Specialist corporate insurance broker Verlingue said it has acquired independent U.K. broker ICB Group. Financial details of the deal were not released.

With the acquisition of Egham, England-based ICB, Verlingue triples its size in the U.K. market. It helps to position the group—and its U.K. subsidiary Finch—as one of the main U.K. independent insurance brokers with premiums of £130 million ($167.6 million), 175 employees and five locations, Verlingue said.

Verlingue said the acquisition:

• Consolidates the presence of Verlingue and Finch in the U.K., a priority country for Verlingue, with a large number of medium-size companies and large corporations.
• Provides ICB Group and its clients with a gateway to Europe and, more broadly, worldwide opportunities through the largest international network of independent brokers, Worldwide Broker Network (WBN).

The intention is for ICB Group and Finch to work collaboratively to further their strengths and to identify best practices in order to build a common entity for the benefits of clients, staff and profitable growth, said Verlingue, which is headquartered in Quimper, France.

“Verlingue has the ambition of being a leading family-owned independent broker in the U.K., and the combination of ICB and Finch will create a great platform from which to build,” said Jacques Verlingue, chairman of Verlingue and its parent company, Adelaide Group.

Neil Campling, CEO of ICB Group, said ICB took the “sensible view” that ICB has to evolve in order to remain relevant to clients. Campling said that as business has expanded, “many of our larger clients now have an international dynamic to their business, and so we need to ensure we are in a position to be able to service them appropriately.”

Campling explained that “as part of this, we believe it is essential that we can continue to trade effectively across the EU post-Brexit. Joining Verlingue helps ICB meet these various needs and puts our business in what we believe is the right position for the future.”

Mike Latham, managing director of Manchester, England-based Finch, said he sees “the skills, location and breadth of services that ICB offer to be hugely complementary to that of Finch.”

Verlingue has 20 locations in France, the U.K. and Switzerland., with 30 percent of its revenue generated internationally. The company said it aims to increase this figure to 50 percent. In 2016, only 5 percent of its turnover came from international business.

Source: Verlingue

*A version of this story appeared previously in our sister publication Insurance Journal.