Aviva’s Financial Lines goes from strength to strength with new hires

Authored by Aviva

Aviva’s Financial Lines team has been strengthened with a raft of new hires – and plans for more to come. This demonstrates our ongoing commitment to the Financial Lines market, with further plans for growth this year.

Heading up the department is Ramesh Singh, who joined Aviva as Underwriting Director, Financial Lines in December. Ramesh brings 25 years’ experience of corporate experience from around the world, across a number of international carriers including Chubb, AIG, AXA XL and CNA Hardy.

Strengthening the Financial Lines team

Ramesh Singh will continue building on other recent senior hires, including Daisy Laskey as Head of Management Liability. Richard Belsey will join Aviva as Head of Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A) Underwriting this summer. Richard brings 20 years’ professional experience as a corporate lawyer, M&A insurance underwriter and M&A insurance broker, most recently as Head of Real Estate Transactional Risk at Lockton. He has led a number of mid-market and large-cap UK and international private M&A deals across various sectors with a particular focus on prime real estate, infrastructure and financial services.

In addition, Samantha Shean will join Aviva next week as Head of Financial Institutions (FI). Sam is a well-known, experienced figure in the market, having built a career spanning 25 years as a specialist in Financial Institutions. She joins Aviva after 12 years at Axis Capital, where she most recently served as Head of Financial Institutions.

Patrick Waters joins Aviva as Underwriting Manager for FI in June, reporting to Samantha Shean. Patrick has over 12 years’ experience in the insurance industry, originating with financial lines claims handling with Chubb and Canopius. He then moved to CNA Hardy and into FI underwriting where he currently holds the status of Senior Technical Underwriter. He has experience on both company and Lloyds platforms, and outside of his deep technical expertise of Financial Institutions, he has also worked with trade credit and political risk products.

Felix Cofie will join Aviva in July, as Underwriting Manager in the Professional Indemnity (PI) team. Felix joins Aviva from Aspen and brings 15 years of PI underwriting experience from a range of Lloyds and company markets. In his role as Underwriting Manager, Felix will assist in the development and implementation of our underwriting strategy, as well as working with brokers to build new and existing business.

Expansion into Scotland

Our specialist Financial Lines team is extending into Scotland, as we invest into building a new Financial Lines Underwriting team in Glasgow.

David Jenkins joined Aviva in January as Senior Financial Lines Underwriter for Scotland and brings over 20 years’ experience. He joins Financial Lines Underwriter Luisa O’Donnell, who joined Aviva in late 2023. Plans are in place to recruit further into this team as we continue to invest into Financial Lines in Scotland, one of our key growth areas.

Duncan Goddard also joined in December as Senior Financial Lines Underwriter for the South & Greater London. Duncan brings more than 20 years’ experience as an underwriter in the insurance industry, and will sit in the Regional Financial Lines Team, focusing on large corporate and complex business.

David and Duncan are aligned to the Regional Financial Lines team and report into Regional Head of Financial Lines, Alison Caine.

“I’m delighted that we’re building bench strength and expertise in our dedicated Financial Lines team. This fits with our ambition to rebuild and rebrand Aviva’s Financial Lines offering, as we continue our commitment to this important part of the Aviva portfolio. Our focus is to work strategically with our customers and brokers across the UK and the globe. Investing into Scotland and further into our London centre of excellence will help us to meet this ambition as we continue to grow.”