With 40 years of experience in insurance brokerage, Paul Scope is confident he knows what to do as chief executive of Acrisure’s new Bermuda office.

He has been chairman of Ardonagh Specialty (Bermuda) and Willis Towers Watson Bermuda. He also founded Park International, acquired by JLT in 2007 to become JLTPark.

“I have done this before and I am doing it again,” Mr Scope said. “We have hit the ground running.”

The new office focuses on wholesale insurance broking for its global clients.

Mr Scope has spent the past three months hand picking staff he knows and trusts. Acrisure Bermuda has a team of seven but he envisions it will grow to between 20 and 25 in the next five years.

The firm plans to move from 32 Reid Street to Mintflower Place on Par-la-Ville Road in January.

They are concentrating on professional liability — directors and officers and employment practices at the moment — but plan for property and casualty, cyber and other lines.

“We have not done any cyber yet, but we have the capabilities to do so,” Mr Scope said. “We intend to get a specialist trained up for that.”

He said there was still a lot of uncertainty around cyber with large clients asking if they could buy enough limit to make it worthwhile taking the risk off the balance sheet, while boards were asking whether to buy cyber insurance. Mr Scope is sure demand for it will grow.

He still remembers when directors and officers liability first got going in Bermuda.

“That, too, had a stuttering start,” he said. “People asked who would buy it and was there enough limit. Was the cover right?”

He said the markets were not sure if they were getting enough premium for cyber.

“If you do get a ransomware attack, that could be a significant claim,” Mr Scope said. “I have clients that just don't buy cyber insurance because there is not enough limit in the market. However, there is between $400 million and $800 million for the right risk.”

Cyber is definitely an area they want to target.

“If you can get new business that you haven’t had before from the same clients, it is a win, right?” he said.

In the decades since Mr Scope started Park in 1989, he has seen more markets and capacity develop in Bermuda.

“Existing markets have de-concentrated their limits or capacity,” he said. “Instead of offering $50 million at any one time, they may be offering $25 million, but there are new markets coming in to fill that gap.”

He said there was still a billion dollars of casualty insurance and well over $500 million of directors and officers, liability and significant capacity everywhere else, all right here in Bermuda.

“The US brokers want to tap that for their clients and they have to use a wholesale broker like we have started to do that,” he said.