I first met today’s guest just under 34 years ago on my first day at work in the London Market.
Back then Alfonso Valera and I worked in the London-based Lloyd’s subsidiary of the biggest broker in Spain. Alfonso was my senior and had already been in post for a year and patiently helped show me the ropes.
He spoke perfect English, was a confident, skilful and forceful negotiator who was incredibly passionate about the insurance business and was always fun, direct and easy to deal with.
He was mature beyond his years and was a natural leader. It seemed obvious to anyone who knew him back then that he was destined for great things.
That broking business was taken over by Aon in the late nineties.
Alfonso stayed on and over 25 years later he is now CEO of International at Aon Reinsurance Solutions.
International covers the whole of the Rest of the World other than the Americas, and Aon is the largest reinsurance broker by revenues, so however you measure it Alfonso has one of the biggest jobs in global reinsurance.
His job titles and seniority might have changed since we first met, but I can guarantee that he is exactly the same person I knew when I was fresh out of University.
He is still disarmingly direct and straightforward and he is still passionate about the business, but now he is speaking from a vantage point that few in the global insurance market can reach.
Alfonso is still great fun to talk to and this conversation took on a life of its own.
Whether it’s the state of the market and changes in buyer and seller appetites, facilitisation in reinsurance, the prospects for M&A, the MGA phenomenon, enhanced competition between reinsurance intermediaries or the changes that AI is likely to bring, Alfonso gives me a straight answer every time and we barely pause for breath.
Catching up with Alfonso was a joy from start to finish. Listen on and you’ll be bound to agree.
LINKS:
We thank our naming sponsor AdvantageGo, now part of Sapiens:
https://www.advantagego.com