Willis Group Holdings, the global insurance broker, has created The Willis Research Network (WRN) - the largest collaboration between the insurance industry and academia. This unique network, comprised of seven leading university research groups focusing on weather and environmental modelling, will produce practical research which will ensure clients benefit
from state-of-the-art interpretation of catastrophic risks and the financial mechanisms with which they can counter these threats.

 

WRN will be run under the auspices of Willis’ Analytics & Solutions division, which provides analysis and advises companies on the financial impact of natural catastrophes
such as hurricanes, storms, floods, earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis and also arranges (re)insurance and other related risk transfer solutions.

 

Willis’ UK group will contain expertise across meteorology, geography, engineering, architecture and the earth sciences and includes the renowned Centre for Global Atmospheric Modelling, part of the world’s leading department of meteorology at Reading University, the Centre for Risk in the Built Environment at Cambridge, as well as key institutions at Imperial College, Durham, Bristol, Exeter and City University.

Rowan Douglas, executive director of Willis and chairman of the WRN, explained: “The primary purpose of the research network is to better predict the frequency, severity and
costs of future catastrophes world-wide".

 

“The insurance market is the ultimate ‘consumer product’ – as it is the mechanism through which international society and the economy share the costs and burdens of severe catastrophes.”