Insurance Team of the Year
This award recognises the team that has handled innovative work and has attracted the most impressive instructions of the year in this constantly changing sector. We welcome submissions highlighting one example taken from a variety of work, including standout transactions, disputes and arbitration, as well as regulatory issues.
2019 Winner
Herbert Smith Freehills
Alex Oddy
Representing Single Buoy Moorings in a dispute over the decommissioned Yme platform in the Norwegian North Sea, the largest insurance case in the English courts in a decade. HSF recovered approximately $390m for clients SBM.
Shortlisted
Stephenson Harwood - HIGHLY COMMENDED
Simon Moore
Securing a Supreme Court victory on behalf of the insurers in the headline B Atlantic case, a long-running dispute over a marine war risks insurance policy. The victory brings greater certainty to the insurance market that exclusion clauses will be fairly applied and that drug smuggling is not a war risk.
AIG/Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer
Chris Newby, George Swan
In-house legal team and external adviser combined to investigate alternative structures for AIG to service its policyholders following Brexit and to ensure that its London-based European operation was not stranded by the loss of passporting. The new structure involved the first combined Part VII insurance business transfer and outbound EU cross-border merger in legal history.
CMS Cameron McKenna Nabarro Olswang
Simon Kilgour
Advising NORECO on its $1.9bn acquisition of Shell’s interests in the Danish Underground Consortium, CMS explored the use of surety and credit insurance to deal with exposure to catastrophic events and the risks associated with being part of the joint venture. The eventual bespoke insurance product enabled the transaction to move forward.
DAC Beachcroft
Jade Kowalski
Advising Lloyds Market Association and the Association of British Insurers on the drafting, negotiating and finalising of an addition to the Data Protection Bill, enabling the insurance industry to process special categories of personal data and information relating to criminal convictions, while complying with GDPR.
Slaughter and May
Jonathan Marks
Advising Standard Life Aberdeen on the £3.24bn sale of its UK and European insurance business to Phoenix Group - the largest insurance deal in the UK in 2018. The transaction was challenging due to preparations for Brexit, an FCA investigation into sales of enhanced annuities and Lloyds Banking Group reportedly ending its investment management arrangements with Standard Life.