Thursday, 23 October 2025
RENOMIA | Gallagher plans to scale its corporate and reinsurance offering across Central & Eastern Europe, building on a three-hub model and a wholesale collaboration strategy that has already lifted intermediated premiums to roughly €80 million, with €30 million generated through the Romanian Hub, Business Development Leader CEE & CIS Dan Ungureanu told CIJ EUROPE in an interview. Ungureanu, who also leads the International Broking Centre (IBC) hubs in Romania and Poland, said the co-brand combines Prague-headquartered RENOMIA — the largest independent insurance broker and risk consultant in the region — with US-listed Gallagher, which acquired a 30 percent stake in 2019. The IBC concept, launched with twin hubs in Bucharest and Prague, is now adding a third in Warsaw.
Ungureanu explained that the Romanian operations, traditionally focused on retail and SME markets, have evolved through the IBC into handling complex risk placement, multinational programmes, and alternative risk transfer. The hubs now serve large clients operating in multiple jurisdictions, combining insurance, reinsurance, and ART tools such as captives and parametric structures. A key differentiator is wholesale collaboration — RENOMIA | Gallagher places and services risks for partnering brokers that lack international reach. The Bucharest hub has expanded from one employee to 16 specialists in four years, with multi-market programmes driving most of its recent growth.
The Warsaw hub is in recruitment, reflecting Poland’s market scale and labour dynamics. Ungureanu identified Poland, Czechia and Romania as the core IBC markets, with operations extending “from the Baltics to the Balkans.” He expects Ukraine to become a key market for reconstruction once conditions allow.
Commenting on market conditions, Ungureanu said large corporates are prioritising programme efficiency over cutting protection. He pointed to two- to three-year arrangements, portfolio clustering across borders, and combined insurance-reinsurance structures to improve pricing. Some firms still limit cover to bank-mandated levels, but most focus on optimising structure rather than reducing scope. Consolidating multiple national programmes into a single master policy takes 12–24 months of adjustment before clients see benefits in administration, unified wording, and capacity leverage.
Cyber risk has become the top concern for corporate boards, followed closely by natural catastrophe exposure. RENOMIA | Gallagher has built a dedicated cyber division providing vulnerability scanning, maturity assessments, phishing drills, and penetration testing before designing insurance layers. Demand is rising across real estate, healthcare, and professional services as companies move from reactive cover to proactive resilience.
Ungureanu noted that global catastrophe events still influence local premiums through reinsurance and retrocession, even without local claims. He highlighted strong global reinsurance capital in 2024, with new entrants such as MGAs in financial lines. While treaty terms have tightened, the advantage lies in facultative reinsurance, which enables brokers to assemble bespoke capacity for complex risks.
He expects alternative risk transfer and captive use to expand among corporates paying eight-figure annual premiums, using captive layers for retentions and buying excess layers on the open market. Looking ahead, he forecasts property and casualty rates to stay broadly flat, with financial lines trending lower due to increased capacity and competition.
Regulatory ESG pressure is intensifying, but markets still avoid absolute exclusions. Pricing and terms are expected to favour stronger ESG performers, while hard-to-place sectors may rely on captives or partial retentions.
Ungureanu said knowledge transfer happens through cross-hub teams rather than national silos, supported by digital client portals offering real-time visibility of policies, spend, and loss ratios. The group continues acquiring brokers across CEE, positioning itself as a long-term, family-backed consolidator.
For RENOMIA | Gallagher, Central & Eastern Europe remains “home ground.” The strategy integrates consultative broking, wholesale alliances, facultative and ART expertise, and cyber and nat-cat services to deliver global solutions locally. With Romania, Poland and Czechia at the centre, the firm expects demand for complex, multi-market risk management solutions to rise as regional corporates expand and reconstruction opportunities emerge.
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