Amwins acquisition 'rejuvenating' for Business Risk Partners’ relationships

By Chris Munro

May 7 - (The Insurer) - Despite Business Risk Partners’ concerns that being acquired by Amwins would cause issues given the MGA’s client base is predominantly comprised of wholesalers, the platform’s president and CEO Lisa Doherty said the deal has been “rejuvenating” for its relationships.

This publication exclusively reported in September 2023 that BRP had been acquired by wholesale broking and underwriting specialist Amwins.

BRP launched in 2000 by Doherty and her sister Linda Boborodea.

The Windsor, Connecticut-based business writes a portfolio of professional, management and cyber liability business.

Speaking during the Target Markets Program Administrators Association’s mid-year meeting in Dallas, Texas on Tuesday, Doherty said that in the lead to BRP’s acquisition by Amwins, the MGA’s distribution “was almost entirely wholesale.”

As Doherty explained, given that BRP was bought by a wholesaler, and one that was the MGA’s biggest client, “we had some dancing we had to do with our customers.”

“We were very transparent about it,” she said.

“Your relationships and your integrity in this business matter, and we had to be very clear that nothing was changing and we were still on our system.”

As Doherty explained, with Amwins being its new owner, the wholesaler was able to see BRP’s system, but she said “they weren’t combining our data.”

“You have to have all of these conversations, and then actually execute as if the business is not changing.”

She said BRP now gets a little more feedback on its deals when working with Amwins, and the wholesaler is now “more likely to take our call or our meeting.”

“But at the end of the day, they are a broker, and they eat what they kill, and they can’t give us the business if we’re not the best deal on the table because they’ll lose it, and they’re just not going to take that chance.

“It’s been a really interesting process for us to learn how to navigate that and fight to win business, and it’s been rejuvenating across all of our relationships.”

Doherty said that, especially during the first year of being owned by Amwins, she had expected more change, but “nothing happened”.

“Now we’ve done this alignment, and really the reality was we still had to go out and grow the business, and still do to this day.”