People Moves: Specialist Aviation MGA Itasca Names John as CEO, Succeeding Zolotusky; DUAL Group Appoints Allianz’s Sayce as Group Head of Emerging Products

This edition of International People Moves details appointments at aviation specialist Itasca MGA Ltd. and DUAL Group, Howden’s MGA subsidiary.

A summary of these new hires follows here.

Specialist Aviation MGA Itasca Names John as CEO, Succeeding Zolotusky

Itasca MGA Ltd., the London-based specialist aviation managing general agent, announced the appointment of Gareth John as chief executive officer and director.

Itasca MGA was created in 2023 by Pine Walk Capital Ltd., the specialist MGA platform and wholly owned subsidiary of The Fidelis Partnership, and Castlelake, a global alternative investment manager.

Itasca sits within the Pine Walk platform and specializes in underwriting, structuring and managing risk associated with secured commercial aviation financing on behalf of The Fidelis Partnership and Itasca Re Ltd., a Bermuda-licensed reinsurance company. Itasca Re, which was established by Castlelake, specializes in insurance-backed financing solutions for buyers and owners of commercial aircraft assets.

John succeeds Kostya Zolotusky, who will retire from the business at the end of the month. Zolotusky served as CEO of Itasca MGA at its founding.

John assumes this role in addition to his position at The Fidelis Partnership, having initially joined in April 2024 as head of Bespoke Economic Lines, and brings significant experience across investment banking in the aviation market. He previously served as the global head of Aviation for Natixis, and as the head of Transportation Finance Americas at Deutsche Bank.

Alongside his new role as CEO of Itasca MGA, John will continue to support The Fidelis Partnership’s economic lines of business, including across portfolio credit, mortgage, and political risk insurance, as well as asset-backed finance.

Since its launch in 2017, Pine Walk Capital Ltd. has established eight MGAs providing custom underwriting and operational and regulatory frameworks to support specialist and innovative underwriting offerings.

“We’d like to thank Kostya for his leadership of Itasca MGA, which has helped to further expand Pine Walk’s distribution into the specialised aviation sector. We wish him all the best for a long, happy, and fulfilling retirement,” commented Rinku Patel, group COO of The Fidelis Partnership and CEO of Pine Walk. “I’m also delighted to welcome Gareth to the Pine Walk platform, where his deep industry experience and network will help to expand our overall reach, capabilities and capacity across commercial aviation financing.”

Gareth John’s appointments are subject to regulatory approval.

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DUAL Group Appoints Allianz’s Sayce as Group Head of Emerging Products

DUAL Group, the specialist underwriting arm of Howden Group Holdings, announced the appointment of Scott Sayce in the newly created role of head of Emerging Products.

Sayce joins the MGA on Sept. 1 and will be based in London, reporting to David Harries who joined DUAL as group director of Underwriting in January 2024. Sayce is the latest addition to DUAL Group’s leadership team.

Sayce brings more than two decades of specialist lines insurance experience including several global leadership roles. These include group head of Financial Lines & Cyber at AXA Group; head of Cyber, Technology and Life Science at CNA Hardy, and, most recently, global head of Cyber at Allianz Commercial.

“Scott has a proven track record of bringing innovative and complex products to market. In this newly created role in DUAL, Scott will be working closely with our CEOs and expert underwriting teams in each of our regions and combining this with the insights we gain from our global network of over 11,000 broker partners, helping to ensure we deliver better outcomes for their clients,” commented Harries.

Established in 1998, today DUAL has over 1,700 people in 21 countries across the Americas, Europe and Asia Pacific, and is one of Lloyd’s’ largest international coverholders.

Topics Trends Aviation Insurance Wholesale Allianz