FTI Consulting hires from EY, Oliver Wyman, Mazars to build EMEA insurance consultancy

08 August 2019

FTI Consulting is continuing to hire staff from across the insurance sector to expand its EMEA insurance consulting team.

The consultancy group, best known for its dispute resolution and structured finance expertise, has recruited more than 10 senior industry executives to its EMEA insurance team based in London with ambitions to double again next year.

Rory O’Brien, formerly managing partner at RPC Consulting and EMB, was appointed senior managing director last year.

He has since been joined by managing director Graham Handy, previously a partner at EY where he led the development of its Asia insurance team; managing director Simon Grout, formerly a partner at Oliver Wyman; and managing director Romy Comiter, previously a partner at Mazars.  

They join Jeremy Riley, previously regional CEO with insurer RSA, and Mark Higgins, senior managing director of FTI’s Digital Science team.

Handy told InsuranceERM that FTI is offering “cross service” high-value advice from a pool of senior experts.

He identified three areas of strength for the business: risk and actuarial, including capital modelling; general strategy advice, including M&A, business integration and “doing smart things with data”; and dispute arbitration.

“We are also independent. Having to decline work because of a conflict of interest is a growing issue for some of the established consultancies, but since we do not provide audit or broking services, it’s not the same systemic problem for us,” he added.

FTI is working on a broad variety of insurance projects across future strategy, Handy noted, and has been involved in projects that use new technologies to improve operations and management.

For example, FTI recently agreed a partnership with price comparison site MoneySuperMarket, whereby FTI will use its digital and data science expertise to create a state-of-the-art visualisation portals through which all of MoneySuperMarket’s insurer and broker partners can access intelligence and insights.

FTI’s global insurance team employs close to 100 consultants, while the New York stock exchange-listed group has more than 4,700 employees worldwide.