PAGE FOLIO Insurance Hub Cologne Open for Business insurance-hub.cologne | 1 | SOURCE: © City of Cologne_Christoph Seelbach | 2 | insurance-hub.cologne CONTENTS ‘Insurance Hub Cologne’... ...is the first publication published by Rubicon Media and Calixa Creative on behalf of the City of Cologne (Stadt Köln) Dr. Frank Grund and Cologne Chamber of Commerce and Industry (IHK). of BaFin: What The publication forms a central part of a joint campaign to expect from backed by the two bodies to raise the profile of Cologne as the regulator an important and vibrant German and European insurance and reinsurance centre. 4 Insurance Hub Cologne is supported by the creation of its own dedicated website insurance-hub.cologne and ongoing news and events. Communications team Adrian Ladbury, founder and Editorial Director of Mayor Henriette Rubicon Media Ltd., publisher of Commercial Risk Europe, Reker extols Commercial Risk Asia, Commercial Risk Africa and International the benefits Programme News, is a journalist and publisher with over of Cologne 30 years-experience of the European and international risk and insurance market. 10 Adrian is a regular host and speaker at leading risk, insurance and reinsurance events in Europe and worldwide and of Rubicon’s own range of industry events. Adrian has produced the content for this report in his capacity as an independent consultant to the Insurance Hub Cologne campaign. Contact: [email protected] 00 44 7818 451 882 Dr. Werner Görg of Alan Booth, is the Creative Direcor of Calixa Creative, and a IHK and Gothaer specialist communications consultant, focused on editorial welcomes fresh design excellence, servicing the business journalism, risk and insurance, and automotive sectors. Alan is a highly competition experienced newspaper and magazine design specialist and has led design teams for news publishers including The Wall 12 Street Journal Europe, Politico and The Sunday Times. Contact: [email protected] 00 44 7817 671 973 Cologne team Sebastian Pitzler: Reiner Gleiss Cologne the Insurance Consultant InsurTech hub Economic Ambassador for Germany [email protected] 00 49 221 28275586 18 Alexander Hoeckle Director International Chamber of Commerce and Industry, City of Cologne [email protected] 00 49 221 16401550 Manuel Wirtz: Michael Josipovic Newline selects Deputy-Director Office of Economic Development, Cologne Cologne, the “magnet for [email protected] insurance talent” 00 49 221 22126123 20 IMAGES: © Wikimedia Commons 2018, unless stated insurance-hub.cologne | 3 | COMMENT But, if you consider the arguments in more detail, perhaps Cologne has a stronger case than appears at first glance for international insurers and reinsurers trying to work out their optimal strategy post-Brexit on a longer-term basis. Perhaps also Brexit could be described as something of a red herring. The real question is surely not how to respond to Brexit in the short term but really how to build your business in the EU for the long term. Adrian Ladbury CASE FOR COLOGNE Economics and politics The case for Cologne in this observer’s view is based on suggest serious local three key arguments: u REGULATION: It will be increasingly difficult for presence needed international insurers to justify their EU subsidiaries based in low-tax specialist insurance centres when to win in European all the real work is still done back in London; insurance game u DISTRIBUTION: Commercial and corporate customers and their brokers want to deal with local insurers who understand their increasingly complex needs and can design bespoke solutions. The capital backing these solutions may be international, but, the customer wants to deal locally drian Ladbury, risk and insurance in the design stage; journalist with some 30 years- experience, founder and Editorial u TECHNICAL EXPERTISE AND director of the Commercial Risk group of titles and INNOVATION: The rise of new Aeditor of this publication, argues that, while the short- risks such as cyber demands a term solution to Brexit may be found in Luxemburg or far higher level of expertise from Brussels, in the longer run insurers that are serious insurers than in the past. This about the huge EU market will need a proper base in a expertise needs to be supported by Gabriel Bernadino leading European city such as Cologne. investment in the latest technology (InsurTech) to better identify, analyse, price and When the City of Cologne delegation led by Mayor Reker package the risk. Hubs such as Cologne and Madrid visited London and presented its case to Lloyd’s and in Europe, Dubai in the Middle East and Singapore wider London insurance and reinsurance market as a in Asia can, and do, attract the skilled staff needed potential new home post-Brexit in February 2018, one to deliver this. London is no longer the ‘only game leading London insurance executive understandably in town’ for international specialty insurance and asked the blunt and obvious question: “Why? Surely the reinsurance and this trend will continue. horse has bolted and most London-based international insurers and reinsurers have already decided to set up The latter two arguments – distribution and proximity their EU operations in Luxemburg, Dublin or Brussels?” and technical expertise and innovation – are strong longer-term arguments for a regional insurance hub This was a fair question to ask. The attractions of such as Cologne. This is fully supported by the range of Cologne as a serious EU-based insurance hub in the interviews carried out with leading local players within heart of one of the world’s biggest and most dynamic this publication. economic regions with plentiful skilled and highly educated workers and a dynamic InsurTech sector are One may argue that the leaders of international clear to see. insurers and reinsurers based in the city itself are bound to argue its case. The simple economics, however, surely dictate that established ‘onshore’ EU specialist insurance and But, only two years ago, the London market itself reinsurance centres such as Luxemburg, Dublin or even published an important report produced by Boston Malta seemingly offer a far more cost-effective option Consulting called ‘London Matters’ and came to this for those international insurers and reinsurers keen to very conclusion: The London market needs to work out retain access to the massive EU insurance market. how to cope with a shift in buying trends whereby risk | 4 | insurance-hub.cologne COMMENT and insurance managers and their brokers the world over want he arrived backed in 2002. Some individual Lloyd’s insurers, to deal directly with local insurers and not a wholesale market notably Hiscox and Catlin, did set up operations in Germany thousands of miles away. and have done well because they have invested in people on the ground. But, little was achieved on a market-wide basis. SHIFTING BUYING TRENDS BREXIT: DECISION TIME This is why Lloyd’s of London, the historic centre of the London market, has invested heavily in recent times to build platforms So, we reach a point where the UK is about to leave the in Singapore, Dubai, Brazil and more recently Mexico and China, European Union and all those international insurers and with varying degrees of success. reinsurers that chose London as their obvious base to access the huge flow of international business that still comes to the The core reason for the historic success of the Lloyd’s market market need to make a decision about where to base their EU is its ability to gather together a deep and broad pool of operations and maintain access to the EU. expertise and capital in a competitive and vibrant market and distribute its capacity and products worldwide via a wide range As noted above, the obvious response was to set up a of wholesale international brokers and retail brokers ‘on the subsidiary in an existing ‘onshore’ EU specialist insurance ground’. and reinsurance centre such as Dublin or Luxemburg (and now Brussels), meet the local supervisory requirements at The rise of more local markets and regional buying habits minimum cost and reinsure the business back to London where coupled with rising protectionism in local the world over all the real staff – sales, underwriting and claims – remain. threatens the validity of this basic model. But it seems that over time this may not be such a simple Another big challenge for a global wholesale insurance market and cot-effective strategy. The various national European such as London is the fact that risk and insurance managers insurance supervisors and EIOPA, the pan-European body want and need better and more efficient service responsible for ensuring that the EU’s rules from their insurers, particularly when it comes to are properly and fully implemented on a paying claims. consistent basis across the EU, are already asking questions about the validity of this The arrival of new technologies such as the model. distributed ledger system Blockchain offers a vastly improved, faster, more transparent and TEST OF TIME lower cost means of achieving significantly improved contract and coverage certainty. Recent statements from EIOPA itself, national supervisors such as BaFin in Germany and Trying to get the entire Lloyd’s market to market experts suggest this could become agree and sign up to a co-ordinated, efficient an increasingly contentious area and make Felix Hufeld and customer-friendly way of adopting such it difficult for the insurers and reinsurers to technologies is terribly difficult. economically justify this approach. The German model of creating digital hubs at a Federal EIOPA and BaFin have already strongly and publicly stated that government level that led to the formation of the networking they will not accept ‘letter box’ insurers that reinsure 100% platform InsurLab Germany that brings together the traditional of the business back to London.