McGill and Partners announces the launch of Underscore Auton (“Auton”). Auton is the first-ever fully digital cross-class follow form, broker facility in the Lloyd’s market, providing clients with significant benefits ahead of the 1/1 renewal season.  

This innovative, auto-follow facility enables clients to access up to 20% capacity across multiple lines of business, underwritten in the Lloyd’s market. Auton is backed by a panel of Lloyd’s insurers, benefiting from Lloyd’s AM Best rating of A+, led by Beazley’s Smart Tracker Syndicate. In addition to Beazley, participating syndicates currently include Canopius, AXIS, Munich Re Specialty and more. 

For the Lloyd’s market, Auton is the first facility of its kind. The recent Lloyd’s Market Association report, which looks at the growth of enhanced underwriting in the Lloyd’s market, highlights the growing demand for digital, data-driven platforms. In relation to this, McGill and Partners identified the need to leverage technology for more efficient market access on behalf of their clients.  

Developed in partnership with Verisk, Auton provides intelligent automated risk selection through a bespoke rules engine and is part of Underscore, McGill and Partners’ proprietary digital and data-driven broking platform. 

Since its formation in 2019, McGill and Partners has taken a digital-first and cutting-edge approach to technology. With Auton, clients worldwide will benefit from a more simplified placement process and a greater focus on the negotiation of more attractive lead terms. Additionally, at a time of increased complexity in the risk environment, clients can have confidence in accessing up to 20% pre-arranged insurance capacity across multiple lines of business. Participating carriers have unparalleled visibility and live access to the underlying data for the Auton portfolio through a dynamic dashboard created with Moody’s.  

Steve McGill, Founder and CEO of McGill and Partners said, “The launch of Auton provides highly effective automatic and digitally enabled Lloyd’s follow form capacity for our clients underpinned by live data access for our underwriting partners. “From the start, McGill and Partners has been built on digital-first principles and we understand the importance of capitalising on technology. As an industry first, Auton is a testament to the calibre of our team and trading partners that have developed this innovative facility. Auton very much aligns with Lloyd’s ambitious plans to deliver profound change in the market through digitalisation and I am proud of the part McGill and Partners is playing in that transformation.”  

Alok Kumar, Managing Director Analytical Services, Moody’s said, “Auton revolutionises risk assessment by integrating Moody’s RMS Intelligent Risk Platform with cutting-edge automation and analytical expertise for unparalleled speed in loss modelling and portfolio analysis. We have transformed both structured and unstructured data into dynamic dashboards providing carriers with risk insights and relevant model outputs for informed decision-making and strategic adjustments.”  

Tim Rayner, President of Specialty Business Solutions at Verisk, said, “Auton demonstrates the power of automation that can be achieved by combining a digital contract with a rules engine, enabling fully digital and algorithmic risk selection. This is an outstanding example of how the relationships between brokers and underwriters can be brought into the ‘digital room,’ people, technology and data working together.”