Liberty Specialty Markets has made changes to its Australian underwriting team as part of a broader Asia-Pacific leadership shake-up.

Brett Gardiner will be chief underwriting officer for Australia and for Asia-Pacific first party. He will have product line direction and oversight of property, energy, construction, terrorism and marine across all regional markets.

Mr Gardiner is currently head of energy, property and construction and senior VP Asia-Pacific, based in Sydney, according to his LinkedIn.

Marcus Thomas will move from Sydney to Hong Kong to be chief underwriting officer for commercial in Asia and for Asia-Pacific third party. He will have oversight of casualty, professional and financial risks, cyber, financial risk solutions and global transactional solutions.

Mr Thomas has been Asia-Pacific head of casualty and professional and financial risks since February 2023, according to his LinkedIn.

Ben Hissey will lead specialty products, with oversight of accident and health in Australia, crisis management, agriculture and weather, surety, Liberty portfolio solutions, regional reinsurance and underwriting enablement. He continues as senior VP.

In other appointments, Angelo Maniatis will lead Liberty’s risk engineering function across Asia-Pacific and Shawn Anderson is Asia chief product officer for auto, accident and health, and personal lines. Mr Maniatis is currently Asia-Pacific assistant VP risk engineering for casualty.

“As Liberty unites our retail, commercial and specialty operations, these regional leaders (all internal appointments) will drive co-ordinated underwriting excellence across the region under Mike Abdallah, who continues as chief underwriting officer of Liberty International Insurance Asia-Pacific,” the company said.

A spokesperson added: “Marcus, Brett, Ben and Angelo are taking on expanded roles. Their previous responsibilities were only for Liberty Specialty Markets, and now they also have oversight for the relevant commercial portfolios for the Liberty Insurance businesses that operate across Asia.”

Liberty Insurance does not operate in Australia. 

“We did not previously have these segment CUO roles, so these are new regional roles,” the spokesperson said.