Jo Sykes: Markel UK set ‘to invest in future growth’ for 2025

Jo Sykes, divisional director for broker and after the event (ATE) insurance at specialty insurer Markel UK, believes there has never been a better time to be at the company, as it looks to its targets for 2025.

This assertation comes hot on the heels of the results of 2024’s Insurance Times Awards, held on 4 December 2024, where Markel UK won two gold accolades, including Excellence in Risk Management and Specialist Insurer of the Year.

Sykes, who has been in her role at Markel for nearly a year now after long stints at Axa and Zurich, told Insurance Times that 2025 will see the introduction of a range of new initiatives for the award winning insurer, such as building its schemes business and broadening the number of regional UK brokers it works with.

She explains: “Having been here for almost a year, I have been amazed by the energy and ambition in the business and it is so exciting. What is clear is we are looking to invest in future growth.

“As a specialist insurer, our engagement with the external market is important. Since I have been here, we have launched new products and opened new offices and it is very much a people come first culture.”

Being ‘an end-to-end insurer’

Looking to the year ahead, Sykes says Markel UK has big plans.

“We are very much an end-to-end insurer,” she notes. “By delivering end-to-end solutions, brokers know that we have the capabilities to support their clients – from a startup through growth to international operations.

“We have our London market operations alongside Markel UK and we want to work together to provide new options to our broker partners.”

Sykes confirms that one way Markel UK plans to address this ambition is by investing in its “distribution capabilities” in the new year.

She adds: “We have challenged ourselves to solve the question around how we broaden our presence outside of London.

“Service is a constant theme in the business. How do we make it easier to trade for brokers? For customers, particularly at the larger end, we want to deliver the products and propositions they are looking to access.”

Partly driving this expansion focus is current market conditions – pricing is in a period of transition, Sykes says, with certain lines of business softening after years of hard market rates.

She continues: “It is a transitioning market. It is not soft, but in some of the financial lines, we have seen rating changes [that] happen when new capacity enters the market.

“We have never pulled out of a market due to rates or claims and we have been able to offer certainty in those classes. Rates might be changing, but we will not be chasing the market down.”

Growth agenda

Sykes plans for Markel UK’s “big ambitions to grow” to come to fruition “over the next five years”, supported by the use of technology.

“We are constantly evaluating how we trade and technology is part of that process,” Sykes says. “Every insurer and broker has infrastructure that is no longer fit for purpose. Insurtechs don’t have those legacy issues.”

With this in mind, Markel UK is “looking at our eTrading capabilities” – the firm has “a contractors combined policy which will go live in April [2025] and we are looking at our platforms and how we can support brokers”.

Sykes adds: “We are keen to look at our involvement in schemes for the coming year.

“We have a few schemes in place, but it is a focus for us and we will be looking at how we can work to create new schemes for brokers and their clients.”

Another area of focus for 2025 will be life sciences, such as biology, genetics, ecology and physiology.

“Life sciences is an area which is all too often misunderstood,” Sykes explains.

“We see the opportunity for us and our brokers and we are working to look at how we can better help our brokers to identify with customers in the life sciences.”

Sykes is eager to get these projects underway. She says: “There has never been a more exciting time to join an organisation which has solid investment behind it and is looking to grow.”