Conduit Re hires Nick Pritchard in Bermuda with alternative capital manager remit

Conduit Re, the pure-play reinsurance company, has hired well-known Bermuda market executive Nick Pritchard, who has joined the company as Underwriting Portfolio & Alternative Capital Manager.

Pritchard is well-known in the property catastrophe reinsurance and retrocession space and has a background that includes working with third-party reinsurance capital and insurance-linked securities (ILS) specialists.

Originally, Pritchard worked in London at Validus-owned Talbot as a catastrophe modelling analyst and then property treaty reinsurance underwriter, before becoming a U.S. property underwriter at Validus after moving to Bermuda in 2009.

He then transitioned to the third-party capital and ILS side, working at Validus’ AlphaCat Managers as a VP Underwriter, originating business and underwriting for the AlphaCat funds.

Pritchard then moved to work at underwriter Neon in 2017, spending over three and a half years at the company, where as Head of Property Reinsurance he oversaw the expansion of Neon’s property reinsurance operations, both across the its Bermuda and London offices.

Pritchard then joined Vantage Risk and held the role of Head of Property Catastrophe Underwriting for roughly two years.

Before most recently joining Aon, as Managing Director, Property Retrocession, Bermuda, a role that saw him interacting with many of the islands ILS funds and collateralized reinsurance writers, as well as the broader traditional side of the retrocession marketplace.

This month, Pritchard has joined Conduit Re, still in Bermuda, in the role of Underwriting Portfolio and Alternative Capital Manager.

We believe he becomes Conduit Re’s first explicitly alternative capital focused employee, suggesting that as the reinsurance company grows, alternative sources of capital and the ILS market are likely to become increasingly important to it, with Pritchard set to manage relationships there.

The addition of Pritchard will provide a focus point for the reinsurers’ discussions and trading with alternative markets and ILS investors.