the market through which Gardian Marine's capacity is written.
Delegated authority premiums rose from £10.4 billion in 2018 to £22.1 billion in 2023, taking their share of Lloyd's premium income from 30% to more than 40%, and are expected to exceed 45% by 2027, according to analysis from Oxbow Partners. That growth has prompted insurers to invest more heavily in coverholder relationships and portfolio management, with delegated authority increasingly seen as a key route to growth in specialist and regional markets.
For MGAs such as Optio, that trend underpins the case for acquiring established coverholders with deep underwriting expertise rather than building capability from scratch.
The Gardian Marine deal extends a run of acquisitions by Optio across the European marine and specialty market over the past year. It follows Optio's purchase of Norwegian marine hull specialist S Insurance, and sits alongside its acquisitions of Luxembourg-based special risks MGA Circles Group and Netherlands and Brussels-based Den Hartigh.
The pattern points to a specialty MGA sector where scale and product breadth, rather than organic growth alone, are increasingly the route to competing for capacity and broker relationships.
The completion also comes at a sensitive moment for the marine war risk market that Gardian Marine's products touch on.
War risk premiums in the Gulf have surged 340% since Iranian strikes at the end of February 2026, after the Lloyd's Joint War Committee expanded its designated high-risk area to cover the entire Persian Gulf following US and Israeli military strikes on Iran that month.
The Lloyd's Market Association has said the disruption to vessel traffic reflects shipowners' own safety assessments rather than a lack of available cover, with the large majority of Lloyd's marine war market participants surveyed retaining appetite to underwrite hull and cargo war risks linked to the region.
For MGAs building out war risk capacity, the episode illustrates how quickly pricing and capacity conditions in that line can move, and how central the London market remains to pricing global marine war risk.
Deepak Soni, CEO of Optio Group, said: “Gardian Marine has rapidly evolved into a respected and disciplined business driven by Guy and Edward's market-leading expertise and strong networks. Over the past few years, their talent and entrepreneurial spirit have laid the right foundations for a successful venture with strong cultural alignment with our own values and operating style. We are delighted that they have agreed to develop the next stage of the business within Optio, which will further strengthen our specialty capabilities and expand our London market presence.”
Meanwhile, Guy Tyler, co-founder and director of Gardian Marine, said: “Ed and I have always understood the value of dedicated and expert service. By joining forces with Optio, we gain the scale and resources needed to elevate that commitment even further, deepening our capabilities while preserving the dedication and agility our clients rely on. We are excited about the opportunities ahead and are grateful to Optio and our capacity providers for their trust as we continue delivering solutions to manage an ever-evolving risk landscape.”
Optio's task now is integrating Gardian Marine's builders' risk and liability expertise into a platform already managing exposure across some of the most volatile corners of the marine market, at a time when Lloyd's delegated authority channel is taking on a larger share of the market's business and capacity providers are watching war risk pricing closely.
