{"id":10099,"date":"2025-07-25T09:46:24","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T09:46:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/?p=10099"},"modified":"2025-07-25T09:49:46","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T09:49:46","slug":"voi-podcast-with-jason-howard-of-acrisure-international","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/content\/voi-podcast-with-jason-howard-of-acrisure-international\/","title":{"rendered":"Building a global value chain for Acrisure\u2019s next phase"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><iframe title=\"Ep262 Jason Howard Acrisure International: A very Simple Model\" allowtransparency=\"true\" height=\"150\" width=\"100%\" style=\"border: none; min-width: min(100%, 430px);height:150px;\" scrolling=\"no\" data-name=\"pb-iframe-player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.podbean.com\/player-v2\/?from=embed&amp;i=ymu7s-190edfb-pb&amp;share=1&amp;download=1&amp;fonts=Tahoma&amp;skin=3267a3&amp;font-color=auto&amp;rtl=0&amp;logo_link=episode_page&amp;btn-skin=1b1b1b&amp;size=150\" loading=\"lazy\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jason Howard, President of Acrisure International, is leading the re\/insurance broker\u2019s international ambitions. He spoke to the Voice of Insurance podcast about M&amp;A, talent, technology &#8211; and why the market should expect more to come.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Jason Howard\u2019s remit at Acrisure is vast. As president of Acrisure International, he is responsible for everything in the broking group outside the US, including reinsurance and wholesale operations. It\u2019s a broad canvas &#8211; and one that has grown fast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since Acrisure\u2019s acquisition of reinsurance broker Beach &amp; Associates in 2018, rebranded in 2020, Howard has helped to build out a global presence through a targeted M&amp;A strategy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve been very successful,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ve bought over 65 companies in that time and grown the business well to represent the UK and European landscape. We\u2019ve also started to invest in Latin America &#8211; Brazil, Puerto Rico &#8211; and we\u2019ll keep on turning our attention to other areas.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Howard stressed that Acrisure isn\u2019t merely interested in \u201cplanting flags\u201d, but in finding strong local partners. \u201cIt\u2019s a very simple model that we have,\u201d he said. \u201cWe only buy businesses that have got successful track records of growth and profitability. No fixer-uppers, no turnarounds, no retirement plays.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As Acrisure\u2019s international operations mature, the focus is gradually shifting from acquisition to brand alignment and deeper integration. \u201cWe don\u2019t really have an integration issue,\u201d Howard explained. \u201cFor us, it\u2019s more about branding them as Acrisure over the course of this year.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Despite being part of a sprawling global group, Howard insisted that connectivity across the value chain is a key differentiator. \u201cWhat most impresses me about Acrisure\u2026 there\u2019s just tremendous communication between everyone that works in those businesses.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That connectedness is key to a core aspect of Acrisure\u2019s strategy: aligning retail distribution with reinsurance and underwriting to create proprietary products and services. As Howard put it: \u201cWe\u2019ve used our retail brokers, we\u2019ve used our wholesale brokers, we\u2019ve used Acrisure Re, we\u2019ve used the capital markets guys.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He pointed to the creation of the Flux Syndicate 1985 at Lloyd\u2019s &#8211; a managing general agent (MGA) designed to bring profitable US SME business into the London market &#8211; as one success story of that integrated model.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIf you look at the two syndicates, Flux and Volante [MGA and Syndicate 1699 at Lloyd\u2019s], they\u2019re trying to achieve the same thing: to bring business into the London market that\u2019s not been there before,\u201d said Howard. \u201cWe thought we could do it much more cheaply than had been done before\u2026 because we had the whole chain under our control.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Despite increasing automation and the rise of \u201csmart follow\u201d syndicates in London, Howard warned the market not to lose sight of the importance of leadership and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/content\/insurtech-maintain-discipline-hardening-market\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/content\/insurtech-maintain-discipline-hardening-market\/\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">underwriting discipline<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cYou\u2019ve got to support all different parts of the marketplace,\u201d he said. \u201cLeaders need to be paid to be leaders\u2026 not just a blind follow that isn\u2019t really delivering anything.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Howard acknowledged that automation and AI are helping to drive productivity, particularly in areas such as client prospecting and back-end processing. But he cautioned against relying too heavily on machines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cHow do you get people to really understand what\u2019s going on in a particular class of business if they haven\u2019t got time to go and broker business or to underwrite business because it\u2019s been done by a machine?\u201d he asked. \u201cYou\u2019ve got to get that balance right.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When asked about competition and market cycles, Howard was unfazed. \u201cI don\u2019t remember a time when it wasn\u2019t competitive,\u201d he said. \u201cYou\u2019re competing for capacity, you\u2019re competing for differentiation, you\u2019re competing with somebody for clients; that\u2019s always going to be the way.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>With an eye on the long term, Howard concluded with an open invitation: \u201cIf you\u2019re an entrepreneur sitting out there somewhere around the world, and you\u2019re looking for a partner\u2026 pick up the phone, give me a call.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jason Howard, President of Acrisure International, is leading the re\/insurance broker\u2019s international ambitions. He spoke to the Voice of Insurance podcast about M&amp;A, talent, technology &#8211; and why the market should expect more to come. Jason Howard\u2019s remit at Acrisure is vast. As president of Acrisure International, he is responsible for everything in the broking [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6594,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[39,14],"line-of-business":[28,20],"class_list":["post-10099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blogs","tag-reinsurance","tag-underwriting-workbench","line-of-business-general-liability","line-of-business-property"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10099","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10099"},{"taxonomy":"line-of-business","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/line-of-business?post=10099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}