Aon launches $100m IP underwriting platform
London-based financial services company Aon has launched what it calls the largest IP underwriting platform in the world, offering indemnity up to a primary limit of $100 million.
A new managing general agent (MGA), an insurance agent invested with the authority to underwrite risk, will have the “world's largest known delegated capacity for IP liability risks,” an announcement from Aon said.
"Considering the current economic environment, the importance of managing the value creation opportunity afforded by IP and the downside risk mitigation of IP has never been higher,” said Lewis Lee, CEO of Aon’s IP solutions division.
The move has been in development since 2018, when Aon partnered with insurance company Tokio Marine Kiln (TMK), to develop a new platform which could offer IP liability cover up to $100 million.
The new MGA will offer primary indemnity up to that amount, as well as additional coverage options such as for litigation, damages, and trade secrets misappropriation. Coverage will automatically include suits from competitors, and so-called patent and copyright ‘trolls’, the Aon announcement stated.
Aon has also looked to bolster its IP team as it expands its range of IP related products. Ian Lewis, who led TMK’s role in developing the new project, joined Aon as global head of IP underwriting solutions last September.
That followed the appointment of Joshua Walker, formerly of LexMachina, as chief product officer for the IP division two months earlier.
"Having worked with Aon's IP Solutions data analytics, risk modelling and due-diligence teams over the past few years from the insurer side, I know that our ability to provide enhanced product solutions, with improved rating supported by robust underwriting, is unrivalled," said Lewis.
A 2018 report from the European Observatory on Infringements of Intellectual Property Rights concluded that in Europe, IP insurance was seen as a “niche”, compared to the rest of the world.
Aon’s own report from May 2019 found that only 16% of IP assets exposed to cybercrime threat were insured.
WIPR has previously looked at the relationship between the IP and insurance sectors here.
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