Havong gained approval in principle, newly formed Lloyd’s Syndicate 1440 is targeting approximately $75m GWP in its first year.

Lloyd's of London inside

OAK Global is launching a new unit, OAK Enterprise, focused on retrocessional business via Lloyd’s Syndicate 1440.

The newly formed syndicate has received in principle approval to assume business incepting 1 January 2026, targeting approximately $75m of gross written premium in its first year.

Roland Morse will head the strategic business unit and assume the role of chief underwriting officer of OAK Enterprise.

OAK Reinsurance, the flagship strategic business unit in the OAK Global group, will continue to focus on underwriting primary reinsurance through Lloyd’s Syndicate 2843, headed by James Irvine as chief underwriting officer, OAK Re.

OAK Re was established to provide clients with holistic primary reinsurance solutions across property, specialty and credit horizontal risks.

Morse and Irvine report to Cathal Carr, OAK Global’s founder, CEO and active underwriter for both syndicates.

Syndicate 1440 will be managed under a turnkey arrangement with Polo Managing Agency, the company said, benefitting from Bain Capital’s underwriting capital support.

“The reinsurance marketplace is evolving,” Carr said.

“Secular trends driven by continued technology advancements and cyclical dynamics such as M&A are driving new opportunities for our business as clients and distribution partners move toward centralised coordination of risk management,” he continued.

“The creation of OAK Enterprise aims to address increasing demand and opportunity across the vertical risk spectrum, enabling us to provide partnership solutions to our clients with retrocession and enterprise risk management needs, supported by our market leading underwriting expertise,” said Carr.

“We are proud to receive in principle approval to launch our second full syndicate at Lloyd’s, introduce OAK Enterprise as a strategic business unit and elevate our group identity to OAK Global. We are very grateful for our partnerships with clients, brokers, capital providers and Lloyd’s in 2025 and we look forward to continuing to create value for our stakeholders going forward,” he added.

Elena Lieskovska, a partner at Bain Capital, said: “We are proud of our partnership with the OAK Global team, and we are pleased to support Syndicate 1440 as a key capital partner.”

Deepon Sen Gupta, OAK Global’s head of capital partnerships, added: “The creation of a retro focused syndicate at Lloyd’s further evidences our capability to align evolving risk demand with technical underwriting expertise and innovative capital structuring.

“Syndicate 1440 will offer clients highly rated capacity while providing investors the opportunity to access strong expected returns in an attractive retro market environment”.

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