Changes for PIB Group executive team in readiness for Chapter Three of growth

Thursday 15 September 2022

PIB Group Ltd (‘PIB’) is strengthening its top team in preparation for Chapter Three in its evolution and to help accelerate its international reach. The changes will see internal movements as well as the arrival of external heavy hitters as the Group continues to deliver on its ambition to build a leading specialist and diversified pan-European insurance distribution business.

Effectively immediately, the Executive team has grown through the appointment of Onno Janssen in a newly created role as CEO for Europe, and Matthew Crane as CEO for Underwriting.

Ryan Brown, who is currently the Group’s Chief Financial Officer, is promoted into the role of Deputy Group CEO and will transition in the coming weeks. He will assume further leadership responsibilities and focus solely on supporting Group CEO Brendan McManus in delivering growth and driving the Group forward.

Ryan Brown, Deputy Group CEO commented: “It’s been six incredible years as PIB’s Chief Financial Officer, and I’m delighted to be helping to lead the next chapter of our evolution in my new position of Deputy Group CEO. It feels like a natural next step in PIB’s journey as well as my own, which frees me up to spend more time with our businesses and talented people, as well as dedicating more support to our Divisional CEOs in driving both organic and inorganic growth. We have many exciting times ahead.”

Bernard Mageean is retiring, facilitated by the arrival of Matthew Crane. Fiona Andrews who is currently the Group’s Chief People Officer will also retire at the end of the year. Successors with exceptional experience have already been secured for both Ryan and Fiona and these will be announced in the coming weeks.

Nick Mountifield who is MD for PIB’s Schemes & Affinities also joined the Executive team earlier this year. Elsewhere in the Group, new hire Gavin Buckley will take over the reins from Andy Tedstone to spearhead insurer strategy and engagement across the Group. This will enable Andy, who is currently in a dual role, to focus his attention as CEO to Cobra Network and its increasing membership.

Brendan McManus, CEO for PIB Group, commented: “I’m thrilled to welcome Onno, Matthew and Gavin to PIB Group. Their broad experience and skills will play an invaluable part in delivering on our growth and international aspirations. At the same time, I want to congratulate Ryan on his promotion to Deputy Group CEO and wish Fiona and Bernard all the best in their forthcoming retirements. I personally feel really proud of these movements and appointments, which are testament to the types of opportunities we have within PIB to grow our talent and look after people, as well as being an attractive career destination to highly experienced newcomers.”

Who’s who

Onno Janssen, CEO Europe

Originally from the Netherlands and now living in Germany, multi-lingual Onno Janssen is an experienced Chief Executive Officer, with rich experience across many countries throughout Europe and globally. He joins PIB after serving 21 years at Aon, which included responsibilities as CEO Central & Eastern Europe, CIS & Greece, CEO for Germany, and several other senior posts. He most recently served as CEO for Risk Consulting EMEA & UK. Prior to Aon, Onno also worked for Shell and KLM.

In his role, Onno will bring together the talent and expertise within PIB’s growing European retail insurance footprint in order to promote collaboration between countries and help drive organic growth. He will also support and intensify efforts for advancing into new or existing markets.

“I feel both honored and humbled to have the opportunity to become PIB’s new CEO for Europe. I set myself a challenge that my next career move had to be with a firm with an exciting vision, that was truly entrepreneurial and staffed with excellent people. It didn’t take me long to decide to join PIB which easily meets all of those criteria, and also offer the opportunity to build something scalable from a very early stage. All of this was too good to resist.”

Matthew Crane, CEO for Underwriting

Matthew Crane joins as CEO for Underwriting which includes PIB’s specialist UK MGA known as Q Underwriting along with Acquinex, a pan-European W&I MGA. With an impressive career of 30 years, Matthew is an experienced insurance executive in underwriting, broking, sales and distribution and client management spanning many parts of the globe and being heavily involved with multinational clients.

He joins PIB most recently from Amwins Global Risks (formerly THB) where he held the position of CEO, as well as International President for Amwins. Prior to that, Matthew spent the majority of his career at QBE in senior roles including Executive Director for Market Management, Managing Director for UK & Ireland, as well as Director for QBE Motor & Product Protection.

“I’ve been observing PIB Group for a while, and I've been impressed with the direction it has been going. It has a brilliant leadership team, high quality businesses, and the ambition to be a game changer. When you see people do extraordinary things as a collective, you can't help but hope that your paths may cross. I’m absolutely delighted to join when PIB is at a critical point in its international expansion, and to lead its successful MGA that is fleet of foot with entrepreneurial, underwriter driven, client focused people.”

Gavin Buckley, Markets Director

Gavin Buckley has been appointed to lead the strategy for market placement and engagement across PIB Group. He joins after serving 21 years at Aon, having most recently held the position of Head of Product Development and Marketing to oversee the development of innovative, market leading products and marketing/distribution strategies. His skills and experience will also compliment PIB’s international activities as his focus will be to drive the development of PIB’s proposition for insurer partners and building new capabilities across the Group for the benefit of clients.

Exponential growth

Since forming in 2015, PIB’s acquisition and integration activity has led to building a strong national presence across many channels and sectors throughout the UK.

Attention has increasingly turned to developing the international footprint which encompasses retail, wholesale, reinsurance and MGA operations across Ireland, Germany, Denmark, Poland, Spain and the Netherlands. Further investment is planned in PIB’s existing territories and with new ones in sight as additional opportunities arise to support the Group’s long-term growth and diversification ambitions.

Brendan McManus commented: “Strengthening our senior team, corporate structure and governance is one of the many critical parts to the next phase of PIB’s expansion journey. Chapter One was about laying the foundations and establishing our infrastructure to create a platform and strong capabilities in the UK. Chapter Two is about maintaining our growth and expanding our footprint across Europe, while remaining committed to delivering great organic growth through the power of collaboration. We’ve grown 50% year on year, and now we are gearing up for Chapter Three which will have a much wider remit so that we can double again in size. Promoting Ryan and investing in our executive team through the addition of Onno and Matthew takes us another step closer to achieving that, and they will bring immediate value by sharing a different perspective through their international experiences and capabilities. Our ambition remains laser focused on creating a Group which can remain independent and privately financed for many years to come. The investment we are making now in the Group Executive establishes a team which will enable us to do that.”

Thirteen investments have been made so far in 2022, mostly in Europe. Around twenty-five more are in exclusivity, with some expected to close before the year is out.