Re|Insurance PR specialists

As climate events intensify, exposure is expanding, and loss severities from secondary perils, such as convective storms, wildfires, floods and hail, are no longer easily dwarfed by hurricanes or earthquakes. These perils have contributed significantly to the insured losses in the last few years, accounting for the substantial portion of the industry’s financial burden.

Hence, traditional “secondary” perils tag may no longer fit within that frame, given their growing role in risk models, pricing, capacity, and treaty design.

Historically, where the primary peril defined the catastrophe boundary, secondary perils lived inside it, contributing to tail losses more sporadically and with less certainty. But the lines between primary and secondary perils are blurring.

Scott Egan, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of specialty insurer and reinsurer SiriusPoint, said the firm is a broader and more balanced business today, giving it the ability to move and redeploy capital across lines, segments, and geographies where there are attractive returns.

SiriusPoint recently reported its second-quarter 2026 results, generating net income available to common shareholders of $69 million, up approximately 16% year over year, while gross written premiums increased 5.5% to $981.5 million.

Nine-year-old Malita Norgrove, who has quadriplegic cerebral palsy, will now be able to move around on her own using specialist eye-gaze wheelchair technology.

The equipment, which she controls using only her eye movements, became a reality after Basingstoke-based life insurance broker Reassured raised £16,000 to help her family purchase it.

Her mother, Sophie, said: “That funding will cover everything Malita needs, which is far beyond what we thought might be possible.

“We are so grateful to everyone involved, the sales agents who gave up their time, those who took part in Tough Mudder, everyone who donated through payroll, and of course the company for not only supporting the fundraising but also covering the administrative fee, which I never expected.

“It’s a truly phenomenal achievement.”

Novella, the artificial intelligence (AI)-powered wholesale insurance broker, has announced the appointment of Sarah Bourdeau as Head of Growth.

Bourdeau will lead Novella’s efforts to expand its independent agent distribution network across the US and grow relationships with larger national retail brokerages.

Max Kane, founder and chief executive officer of Novella, said: “Very few people spend a whole career inside an industry and can still see what’s broken. Sarah Bourdeau is one of those people. She’s spent more than 20 years bringing insurance products to market but still deeply understands where distribution is broken. I’m excited to welcome her as Novella’s Head of Growth to help fix wholesale.”

QBE Re has doubled in size since 2020, and plans to double its scale again by 2030 to underwrite $6bnn of business.

But how can this continued expansion be achieved in a market undergoing significant softening?

According to QBE Re managing director Nick Hankin, the business is not relying on one or two big bets, but is targeting broad-based expansion across product and geography.

He told Insurance Insider that QBE Re benefits from harnessing the data and broker partnerships of the wider QBE group, as well as its capital strength and balance sheet.

And in this week’s news discussion, Insurance Insider editor Fiona Robertson explains what is influencing the rapid growth in the London smart follow market

US technology startup Orbital Sentry has secured pre-seed funding to accelerate the development of continuous satellite monitoring for wildfire risk.

The funding round was led by venture capital firm Ridgeline, with participation from fellow investors Superorganism and Hustle Fund.

The investment will be used to build a real-time monitoring capability that will deliver persistent infrared imaging platforms for wildfire detection and defence.

Orbital Sentry said by having more “persistent data” wildfire detection can become faster and catastrophe model validation will be improved.

Orbital Sentry said it is actively building relationships with re/insurers who can benefit from earlier and more precise fire intelligence.

Orbital Sentry has closed a pre-seed financing round to develop persistent infrared imaging systems designed to operate from geosynchronous orbit.

Ridgeline led the round, with participation from Superorganism and Hustle Fund. Orbital Sentry did not disclose the amount raised.

The company is developing a dual-use platform for defense, wildfire detection, industrial monitoring, severe weather tracking and other applications requiring continuous observation of events on Earth.

Orbital Sentry’s satellites are intended to operate in geostationary orbit, moving in alignment with Earth’s rotation so that each satellite maintains a continuous view of the same geographic region.