Capita gathers new forces for rebrand and turnover hike

Capita is aiming to double the size of its intermediary business over the next three years while completing a rebrand.

Personal lines broker Hero, snapped up from LV= for £15m in March, and classic car specialist Lancaster, will be rebranded Capita Insurance Distribution (CID). White labelling arm BDML Connect will also be rolled into CID.

CID managing director Mark Townsend said: “This is about bringing it all together under one umbrella. Capita Insurance Distribution is very much going to be the market-facing brand that will be on the letterheads.”

Townsend wants to double CID’s £194m turnover, through both organic growth and acquisition.

It has undergone huge growth in the past four years, snapping up Hero, Lancaster and BDML to become the fifth-largest personal lines intermediary. A total of 800 staff work on 880,000 policies.

He said: “The ambition is to double the size of the business over the next three years, in terms of top line and bottom line.

“Within that, Hero is going to be an important part of the business.”

Townsend has beefed up the team by appointing Andrew Beer as chief operating officer, to oversee IT, operations and management information, and Stuart Anderson as sales and marketing director.

Anderson was previously strategic development director at Homeserve Energy Services. Beer has worked at Capita since 2005 and held a number of roles including managing director of insurance services business process outsourcing (BPO).

Townsend said: “These appointments reflect the size and complexity of the business, especially following the recent acquisitions of Hero and Lancaster."