Castel Underwriting Europe B.V. (Castel Europe), the European subsidiary of Castel Underwriting Agencies Limited, has announced the acquisition of Arena N.V., a Belgium-based specialist accident and health (A&H) MGA, from StarStone Group.
Arena has been servicing a range of sports clubs and federations in Belgium for over 25 years providing A&H and related liability coverages.
Following the acquisition, Managing Director Eddy Van Den Bosch and his team based in Brussels will all transfer to Castel Europe.
Castel Europe was established in 2018 by Castel Underwriting Limited to support specialty underwriting cells and individual underwriters with books of niche business, across Europe.
Arena will join other Castel Europe divisions Transact, which provides tailored warranty and indemnity and tax risk insurances for European-based organisations, and Castel Marine, which writes Dutch and Belgian domiciled marine cargo, hull, land-based equipment and liability business, based in Rotterdam.
“Arena has a strong presence in Belgium built on the team’s expert knowledge and understanding of client needs in this specialist area of the A&H market,” said Gert van Middelkoop, Chief Underwriting Officer of Castel Europe.
“Their niche focus makes them an important addition to our European portfolio and provides opportunities for us to bring Arena’s expertise and products to other European markets,” he added.
Mark Birrell, Chief Executive Officer of Castel, also commented: “The expansion of our footprint in Europe is a core part of our strategy and behind our initial investment in our European platform. We anticipate opening up more European offices to both offer existing and new products to our expanding broker network across the continent.”
