International Reflections: The Enduring Power of Active Insurance
If I’ve learned anything since joining Coalition a little over a year ago, it’s that Active Insurance is more important than ever. Since beginning our international expansion, we’ve clearly seen that businesses worldwide are crying out for cyber support.
Why? Because there’s no off switch for threat actors. So, faced with potentially thousands of daily attacks, businesses need a cyber insurance policy that works with them; springing into action when it’s already too late is next to useless.
That’s the Active Insurance difference.
I’m so proud of the progress we’ve made on our mission to protect the unprotected. And we’ve passed some pretty significant milestones. From entering the German market to growing our local teams in Canada, the United Kingdom, and Australia, this last year was truly one for the books. Let’s look back at Coalition’s global growth in 2024.
Germany
In August, we officially launched in Germany. While many business owners in the country see cybersecurity as a preeminent concern, only a tiny portion of businesses in the country have cyber insurance. We saw this as a major opportunity to expand awareness about the available protections.
Our primary goal in the last five months was to build meaningful, long-lasting relationships with as many brokers as possible. We hired our first German employees and hosted our first in-person event in Munich, followed by two webinars to grow these relationships and introduce the German market to our unique proposition. We were also pleased Tine Simonsen joined the company as our Head of Insurance for Continental Europe; she has already proven to be an instrumental addition to the team as we continue expanding across the continent.
Australia
After surpassing 1,000 policyholders in our first nine months, the impressive momentum in Australia has only continued. I’m happy to report we have now exceeded 2,200 policyholders in the country. Based on our data, we estimate that 60%-70% of these are first-time buyers of cyber insurance, showing how well Active Insurance works to protect those who were previously uninsured.
We announced that we entered a new capacity agreement with Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance, expanding our existing partnership in Japan. We also announced our entry into the excess cyber insurance market, enabling businesses to add a layer of risk management to their cyber towers.
An estimated 60%-70% of Coalition policyholders are first-time buyers of cyber insurance.
This is just the start of our growth. To meet the high demand and support our ambitions, we tripled our Australian team and now have local representation for every component of Active Insurance (assessment, protection, response, and coverage) through on-the-ground resources, including several influential security hires.
United Kingdom
When Coalition launched in the UK in September 2022, we were in the midst of a hard market, and brokers came to us looking for a new home for their renewal business. Things have changed since then.
Our broker partners have found that our continuous cyber protection offering, designed to prevent attacks before they happen, resonates powerfully with clients. For this reason, we’ve increasingly found ourselves working closely with brokers and their clients to help them generate new business.
This past year, we increased our on-the-ground team in the UK by more than one-third, with a focus on hiring locally to support our brokers. We also brought on new capacity from The Hartford to support our growing proposition and demand from our broker partners and their clients.
Coalition successfully clawed back £1.4 million in stolen funds for a UK policyholder in 2024.
We also introduced our clawback service in the UK. Our first successful clawback — working with a leading national law firm to intercept stolen funds before an attacker could move them—saw the recovery of £1.4M for a policyholder. Our new UK Head of Claims, Laura Stewart, has been a phenomenal presence and a welcome addition to our team to support this program. As far as we are aware, Coalition is the first cyber insurance provider in the UK to offer this sort of service.
Canada
Since we launched in Canada in 2020, we’ve established ourselves as an influential provider and strong partner for our brokers. Substantial growth allowed us to shift up the market.
In May, we announced the expansion of Coalition’s cyber insurance offering to large enterprises in Canada with revenues of up to $5 billion. We also expanded our Canadian staff by more than 37% to support growing demand.
Changing the global perception of cyber insurance
We live in a constantly evolving world. However, Coalition’s core proposition remains the same and just as relevant as when we first entered these new markets: relevant to clients needing allies in the fight against cybercrime and to brokers looking to grow their books.
Our broker partners have found that our continuous cyber protection offering, designed to prevent attacks before they happen, resonates powerfully with clients. For this reason, we’ve increasingly found ourselves working closely with our brokers to help them generate new business, particularly from clients who do not usually purchase cyber protection. This is a very welcome development for us.
Traditionally, cyber insurance has been bought by larger publicly traded companies, usually after a highly publicized attack impacts another company in their industry. While cyber insurance was previously perceived as purely a method of risk transfer, Coalition has helped change that.
In the coming year, we’ll focus on helping our brokers sell to small and midsize businesses that are considerably more exposed on a percentage basis. Financial loss and downtime will hit a small business much harder; Coalition’s Active Insurance can help reduce that burden.
