Beach expands US capabilities with new hire

Beach expands US capabilities with new hire 150 150 Haggie Partners

Beach & Associates [“Beach” or “Beach Re”] is pleased to announce the hire of Warren Berkstresser as Senior Vice President of its US reinsurance division, Beach Re. He will join at the end of October and will report to Simon Hedley, CEO of Beach North America.

Berkstresser will focus on developing Beach’s US property treaty and specialty programs business. He will also launch and run Beach’s new office in Seattle and sit on the North America office head’s executive team.

Hedley said: “I am delighted Warren will be joining Beach. The role of the treaty broker is constantly evolving – brokers need to combine the sales aspect and understanding of their marketplace, with a deep, technical knowledge. Warren perfectly embodies this 21st century approach; he has extensive analytical skills and an outstanding insight of the P&C market which complements Beach’s client focused and analytical approach to the risk transfer process. He is well respected in the market and a fantastic hire for us. I look forward to working with him to further build our property business and presence on the west coast.”

Jason Howard, CEO of Beach Group, added: “Acrisure has a significant retail property & casualty presence on the North American west coast so we are happy to be complementing this with our reinsurance capabilities. He will be vital in our US expansion plans and working with our parent Acrisure to identify mutually beneficial opportunities to build upon the Beach franchise.”

Berkstresser began his career in the reinsurance industry in 2005 within Guy Carpenter’s Instrat Global Analytics. He spent four years within the integrated analytics unit, helping develop risk transfer solutions supported by predictive, financial and catastrophe modeling analyses. In 2010, Berkstresser joined Willis Re – most recently acting as an Executive Vice President of production and broking, specializing in the property catastrophe market. There he managed a team responsible for analysis, structuring, marketing and negotiating advanced risk transfer strategies consisting of traditional reinsurance, capital market solutions, and accretive business partnerships.