Q: Hiscox is pursuing ambitious growth and a significant programme of business transformation. How do you make sure you drive both successfully?
A: We built our business on making bold choices, and we’ve continuously reinvented ourselves to better serve our customers and to reflect the evolving risk landscape. So really, our current transformation programme is just the latest chapter in a story that’s now 125 years old. Defining our growth targets and setting out the scale of our ambition to the market in May last year was an important moment in that story, and we’ve come a long way since then. We’ve brought in new expertise in transformation, data, technology, and outsourcing which is collectively supporting a comprehensive and aligned programme. We’ve also introduced new skills and capabilities to our existing teams, who have gone above and beyond to deliver for our customers and drive growth while we’re building our future state. We’re making material progress against both our growth and transformation goals. Balancing both means being ready to respond to changing needs, and to flex our approach as situations change. That can mean establishing new skills or enhancing existing ones; being open to new information and ready to pivot, fast-fail and learn from experience. It also means more frequent, deliberate and transparent communication with colleagues across the business. This is a journey we’re going on together, and it’s incredibly important to me that every single person in Hiscox understands the importance of their role in delivering our transformation and growth agenda.
Q: What changes will Hiscox’s customers and business partners see as that journey continues?
A: The reality is they’re already experiencing it. We’ve launched more new products this year than during the previous five years, and our acquisition of a digital platform in Italy marks our expansion into a new country for the first time in over a decade. We’ve also deepened our presence in the USA through the acquisition of an insurtech which has accelerated our US roadmap, expanded our reach into new specialist customer segments, and supports the ongoing digitisation of our US broker platform. At the same time, our technology investments are making the process of buying insurance from us much more frictionless, whether you’re doing it directly or through a broker. For example, the AI model we’ve introduced in our UK high net worth business is helping to quickly assess broker submissions, categorising them by risk appetite, and streamlining the workflow for underwriters. This means brokers get faster responses and customers get an improved service and more tailored products. The same principles apply in our big‑ticket businesses, where for instance in Hiscox Re we’re automating the classification of broker emails which is speeding up our response times around key renewal periods. In Hiscox London Market, we’ve also extended our collaboration with Google Cloud to broaden our use of generative AI in our underwriting and risk modelling, having started with one product line in 2024 – sabotage and terrorism – and since expanded to others including major property during 2025. We’ve also entered new lines during the year in our London Market business, including SME cargo and middle-market property – areas that were previously inaccessible to us because of the economics, but where our AI platform has enabled us to reduce our cost structure sufficiently.
Q: How will the Group’s transformation and growth ambitions impact Hiscox’s distinctive culture?
A: Our culture is defined by our values – ownership, integrity, courage, connected and being human in our approach. Those remain constant, even as how we operate evolves, in much the same way as being known for our entrepreneurial spirit and specialty focus remain hallmarks of Hiscox. The transformation we’re undertaking is about changing how we do things, not who we are. It means moving from manual processes to digitisation and AI, which is something we’re doing in every single part of the business. It also means encouraging even greater collaboration across business units and functions, so that we’re truly operating as ‘One Hiscox’. The unique composition of our business means that working collectively is becoming a superpower for us, especially as we focus on unlocking new opportunities and strengthening our existing capabilities.
Q:Hiscox held its first Capital Markets Day in 2025. What was the motivation behind it and what impact did it have?
A: 2025 was the right moment for us to share more on our strategy, our culture, and our transformation plans, and to highlight the amount of momentum we have in the business. It was also a chance for us to lift the lid further on our specialist retail business, where the multi-market opportunities for us in areas such as high net worth personal lines and small business insurance are huge. The feedback from the day itself was extremely positive. Shareholders met more of our senior management team, they saw our depth of talent, and now they better understand our ambition; and it was a boost for colleagues to see our story resonate so well externally.
Q: You’ve talked about building a data‑first culture – what does that look like and how will it impact colleagues?
A: A data-first culture means even sharper and more evidence-based decision-making. We’re taking some of the strong data practices we already have, in areas such as underwriting and claims, and embedding them across every part of the business. Data fluency is something we are beginning to build in every Hiscox colleague. Every role, at every level, is evolving in some way because of AI and data-driven decision-making, and we want our people to be ready. One of the ways we supported colleagues with this in 2025 was by introducing a new data fluency assessment. This provided each person in the business with a data persona – I’m a data storyteller – and tailored data coaching and training based on their assessment. That’s a pretty advanced approach and it gives us a consistency of data language and confidence that we’ll need as we scale.
Q: Turning to 2026, what excites you most about the next phase for Hiscox?
A: It has to be the size of the opportunity ahead of us. We’ve come a long way in the last few years, and the momentum in our business transformation will accelerate even further during 2026. Personally, I find that incredibly exciting. In our big-ticket businesses, market conditions are generally moderating as pricing comes down and competition intensifies. We’ll remain disciplined in our cycle management while continuing to seek out new and interesting opportunities as we expand our horizons; but in retail, our growth engine is just getting started. There’s a huge amount of pace and energy in the business. We have a great range of new products and propositions coming to market over the next 12‑18 months, and we’re laser‑focused on serving more customers with more products by addressing emerging, evolving and in some cases unmet insurance needs. It’s a great time to be at Hiscox.
