Hong Kong's Insurance Industry Development
Honk Kong’s Insurance market has revealed very positive figures for the first half of 2013, with the industry growing by 14.5% in just 6 months. Total gross premiums stood at HK$143.7 billion (£11,849,860,500) at the end of June. Large quantities of these insurance premiums were in long term in-force business, which increased by 14.9% across the same period in 2012. According to the Office of Commissioner of Insurance, new long-term business premiums increased by 21.1% for the first half of 2013, a massive improvement on the same period in 2012.
These figures are not the only insurance news in Hong Kong. Will Harrison, the head of DLA Piper’s Hong Kong office has announced that he will be leaving the company in order to pursue a career opportunity in legal consulting. Mr Harrison joined DLA Piper in 2007 as a senior associate. Prior to DLA, Harrison worked at Clifford Chance in Hong Kong, and he is highly rated in the region for his contentious insurance work. He has also worked on a variety of high-profile negligence cases, such as the Barings Bank collapse in London.
This is not the only hit that DLA has taken in reference to its force in the Asia-Pacific region, with several of their partners having left in the past year. The managing director of DLA’s Singapore office left his position earlier this month, along with the head of their Asian intellectual property and technology group. It can be tough for big businesses to lose a lot of high-profile members in such a short period of time – it can be very hard to recruit somebody suitable for these roles. DLA’s Australian offices have recently lost their corporate and technology partner, who was poached by Squire Sanders, a leading law firm.
James Savery, 04 September 2013