Steadfast says it will “continue reviewing” options to bring more of its brokers and underwriting agencies together – but stresses such mergers are often driven by the businesses themselves.

The giant listed insurance group has overseen a number of significant collaborations, most recently bringing seven agencies into Miramar Group, which followed the combination of Mansions, Dawes and Argis into Prevail.

On the broking side, the operations of Coverforce were last year split between other Steadfast-owned businesses, and Insurance House and Network Insurance Group were brought together as Network Insurance House.

Steadfast Australasian broking CEO Tim Mathieson says such moves enable the businesses to “build scale through expertise”.

“Overall, that’s a model that we’ll continue on reviewing,” he said. “[But] a lot of that is driven within the group. It’s not something that we push top down.

“It’s really the brokers themselves recognising that one business and one business together can be a lot stronger.”

Mr Mathieson says while he “loves brands”, consolidation is needed because “we can’t run thousands and thousands of brands across the business.

“We’re always on the lookout for opportunities where there’s synergies between two businesses. But we’re reliant on those businesses working more closely together and identifying their own opportunities for either hubbing or merging or acquiring with others.”

Underwriting agencies CEO Mark Senkevics says Steadfast is “always looking at optimisation opportunities” for its agencies.

Prevail brought together three high net worth consumer brands on a single platform, backed by improved product, he says, while Miramar Group is about building a “one-stop shop”.

“We have a number of smaller agencies that we brought together under the Miramar brand,” he told insuranceNEWS.com.au. “That brings us greater efficiencies, of course, as a business. But for brokers, [it’s] a one-stop shop for a multitude of products.”

Mr Senkevics says further agency acquisitions are likely, but the focus is on increasing product breadth.

“We’re very mindful not to bring in additional competition within our own underwriting agency portfolio, but rather to expand out into new product offerings, [and] also to grow our existing agencies,” he said.

“We saw last year ProRisk purchase Xenon, and that was about building geographic and product diversification to allow them to grow their business out.

“That’s already been successful. They’re all on the same tech platform, and we’ve seen that property product grow out because of the ProRisk distribution.

“So we’ll look for opportunities to support our underwriting agencies to grow, either into adjacent lines, new product, so new binders, or through acquisition or portfolio acquisition as well.”

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