SWISS RE CORPORATE SOLUTIONS CELEBRATES NEW OFFICE OPENING IN JOHANNESBURG

Swiss Re Corporate Solutions Advisors South Africa and Guardrisk recently celebrated the Johannesburg office opening with an exclusive event, which was attended by over 130 key representatives. With the new office, we will provide commercial insurance solutions to mid and large sized clients, further strengthen and develop lines of business within property, mining and engineering risks, and provide customised risk-transfer solutions for agriculture, weather and energy. We also want to extend our primary lead offering, expand our international reach and open up additional market space.

Guardrisk's role in the partnership is to assume the insurance covers bound by the legal entity SASA, which will be ceded on a reinsurance basis to Swiss Re Corporate Solutions. Guardrisk also provides various services to our clients such as invoice issuance, premium collection and claims management.

The opening celebration was preceded by two industry sessions dedicated to insights and broader knowledge sharing for agriculture and energy lines of business.

Natasha Wally, Swis Re Corporate Solutions Country Manager of South Africa, commenced the official office opening celebrations with an inaugural heartfelt welcome expressing her optimism that the office in South Africa enables us to accelerate the delivery of innovative and client-oriented risk-transfer solutions, as well as showcase Swiss Re Corporate Solutions' capabilities in other African countries.

"Our presence in South Africa underlines Swiss Re Corporate Solutions' commitment to bring our products and services closer to clients in their local markets. We strongly believe that clients can benefit from our value proposition of innovation, high net capacity, financial strength and underwriting expertise". 
 
   
 To mark the occasion, guest speaker Peter van Kets, one of South Africa’s top extreme adventurers and international motivational speakers, shared stories from his amazing expeditions and related the lessons he's learned and critical success factors to the insurance industry and risk taking.

Both Tony Buckle, CEO Europe, Middle East & Africa, and Hermann Schoeman, Managing Director of Guardrisk, gave introductory speeches before the group participated in an engaging and highly interactive panel discussion.

We invited guest panel experts Terence Williams, CEO Aon South Africa, Gert Cruywagen Director of Risk from Tsogo Sun and Berenice Francis, Chief Risk Officer from Imperial Holdings. They were joined by our Corporate Solutions experts Tony Buckle, Herman Schoeman, Reto Collenberg, Head Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Benelux & CEE and Christina Ulardic, Head Market Development Africa.
 
The cocktail reception which followed was a great opportunity for everyone to converse with the many industry professionals in attendance. For dinner, South African and Swiss themed menus were served. Those attending were also treated to gift giveaways and the unusual sight of musicians playing within giant plastic bubbles.