Press release - 6 March 2024 09:40

Allianz Commercial strengthens regional distribution

Allianz Commercial has announced the appointment of four regional distribution managers covering the South, North, London, Midlands and the South West regions to ensure that brokers across the UK are fully supported within the market.

All four regional distribution managers will be responsible for overseeing the sales and distribution strategy for Allianz Commercial. They’ll be responsible for establishing long-term relationships with partner brokers and mutual customers through regular engagement and offering solutions that provide peace of mind for customers.

Mike Thomas, director of distribution for digital and mid-market, Allianz Commercial commented: “Whilst we have strong long-established relationship with our partner brokers, I’m sure that these relationships will develop further with the leadership from Victoria, Viral, Mark and Julie. Their expertise will enable us to deliver the best of Allianz to our partner brokers and customers and deliver our strategic growth plans.”

Responsible for the South region is Victoria Ashman. Having joined Allianz in 2010 in the corporate partner team, she managed key partner relationships before taking on the position of key account manager. More recently Victoria has held the regional operations manager role for the South before becoming a strategic account manager for some of Allianz’s largest accounts.

Viral Patel takes on the position of regional distribution manager, Midlands & South West region. He started his career at Allianz in 2005 as an engineering assistant business development underwriter, before moving into a business development role where he managed a panel of broker relationships and later a development manager role leading the engineering development team across the Midlands and South West region. More recently, Viral was distribution manager for Engineering Construction & Power in the London & Real Estate markets.

Mark O’Brien has been appointed regional distribution manager, North. He joined Allianz in 2011 as a business developer before stepping into the position of distribution manager for Manchester in 2017. Mark joined Allianz from Axa where he held internal and external account executive roles.

Managing the London region is Julie O’Donovan who has been appointed London Market Manager. In this role Julie with lead the Broker Development Manager team and will have overall responsibility for the Mid Market Distribution strategy within the London Region, in close alignment with the Large Corp and Specialty segments Distribution teams. She will report to Alastair Warren-Upham the Head of Distribution, London for Allianz Commercial in the UK. Julie has a wealth of experience having worked or Allianz in Ireland, Australia, within the London team as well as a spell in Singapore. More recently she has worked as a Strategic Account Manager responsible for leading a number of national broker relationships.

Topics

Insurance, Insurance issues

Regions

About Allianz Holdings plc

Allianz Holdings plc is the non-regulated holding company which owns the principal insurance operations of Allianz SE in Great Britain including Allianz Insurance

About Allianz

The Allianz Group is one of the world's leading insurers and asset managers with more than 122 million* private and corporate customers in more than 70 countries. Allianz customers benefit from a broad range of personal and corporate insurance services, ranging from property, life and health insurance to assistance services to credit insurance and global business insurance. Allianz is one of the world’s largest investors, managing around 717 billion euros** on behalf of its insurance customers. Furthermore, our asset managers PIMCO and Allianz Global Investors manage about 1.7 trillion euros** of third-party assets. Thanks to our systematic integration of ecological and social criteria in our business processes and investment decisions, we are among the leaders in the insurance industry in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index. In 2022, over 159,000 employees achieved total revenues of 152.7 billion euros and an operating profit of 14.2 billion euros for the group***.

*Including non-consolidated entities with Allianz customers.
**As of March 31, 2023
***As reported – not adjusted to reflect the application of IFRS 9 and IFRS 17.

Cautionary note regarding forward-looking statements

This document includes forward-looking statements, such as prospects or expectations, that are based on management's current views and assumptions and subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties. Actual results, performance figures, or events may differ significantly from those expressed or implied in such forward-looking statements. Deviations may arise due to changes in factors including, but not limited to, the following: (i) the general economic and competitive situation in the Allianz Group's core business and core markets, (ii) the performance of financial markets (in particular market volatility, liquidity, and credit events), (iii) the frequency and severity of insured loss events, including those resulting from natural catastrophes, and the development of loss expenses, (iv) mortality and morbidity levels and trends, (v) persistency levels, (vi) particularly in the banking business, the extent of credit defaults, (vii) interest rate levels, (viii) currency exchange rates, most notably the EUR/USD exchange rate, (ix) changes in laws and regulations, including tax regulations, (x) the impact of acquisitions including and related integration issues and reorganization measures, and (xi) the general competitive conditions that, in each individual case, apply at a local, regional, national, and/or global level. Many of these changes can be exacerbated by terrorist activities.

No duty to update

The Allianz Group assumes no obligation to update any information or forward-looking statement contained herein, save for any information we are required to disclose by law.