Our Christmas letter 2021
December 15, 2021 Chris Sandilands
“Okay, campers, rise and shine, and don’t forget your booties ’cause it’s cooooold out there today.”
If 2020 was best summed up with Ron Burgundy’s observations about situations escalating quickly, then December 2021 feels like Groundhog Day. After a few short months of in-person meetings and breathing in the sweet aroma of kerosine at airports around the world, it’s all back to Zoom and Teams.
But things are surely on the up now. We hope that you had an enjoyable, fulfilling and productive 2021 and are bullish about 2022.
To all of our clients and partners – we have enjoyed working with you in 2021, and to everyone else we hope that you’ll become either a client or a partner in 2022.
Oxbow Partners continues to go from strength to strength. We grew by considerably over 50% this year, were named one of the top 10 leading management consultancies for insurance by the FT, and continued to grow the team. We are personally and professionally proud of the team we are building and delighted with the impact that we are making around the market.
We hope you enjoy our 2021 Christmas Letter.
Team news & 2022 hiring
Our company mission is to be the “most trusted, best informed and most entrepreneurial insurance advisory firm and have more fun delivering than any of our competitors”. We spend a lot of time building the culture at Oxbow Partners; we want to be both the best advisors for our clients and a great place to work.
Our team is growing and our 2022 hiring plan is more ambitious than ever. If you have current or recent experience as a senior consultant, manager or partner at a top-tier consulting firm, why not make it a new year’s resolution to have a chat with us in 2022? Or if you have daughters, sons, nephews or nieces who are looking for a graduate role, put them in touch with us.
B Corp
In Q1 we will be submitting our application to become a certified B Corp, a designation for companies who balance purpose and profit. We are proud of the transparent way in which we manage our business, and believe that B Corp certification is a badge that signals this to the outside world. We think that this is particularly important in a new ESG-focused world, where credible advisors must “walk the walk” and not just “talk the talk”.
We will be making some exciting announcements about initiatives in this area during the course of 2022.
Engagements
We have worked for reinsurers, London Market insurers, European composites, UK&I domestic players and PE investors this year. Topics have ranged from helping a health insurer find growth opportunities, to an operating model for a reinsurer, a technology review for a large UK domestic player and various M&A deals covering technology, distribution and niche products. If you’re interested in hearing about more projects we were involved in this year, see our Christmas-themed twelve projects we executed in 2021 blog post.
In 2022 we expect ESG to become a significant part of our portfolio given the activity around the market, and reinsurance to remain strong as digitalisation accelerates. We also expect innovation and InsurTech to move back up the agenda as companies come under increased pressure to develop a coherent strategy and execution model – something that few so far have succeeded in doing.
Magellan
Magellan, our insurance technology navigator is gaining momentum and we have built the team during 2021. Curated Searches (a bespoke service to help clients find the best tech vendors for their challenges) are flying off the shelves and we have our first enterprise subscribers. Please get in touch with the team if you need help navigating the high seas of insurance technology vendors.
Fun fact: We started working on Magellan precisely – to the day – 500 years after Ferdinand Magellan set off on a voyage which would be the first (known) circumnavigation of the earth – 20 September 2019 (or 1519 in his case). He died on the voyage in 1521, but we are happy to report that there have been no further parallels between Magellan the explorer and Magellan the insurance technology platform.
We wish you all the best for 2022 and beyond.
Happy Christmas,
The Oxbow Partners team
