Like the rival companies that have set up in Bermuda since 2001, Quanta saw an opportunity. Indeed, each company has claimed it saw that the time was ripe to jump into the sector with there being a void in capacity across nearly every line after the devastation left by the 9/11 terrorist attacks and that the low supply of insurance premium was pushing prices up to (finally) profitable levels.

Quanta executives were no different than others in recognising this as their chance ? but that may be where the similarities rest.

But not all see it that way: Critics say that Quanta got into the market too late ? several years after most of the other new companies, with the early birds now being fairly established names in insurance circles.

Quanta only listed on the Nasdaq in May of this year ? which was a mere eight months after it raised $505 million in initial net capital from investors last September.

Quanta is in fact the latest class four insurer to set up on the Island ? with no new incorporations of this type of large, highly capitalised company since.

But the timing of its incorporation aside, the company has set a pretty impressive pace in the the time since it got up and running.

Quanta?s senior management ? CEO Tobey Russ and COO Michael Murphy ? told The Royal Gazette that technology, strict underwriting discipline (the company will not write lines of business below certain established floors) and a firm financial approach to the running of the business would see them do well, whether the market is in hard or soft phase.

They have also vowed to follow a path of organic growth so as to avoid the legacy issues that have plagued so many of the sector?s established firms in recent years, forcing millions of dollars in reserve increases.

Today the Quanta empire ? bearing in mind that it is not yet a year on from its initial capital raising ? comprises a Bermuda holding company, Bermuda-based insurance and reinsurance operations, an Irish company with a UK-based branch and perhaps most impressively, the company has licences as admitted carriers and to write excess and surplus (E&S) coverage in 42 US states.

The company is also already making a name for itself on the consulting side, an area it was able to break into with the acquisition of Environmental Strategies Consulting (ESC).

Behind this already large operation is 254 employees, working from one side of the Atlantic to the other.

Although only 20 of those staff are in Bermuda, Mr. Russ said a significant percentage of the business they write is on Bermuda paper and that would continue on the reinsurance side.

Mr. Murphy added that specialty insurance lines would also be largely written out of the Bermuda office.

Mr. Russ added that in most ways, Quanta has gone about its business differently than the path rival companies took.

For one, the company?s founders raised initial funding for the venture through what is called a 144a private offering, enabling them to go directly to the institutional market and securing backing from mutual and pension funds.

The company said 180 such investors signed on and none took on more than six percent ownership of the company.

Mr. Russ said the benefits of this kind of shareholder base was a long-term approach from investors (most of the investors have held on through the IPO process earlier this year), and no one party has enough of a stake to have undue influence on how the company is run.

This stick-with-the-company approach from investors is in contrast to what has been seen from the majority of investors that behind Bermuda?s other newest re/insurers.

Most of Quanta?s Bermuda-based rivals were not only backed by significant investments from only a handful of institutional investors ? but have seen those investors, some venture capitalists, withdraw funding now that the firms are public and market conditions are changing.

Mr. Russ said Quanta?s relatively small initial capitalisation was also a ?prudent? way to go.

The company?s $500 million in seed money was significantly less than the $1 billion plus that Arch, Montpelier, Endurance, Allied World Assurance Company (AWAC) and AXIS each raked in when they opened their doors.

Quanta has also diversified its business by marrying its specialist re/insurance offerings with a highly-specialised consulting arm.

Those technical skills, as well as a carefully-recruited staff base described as Quanta?s ?greatest resource?, were said to be what truly set Quanta apart.

On the primary side, Quanta writes professional liability, marine, technical risk and aviation, environmental liability, fidelity and crime, surety, technical risk property and structured insurance.

On the reinsurance side, Quanta has a more specialised focus, writing casualty and professional treaty reinsurance, property treaty reinsurance, marine, technical risk and aviation reinsurance and structured reinsurance. The third component is the consulting arm which offers such services as investigation, remediation and engineering services.

Here, it said it shines most in the environmental consulting it offers, with services including environmental site protection, litigation support, insurance claims management, regulatory compliance plans, regulatory permits, training, technical reviews and policy/procedure manuals.

Mr. Russ and Mr. Murphy claim the company they have built now offers the ?greatest depth? of environmental services of any insurance company.

In large part, they can make that statement because of buying ESC which puts an environmental engineering company with 17 years under its belt at Quanta?s service.

They said having the environmental consulting business has been a boon to their ability to best assess risks because they are able to do it in a ?technically competent way; the underwriters are supported by the environmental engineers. This is a value-added prospect for clients.

?What we wanted to do was differentiate ourselves by offering engineering services,? Mr. Murphy said. But that technical approach goes beyond consulting. For example, Quanta said Nasdaq was a better fit for the company than the popular-with-most-Bermuda-insurers New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) because the former is fully electronic.

Mr. Russ added that the Quanta companies all operate on ?real-time management information systems?.

?Serious returns require technical depth,? the company said. Mr. Russ said that even in lines that had seen significant softening ? or premium drops ? like Director & Officers (D&O) liability coverage, it was still possible to ensure underwriting discipline with a broad risk assessment process including technology.

Although many companies talk about their ?technology spend? and the importance of technology, the men behind Quanta said that technology is coupled with a greater numbers approach to running the business.

It may well be a re/insurance operation, but they said they run it more like a bank.

?Many of our employees were greatly frustrated in how things were going (at the companies they worked for). We felt that there was a better way to engage in this business. We felt there was room for a specialty lines company with the right capital structure and with a highly disciplined approach,? Mr. Russ said.

They said that in addition to normally accepted accounting methods (GAAP) they also use a second method of crunching the numbers, called net present value (NPV), which gives the ?real economics of the business?.

Those ?real? numbers are also used in the company?s employee compensation plan that is designed to reward underwriters when shareholders benefit.