{"id":10245,"date":"2025-12-05T09:52:55","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T09:52:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/?p=10245"},"modified":"2025-12-05T09:55:56","modified_gmt":"2025-12-05T09:55:56","slug":"voi-podcast-with-lsm-president-luis-prato","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/content\/voi-podcast-with-lsm-president-luis-prato\/","title":{"rendered":"London\u2019s growth will come from \u201cpeople, expertise and smarter use of data\u201d \u2013 LSM\u2019s Prato"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><iframe title=\"Ep280 Luis Prato Liberty Specialty Markets: You have to Outperform\" 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=43vbu-19daae1-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>President of Liberty Specialty Markets in the UK and MENA and CEO of Liberty Managing Agency at Lloyd\u2019s Luis Prato explains how London should grow even as the market softens and continues its digital transformation and AI projects.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>London felt like home to Luis Prato long before he oversaw businesses writing more than two and a half billion dollars of premium, he told host Mark Geoghegan during the latest episode of <em>The Voice of Insurance<\/em> podcast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He arrived from Caracas, Venezuela, more than thirty years ago with an engineering degree and a government scholarship that allowed him to study in the city he calls \u201cthe mecca of insurance\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI discovered insurance accidentally. I needed to earn a bit of money during my studies, and I worked part time for a local insurer doing simple risk engineering work,\u201d he told the podcast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The early exposure shaped a career built on technical strength and an instinct for people, he emphasised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That experience persuaded him to stay in the sector. \u201cAs soon as I finished my engineering degree, I decided that was the industry I wanted to work in,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve been here since the early nineties. I never went home. I\u2019ve been here since.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>His career took him through engineering roles, distribution, and an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/products\/underwriting\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/products\/underwriting\/\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">underwriting focus on specialty lines<\/a> and energy business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Two years ago, he joined Liberty Specialty Markets (LSM), taking on the role of CEO of LSM\u2019s Lloyd\u2019s business and president for its UK and Middle East and North African activities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>His role involves leads roughly 400 people across the insurer\u2019s Dubai, London and regional UK hubs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>LSM\u2019s mission<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Prato stressed that LSM wants to be viewed as a leading specialty carrier with a reputation not just for expertise but collaboration, with strong relationships and partnerships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Prato emphasised that LSM prioritises consistency for its brand and culture across the market. \u201cThere are things we already are that we would like to keep being. One of them is being recognised for expertise and leadership,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Another is people. \u201cWe are a company that is recognised for being very good around people. Every decision we make, high up on the list of factors to consider, is the impact on the people,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Market change means adaptation, he acknowledged. \u201cWe are cognisant that the market is evolving quickly. The role of carriers, the role of brokers, the role of the market as infrastructure, is changing fast,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is an opportunity for us to reflect on what we want to keep being and what we want to be new.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe want to continue to be leaders in the market, creating value through our underwriting, not at the expense of being a great place to work, and we want to be part of this new movement that incorporates new systems, processes and tools,\u201d Prato added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Baby steps for AI<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>LSM is starting to explore <a href=\"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/content\/advantagego-unveils-underwriting-workbench-3\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">algorithmic and automated digital approaches to underwriting<\/a>, albeit cautiously, he revealed, as many in the market experiment with artificial intelligence (AI).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe steps we are taking are baby steps,\u201d he said. \u201cSome of what we do today is ripe to accept some degree of automation. I am going to stop short of saying full automation because I do not think much of what we do is ready for that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The rationale is practical, rather than aggressive in its ambitions, he suggested. \u201cIt\u2019s about being up to date, being at the forefront\u2026so that we can lead the market,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>AI experimentation is underway across underwriting, claims and client facing roles. \u201cThe first steps we are taking are to assist with underwriting, to use AI to learn from our engineering information and to help digest enormous volumes of data,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Claims management is also ripe for greater automation efforts, he suggested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe are using AI to read first notices of loss and help identify points of correlation. Patterns that were not identified before can become visible,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The potential is exponential, of course, as development of technology and its rollout accelerates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe risk landscape is changing very quickly. We can rely less on statistics to help us understand the risk of today. AI could sense real time risk and find trend changes,\u201d Prato added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Soft market potential<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The commercial re\/insurance market is softening, Prato acknowledged, but his comments suggested room for growth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt has reached and maybe slightly passed the point of inflection. I still think 2025 and maybe even 2026 will be solid trading years,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Cycle management is embedded into LSM\u2019s approach. \u201cWe are measuring things we were not measuring before. We are deciding beforehand what actions we will take when certain triggers get hit,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe want to be first movers. We do not believe the cycles will be any less pronounced in the future,\u201d he continued.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Opportunities remain despite an emerging and evolving risk environment, picking cyber as a line of business that has been soft for some time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThere is plenty of opportunity to grow in cyber. Anything in demand as a result of changes to the energy systems or the enormous amounts of investment going into infrastructure,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>London\u2019s competitive advantage still rests on its human core, he stressed, which technology is there to serve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cMarkets like London create special value on the back of relationships, and those relationships are difficult to build in any other way than being in front of each other,\u201d Prato added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>President of Liberty Specialty Markets in the UK and MENA and CEO of Liberty Managing Agency at Lloyd\u2019s Luis Prato explains how London should grow even as the market softens and continues its digital transformation and AI projects. London felt like home to Luis Prato long before he oversaw businesses writing more than two and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10232,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,26],"tags":[10,14],"line-of-business":[23,28,20],"class_list":["post-10245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-podcasts","category-latest-insights","tag-exposure","tag-underwriting-workbench","line-of-business-energy","line-of-business-general-liability","line-of-business-property"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10245","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=10245"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10245\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10245"},{"taxonomy":"line-of-business","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.advantagego.com\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/line-of-business?post=10245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}