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Senior Vice President
Wells Fargo, San Carlos, Calif.

Daly at the Bat

Peter Daly, a senior vice president with Wells Fargo Insurance Services Inc., knew that one of his technology clients was going to have a tough time renewing its directors' and officers' (D&O) insurance coverage last year.

The client had reported earnings that were below expectations and the company's stock dropped 23 percent. This led the lead underwriter to warn that the client was not going to be competitive on renewal.

"The timing was very bad," this client said. Daly had the company's chief financial officer fly to New York to meet with underwriters and tell the company's story. The company knew that it would see an increase in its premiums, but the price increase was far less than feared, in part, because the company switched primary carriers, the client said.

This client said he has worked with Daly for 12 years and has maintained the relationship because he trusts him and knows Daly will let him know if the company is buying insurance that it doesn't need. "I find him to be very client-service oriented," he said.

Daly also went to bat for another of his clients, a biotech company, in a dispute with its insurer over D&O insurance. The insurer argued there was an exclusion in the policy and, therefore, no coverage.

Daly prevailed and that meant the difference of millions of dollars in coverage, the client said. The client also gave Daly credit for successfully arranging complicated product shipment and product liability coverage for a new product.

Vice President
Heffernan Insurance Brokers, San Francisco

Broker Understands the Peer-to-Peer World

Julie K. Davis, vice president, brokerage and social media leader with Heffernan Insurance Brokers, has put her knowledge of Silicon Valley to work to help arrange for insurance for two unusual peer-to-peer start-up technology and Internet related firms.

The peer-to-peer company, a bag-check and personal courier service, needed general liability insurance on short notice in order to obtain the commercial lease for its "pop-up" store. "We had approached many, many brokers before we met Julie," this client said. But none was able to help.

Davis was the first one to understand the problem, the client said, and the broker then secured coverage for her client in 24 hours, allowing the business to open as scheduled. "We could not have done it without her guidance and expertise in the unique risks of peer-to-peer businesses," he said.

Another peer-to-peer business, a car-sharing firm, also faced serious challenges. "Nobody really knew how to approach this," the client said.

"From an insurance standpoint, it's a horse of a different color," he also said. "Insurers didn't know where to place this, it's not personal auto, and it's not fleet. It's kind of a hybrid," he said.

Once again, Davis worked with insurers and developed an innovative policy. "It is the first commercial policy ever written specifically for peer-to-peer sharing, is usage based, provides nationwide coverage for all vehicles located in markets currently served and covers a wide range of vehicles," he said.

Senior Vice President
Wells Fargo, San Carlos, Calif.

Broker Delivers Crisp and Succinct Reports

Frances Lisius is, of course, an insurance broker but she is also a value-added business partner, said one of her technology clients.

Lisius, a senior vice president at Wells Fargo Insurance Services Inc., last year led a team that conducted an in-depth analysis of this client's contingent business interruption exposure. The client is a global manufacturer with multiple suppliers around the world and wanted to assess the adequacy of its insurance limits.

Lisius and her team dug into the company's complicated, multilayered supplier relationships and produced a report that is being used not only by underwriters, but throughout the organization as an operational knowledge tool, the client said. "Underwriters loved it," she said. "It gave a crisp view of the risk they were underwriting," she said.

The senior executive team and the supply side team are also now using it as well. "It's phenomenal. That thing is still paying dividends," she said.

Lisius also helped with the evaluation of some of the key risks involved with the outsourcing of some of the transactional areas of the client's business. The key is that Lisius is not just handling insurance, but helping the client to manage the risk. "Her team is my in-bound risk management help desk," the client said.

"They are the first point of contact for any questions. And she's helped me manage the day-to-day operations of the department.

"In terms of the contribution to my organization in the past year, she's been the most impactful," the client said.

Senior Vice President
Wells Fargo, San Carlos, Calif.

Broker Takes Her Work a Step Further

Renee Polk has worked virtual miracles in arranging employee benefits coverage for technology and telecom companies that were in the midst of making acquisitions.

In one example, Polk was working with a company that was about to be acquired. After meeting with her, the acquiring company fired its incumbent broker and hired Polk, a senior vice president at Wells Fargo Insurance Services Inc., to come in and take over the merger of the employee benefits programs.

This client gave Polk credit for meeting an aggressive target and being an effective leader so that there was a "perfectly smooth transition."

This client has since started work at a new firm. "The broker they had in place was doing a fairly good job, but I knew that if I brought Renee in, she could bring it a step further," he said.

In another example, one of Polk's clients was acquiring a company and the deal was set to close just a few days before the acquired company's employee benefits were scheduled to expire. She was able to get the employees of the new company signed up for benefits on the day the acquisition closed and to get the paperwork processed so that employees would not have any gaps in coverage.

"Renee was able to sit down with us and came up with solutions," said Paul Stearns, who worked for the acquiring company and is now senior director, global total rewards at Jive Software in Palo Alto, Calif.

"I've been doing this about 30 years and I've never met someone like Renee," he said.

President
AH&T Northeast, Newark, N.J.

Where to Go for D&O

Michael Tomasulo, president of AH&T Northeast, wins kudos from his technology clients for his expertise in placing directors' and officers' (D&O) insurance, and for providing clients with outstanding service.

One of his clients, a service provider primarily to wireless carriers, faced a particularly difficult D&O renewal last year. The company had just announced a missed interest payment, the resignation of its chairman and layoffs.

In spite of all of this, Tomasulo successfully placed the company's D&O coverage and saved the company money on the placement as well. "It was not an easy year for us and he was still able to get us coverage with better pricing," the client said.

She said she has worked with Tomasulo since 2006. "I have maintained the relationship with him regardless of the company that he's worked for," she said. "That tells you the measure of his worth."

Another client said Tomasulo was able to arrange a two-year deal on his D&O, saving the company time and money. "We work with Mike Tomasulo and we think he's fantastic," this client said. "He knows his stuff inside and out."

This client's risk management department is small, but the client gave Tomasulo credit for being his "second pair of eyes and ears."

In another example, Tomasulo took a close look at a client's D&O policy and found deficiencies in the coverage.

"We're paying a third of what we were paying a few years ago," this other client said.

Senior Vice President
Wells Fargo, San Carlos, Calif.

Managing an Earthquake

Tom Whitenight, senior vice president with Wells Fargo Insurance Services Inc., played a critical role for a technology client that had just completed the acquisition of a company in Japan when the country was hit with a devastating earthquake and tsunami.

The story began in 2009 when the company declared bankruptcy and sold most of its assets to another company. Whitenight helped the client throughout that process. But it didn't end there. The new, acquiring company, Rackable Systems Inc., a data storage company, went on to acquire the bankrupt company's former Japanese operation. The ink was barely dry on the deal when Japan was hit by the earthquake and tsunami, which devastated much of the east coast and sent global supply chains into a tailspin. The Japanese operation had 272 employees and six offices in the country, one of which was in Sendai, where the earthquake and tsunami had hit.

"He was just so calm," the client said. "We didn't know what the implications would be. We had people in Sendai, people in Tokyo. It was just chaos," this client said. "The timing was just ¿ literally you just shake your head."

This client credited Whitenight with getting the coverages in place in the first place, but then for helping in the immediate aftermath to determine whether the company's employees were safe and to assess damage. Whitenight sorted out coverage issues while managing the claims process. He came through in the middle of one of the world's worst natural catastrophes, making sure his client had the appropriate coverages.

Global Practice Leader
Aon Risk Solutions
Chicago, IL

Vice President
Aon Risk Solutions
New York, NY

Vice President
Marsh
Washington, DC

Executive Vice President, North American Practice Leader
Willis
New York, NY