2020 was a year of learning and innovation for those of us working in the field of insurance industry mergers and acquisitions. So far, it appears that 2021 will be another year of abundant challenges and opportunities.

The past couple of years have seen a large volume of insurance industry transactions, with many deals effected through highly competitive auction processes. During this period, various drivers have converged to motivate strategic buyers to seek deals. These have included traditional M&A objectives such as greater geographic, distribution channel and product diversity; the potential to grow premium volume and achieve economies of scale more quickly by acquisition than could be achieved by reliance solely on internal growth; and the potential to achieve synergistic advantages by combining companies with complementary strengths and talent pools.