As organizations have strived to recover from the pandemic, deal with supply chain disruptions, and mitigate cyberattacks and other threats in recent years, Arch Insurance has concentrated on delivering underwriting and risk management services to a growing number of clients. Its excellence in this area has made it one of Insurance Business America’s 5-Star Professional Liability Insurers for 2022.
In this episode of Insurance Business TV, Arch’s senior vice president of executive assurance, growth and middle market, Hela Trerotola, and executive vice president of professional liability and cyber, Jamie Schibuk, discussed what has been happening in the marketplace and what their expectations are for 2023.
Looking at how the management liability marketplace evolved through 2022, Trerotola observed a decrease in public rates year over year because securities class-action activity dropped in 2020 and 2021.
In the professional liability market, Schibuk pointed out a continuing hard phase, with rate increases across several business areas and significant evolution in the cyber sector. This segment has experienced higher rates and a contraction in capacity due to more frequent and severe ransomware activity. To deal with this situation, Arch increased its resources by bringing more security risk engineers into its underwriting team and growing its panel of cybersecurity risk vendors that insureds can access.
Regarding the qualities that differentiate Arch from its rivals in the management and professional liability space, Schibuk said it’s the focus on responding to customers’ needs, being “a consistent provider of capacity across both segments, particularly in the cyber marketplace.” While other companies were cutting back on underwriting, Arch delivered a greater capacity that helped it grow despite challenging times.
Trerotola said that Arch’s “commercial approach to the handling and settling of claims,” its excellent reputation in this field, as well as its data analytics and digital capabilities, set the company apart. Arch’s diverse book and product offering also allow it “to thrive regardless of the market cycle.” She expects the management liability market to remain competitive in the coming year.
“[D]epending on the sector that we’re talking about, we think that there’s still going to be plenty of opportunity to help us solve our broker and insurance problems. And we definitely look forward to that growth and continued partnership in 2023,” she said.
Trerotola added that since private company business management liability is a growth engine of their division, Arch will be launching an improved Canopy 2.0 product next year.
According to Schibuk, the initiatives that Arch will launch in 2023 include a new cyber primary policy form as part of its effort to be a bigger solution provider in policy for this market segment. Arch also anticipates growth across all lines of traditional professional liability insurance, he said.
