Horseshoe transitions to Artex brand, mission stays the same: Faries

Today, Artemis can report that leading insurance-linked securities (ILS) market facilitator Horseshoe has transitioned to sit underneath the Artex brand of its parent, but CEO of newly formed Artex Capital Solutions Kathleen Faries told us that this doesn’t change the mission to be the best-in-class ILS service provider.

Artex Risk Solutions, a subsidiary of insurance and reinsurance brokerage giant Arthur J. Gallagher & Co., acquired Bermuda-headquartered specialist ILS, insurance or reinsurance management and fund administration, servicing, and risk transformation specialist Horseshoe back in 2019.

With that acquisition, Artex established a market-leading position for insurance-linked securities (ILS) market facilitation and servicing, and now all of that expertise and product offering will sit under the Artex brand as the Horseshoe company name is sunset.

“Artex expanded its ILS offerings with the acquisition of Horseshoe in 2019 and, until now, Horseshoe’s operations fell under the Artex business segment ILS (Insurance Linked Securities). Now, Horseshoe will be called Artex,” Kathleen Faries, CEO, Capital Solutions, Artex explained to Artemis.

“We’ve always been more than just an ILS specialist firm and the Artex name represents our wide range of client services, including fund administration across ILS, private equity and hedge funds, insurance management, commercial outsourcing, corporate service and other advisory and professional services,” Faries said.

But the move changes nothing as far as the original mission of Horseshoe and the ILS focused teams at Artex, as they come together under one banner to continue their mission to offer an ILS centre of excellence to clients.

Faries told us, “Our mission will stay the same – to help our clients find a better way to connect risk with capital. As the Capital Solutions segment of Artex, we will continue to provide our clients with the same best-in-class service as we always have.”

There are opportunities to further expand the ILS footprint of the Artex business as well, Faries believes, with regional expansion now a focus.

“Expanding our Fund Services footprint into Europe is in focus, and increasing our advisory, corporate and professional services offering definitely remains a priority,” Faries explained. “We have also recently brought on board another actuary, so we are keen to keep expanding our actuarial and analytics offering and client base as well.”

In addition, Faries believes this more integrated approach is set to deliver greater value and opportunity to clients.

She commented, “Artex already had a strong ILS offering, and both Artex and Horseshoe have always been recognized as collaborative, market-leading and entrepreneurial. Together we’re positioned better than ever to blend expertise with creativity, data with strategy and efficiency with execution to deliver best-in-class account management, communication, coordination and governance.

“Our shared purpose of helping clients find a better way and our enhanced connectivity will result in greater solutions and improved efficiencies as we continue to partner with our global clients.”

Part of the client-delivery promise is to continue innovating in ILS and other areas of collateralised reinsurance as well, with data services also set to become supportive of core offerings to add greater client value.

“As a global ILS facilitation leader, the Artex Capital Solutions segment will continue to look for areas where we can leverage our insights and expertise to drive innovation and efficiencies for the ILS market,” Faries said.

Further explaining that, “Providing more industry data insights and being a conduit for ILS industry-wide initiatives and discussion is another way we can drive innovation because we are a centralized source for collaboration.”

Faries sees exciting prospects for insurance-linked securities (ILS) as well, with opportunities in new risks, and Artex intends to help the ILS market expand its remit.

“We are optimistic about the future of the ILS market,” Faries told us. “I am encouraged by the increased amount of discussion and activity around Casualty, Specialty and Cyber.

“We intend to be at the forefront of helping investors access more risk as efficiently and transparently as possible.

“To that end, we will continue to evolve our own infrastructure and expertise to support this expansion and evolution of the market.”