Business Moves

OneBeacon, Southern Marine & Aviation

OneBeacon Insurance Group announced an agreement with Houston-based Southern Marine & Aviation Inc. to represent OneBeacon’s International Marine Underwriters (IMU) division. Under the agreement, IMU will assume the new and renewal business written under a primary marine cargo program managed by Southern Marine & Aviation, effective Jan. 1, 2008.

Southern Marine & Aviation is specialty managing general agent writing commercial marine and cargo insurance. It is a division of Crump Insurance Services Inc. Southern Marine & Aviation has the capability to write cargo interests up to $50 million.

IMU, headquartered in New York City, offers ocean marine coverage for hull, marine liabilities, and private-pleasure yachts, as well as ocean cargo.

NYMAGIC, Southern Marine & Aviation

NYMAGIC Inc. said it is terminating its program management agreement with Southern Marine & Aviation (SM&A) on Jan. 1, 2008. Under the program management agreement, SM&A wrote ocean cargo business on behalf of NYMAGIC’s subsidiary, New York Marine And General Insurance Co.

A. George Kallop, NYMAGIC president and chief executive officer, commented that the move gives the company more control over this business. “The cumulative results of the SM&A book during the term of the agreement have had little or no positive impact on the bottom line. Mutual Marine Office, a NYMAGIC subsidiary, has written ocean cargo insurance for more than 40 years and continued to do so very successfully during our relationship with SM&A. We concluded that going forward the company and its insureds would be better served by having MMO exercise complete control over ocean cargo production and underwriting.”

InsuranceNoodle, ACE USA

InsuranceNoodle Inc. announced a broker agreement with the insurance companies of ACE USA, which will provide workers’ compensation and specialized pollution liability products to more than 2,500 independent insurance agencies currently using InsuranceNoodle.

Darwin, Agency Marketing Services

Darwin Professional Underwriters Inc. and Wolf Professional Risk in Tampa, Fla., have acquired Agency Marketing Services Inc. of St. Petersburg, Fla. The acquisition will be effected through a new Darwin affiliate, Evolution Underwriters Inc. (EUI), to be headed by Boyd H. Wolf, as president, and David E. Gough, as senior vice president. With its headquarters in Florida, EUI has been created as a stand-alone entity focused on the professional liability insurance arena.

Brown & Brown, Dalton Insurance Agency

A subsidiary of Florida-based insurance agency Brown & Brown Inc. has acquired Dalton Insurance Agency LLC, of Glassboro, N.J. Dalton Insurance Agency, with annualized revenues of approximately $2.5 million, is a retail commercial insurance agency. Agency principals Daniel Dalton and Jack Lynn and their staff will continue to operate from their existing Glassboro location as a freestanding Brown & Brown office.