MARSH AFRICA: For Marsh, the Purpose Is Possibility

For over 150 years Marsh has grown by helping clients anticipate and meet the needs and challenges of changing times and technologies. In Africa, this has primarily been borne out in specialising in providing clients with the intellectual capital and industry experience to unlock the opportunity in risk. Throughout this long lifetime clients have trusted Marsh to advise them during the most trying and celebratory times, helping them achieve success by becoming more resilient and attaining the possible.

“Our purpose is possibility,” Marsh Africa declares. “At Marsh, the idea of possibility isn’t just something we talk about – it’s something we’ve lived for over 150 years. With new risks and opportunities constantly emerging, we help clients navigate the changing risk landscape, realise ambitious goals and make their future more secure.”

“We go beyond risk to rewards for our clients, our company, our colleagues, and the communities in which we serve, protecting and promoting possibility and allowing our clients to dream bigger, reach further and plan for the opportunities ahead.”

GLOBAL RISKS

“Together,” Marsh Africa continues, “we are creating a benchmark of excellence in the risk and insurance industry by harnessing our global and domestic expertise drawing from over 40 years of experience and insight from our continuously expanding operations in the Middle East and Africa.”

Marsh’s staggering number of colleagues worldwide, quickly approaching the 50,000 mark, means that local expertise is always on hand, providing commercial and individual clients with tailored insights, advice and support in the specific markets in which they operate or where their business may face risks. “We help you understand coverage nuances, regulatory developments and risk trends, and we work together with you on placement, mitigating risk and optimising your risk spend.”

At the turn of the year, climate risks dominated the list of long-term global concerns as the world entered the third year of the pandemic, while the top shorter-term global concerns included societal divides, livelihood crises and mental health deterioration. Now in its 17th iteration, the World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report encourages leaders to think outside the quarterly reporting cycle and create policies that manage risks and shape the agenda for the coming years.

“Health and economic disruptions are compounding social cleavages,” said Saadia Zahidi, Managing Director, World Economic Forum. “This is creating tensions at a time when collaboration within societies and among the international community will be fundamental to ensure a more even and rapid global recovery.”

Carolina Klint, Risk Management Leader, Continental Europe, Marsh, added the need of prudence around cyber and space concerns. “As companies recover from the pandemic, they are rightly sharpening their focus on organisational resilience and ESG credentials,” she observed.

“With cyber threats now growing faster than our ability to eradicate them permanently, it is clear that neither resilience nor governance are possible without credible and sophisticated cyber risk management plans. Similarly, organisations need to start understanding their space risks, particularly the risk to satellites on which we have become increasingly reliant, given the rise in geopolitical ambitions and tensions.”

COLLABORATION AND ACQUISITION

In March, Marsh announced an exclusive collaboration with technology company Inoxico, specialist in predictive trade credit analytics solutions, to support South African clients in managing their trade credit risks and increasing their profitability generated from trade credit sales.

Trade credit is the most important form of growth capital in developing countries and is estimated to be a significant – and growing – $100bn industry in Africa. Using Inoxico’s Trade Shield solution, Marsh’s South Africa’s clients can use predictive analytics on their accounts receivables to gain debtor credit scores and debtor risk segmentation, as well as access to customer credit reports, credit limits insights and changes to risk profiles.

“Marsh and Inoxico’s collaboration will enable our South African clients, through the use of powerful analytics, to gain more insight into their commercial credit management function, assessed Pieter Dingemans, Credit Specialties Leader, Middle East and Africa, Marsh Specialty. “As a result, our clients will be able to confidently extend the amount of trade credit offered to their customers, while also increasing their operational resilience, boosting their growth strategy and reducing the impact of future shocks.”

“I am proud to formally announce this industry-shaping collaboration,” added Kiashan Moodley, Head of Partnerships at Inoxico. “This is what the market has been waiting for – a partnership that puts the customer back in the driving seat and provides them with powerful tools to confidently navigate the complex business landscape we currently, and will continue to, find ourselves in.”

In November, Marsh revealed that it intends to exercise its option to acquire the majority of shares in Beassur Marsh, a leading insurance broker in Morocco in which it had acquired a stake in June 2019. Beassur Marsh will henceforth operate as Marsh Morocco and current CEO Mehdi Tazi will become CEO of Marsh Morocco. Beassur Marsh team will become part of Marsh’s expanding network of dedicated regional expertise across the Africa region, benefitting not only from local knowledge and experience but access to Marsh’s global resources and capabilities.

“Through Marsh’s network, leading Moroccan businesses will, for the first time, have local access to unrivalled risk and insurance services and solutions than can support them in realising their growth ambitions and enhance their contribution to the region’s wider economic success,” said Tazi.