Speaker information: Construction Risk Management

Company	Job Title	Name	Speaker Bio	Speaking At
Allianz Commercial	Senior Risk Engineer	Clara Anthonysamy	Clara is a Senior Risk Consultant at Allianz Commercial. A Civil Engineer, she has over 12 years’ experience in the London Insurance Market as a Risk Engineer and previously worked in continental Europe, North America and Asian insurance markets, looking at a variety of large complex construction risks.	Presentation & panel discussion: Climate change risk
Allianz Commercial	UK Head of Professional Indemnity, Large-Corp & Specialty	Katherine Watson	Kat is Head of Professional Indemnity at Allianz Commercial in the UK, a role she assumed in 2022. Prior to this she held underwriting roles of increasing seniority at different carriers including Ace, Hiscox and Berkshire Hathaway.	Panel discussion: Professional Liability – What does the London Market have to offer?
Allianz Commercial	Global Head of Construction	Darren Smart	Darren is Global Head of Construction at Allianz Commercial. He returned to Allianz in 2024, where he started his underwriting career as an underwriter at Allianz Cornhill (Allianz UK), before working at Trans Re as Assistant Vice President. He joined Liberty Specialty Markets in 2007 as Construction Regional Product Line Manager for EMEA, before becoming Global Construction Practice Leader role in 2016.	Case study: LEG3 Court decision – what it means for the CAR market
Aon	CCO, Construction & Infrastructure	Tariq Taherbhai	Tariq is the Chief Commercial Officer for Aon’s Global Construction & Infrastructure (C&I) industry specialty. In his role, Tariq is tasked with developing and implementing the global growth and marketing strategies for the specialty. In addition, Tariq works with other leaders to ensure that the full capabilities and expertise of Aon are properly delivered to the firm’s global C&I clients. Tariq has significant experience with project finance and public private partnerships, having advised on multiple large, complex projects over the past two decades. Before joining Aon, Tariq was vice president of the project legal group at Infrastructure Ontario, with responsibility for all legal and procurement matters related to public private partnerships procured by the Province of Ontario, Canada.	Workshop: Developing risk management strategies
Aon	Global Claims Leader, Construction & Infrastructure	Clarence Ting	Clarence has been working in insurance since 2003. During this time he has been effectively managing Energy, Construction, Machinery Breakdown, Delay Start-Up and Business Interruption claims globally. Prior to joining Aon, he worked with global reinsurance firms leading their major and complex losses in the region. In his current role, he is a member of Aon’s Global Construction & Infrastructure Leadership team and a member of the Global Claims Leadership team delivering significant client value through Aon’s governance and escalation protocols, and dedicated Claims Advocacy. Clarence spent 9 years as Council Member with the Singapore Insurance Institute (SII), and is the Secretary & Founding Member of the Asia Power Forum (APF).	Panel discussion: Claims – trends & future
Aon	Global Specialty Industry Leader C&I	James Macneal	James has 32 years of construction insurance experience, of which 18 have been with the Aon Group. He has travelled extensively and placed a large variety of major construction projects in most parts of the world for owners, contractors and infrastructure funds. He is currently Aon’s Global Head of Construction and Infrastructure team which includes over 1000 specialist colleagues in 48 countries.	Fireside discussion: Leadership approach to managing risk on large construction projects
Aon	Head of construction Asia	Vincent Banton	Vincent leads Aon’s regional Construction and Infrastructure practice across Asia and has 23 years of experience in the insurance and construction industries. He has managed underwriting portfolios in facultative reinsurance and direct market insurance together with working as a practicing project engineer for major civil and building construction contractors in the United Kingdom, West Indies and Australia.	Panel discussion: Emerging risks and insurance market response
Aon	Executive Director, International Construction	Joe Chivers	-	Fireside discussion: Managing GIGA projects – Vision 2030
Aon	Energy Lead - Climate	sophie burnoud	Sophie is the Energy Lead for Aon’s Climate Risk Advisory Practice. She has more than 20 years of experience in the London insurance market. Prior to joining Aon she was the Regional Group Practice Leader at Allianz for Downstream Energy, Power and Renewables for 4 years. She spent most of her early career in broking roles, including 8 years within Marsh Energy Practice as a Lead Client Executive. As part of the Climate team – she focuses on understanding Natural Resources clients’ needs related to climate and how Aon solutions can increase clients’ resilience against physical risk, reduce costs, volatility and unlock growth opportunities. She is also actively involved in developing new products and solutions to insure the energy transition.	Presentation & panel discussion: Climate change risk
Aon	Executive Director	Tom Anderson	Tom has 20 years’ experience in construction and construction insurance. His career was spent at one of the UK’s largest contractors where he led their insurance and risk management programme. Now at Aon he is now focussed on supporting the Professional Services team and their clients with insight and innovation.	Panel discussion: Professional Liability – What does the London Market have to offer?
Aon	Head of UK Retail Cyber	Nathan Hankin	Nathan Hankin is the head of the UK Retail Cyber team at Aon. He has fifteen years of experience in commercial insurance helping organisations across many industries of all sizes from start-ups to global organisations. Nathan has presented at many Cyber focused events across the country. He offers help and insight around Cyber risk with real life examples or media, to help educate colleagues and clients.	Presentation: Cyber risk
Aon	EMEA Property Broking Director	David Gierski	David has more than 25 years of service in the insurance industry with 20+ years spent on carrier side from field risk engineering up to group head of commercial lines. David served in Asia for couple of years. Since 2018 David has moved to broking and he joined AON as EMEA Property Broking Director in 2022. In his role, David is supporting program structuring including parametric insurance and alternative risk transfer.	Presentation & panel discussion: NatCat trends accelerating alternative risk transfer solutions
Aon	Energy Transition Risk Engineer	Adam Beardmore	Adam joined Aon in 2022 within the global risk engineering consultancy practice and recently moved into the Offshore Construction & Decommissioning team in London. He has over a decade of experience in engineering and operational roles across upstream energy assets and renewable generation. As a chartered chemical engineer with an MBA, he provides technical risk modelling, strategic insights and engagement with clients to translate construction project risk to the insurance markets. Adam leads Aon’s energy transition risk engineering support with recent projects including BP’s Northern Endurance carbon capture and storage project and Aberdeen Council’s hydrogen hub development.	Presentation: Renewable Energy - Insurance coverage for batteries
Aon	Design Firms Professional Risks	Oliver Heaton	-	Panel discussion: Professional Liability – What does the London Market have to offer?
Aon UK Ltd	Managing Director, Construction & Infrastructure	Simon Simpson	-	Panel discussion: Contractual risk transfer – contract wordings
AXIS Capital and Chairman, London Engineering Group (LEG)	Head of Construction & Power	Steve Cross	Steve Cross is a Chartered Civil Engineer and is currently the Global Head of Construction at AXIS. Prior to his insurance career Steve worked with both contractors and designers over a 10 year period, chiefly in the design and construction of tunnels. Since 2001 Steve has held a number of underwriting positions in the Company and Lloyd’s markets culminating in his current role at AXIS.	Panel discussion: Emerging risks and insurance market response
Beazley	Underwriter – Large Client Professions & Product Leader - Large AEC	Michael Attwell	Michael is an Underwriter and Product Leader at Beazley in London. He has excess of 20 years’ experience in professional liability insurance and has spent most of that time specialising on global construction, architecture and engineering firms. He was the inaugural chair of the International Underwriting Association’s construction working group, a grouping of professional liability underwriters specialising in construction risks.	Panel discussion: Professional Liability – What does the London Market have to offer?
Bechtel	Risk Manager	Paul Aird	Paul has been a corporate risk and insurance manager for over 30 years on a global basis. He has been a Risk & Insurance Manager for Bechtel (a global engineering and construction company) for most of his career (23+ years). He is currently based in London and the Risk Manager for Bechtel’s Infrastructure Division. This work has involved being responsible for the placement of insurance and the allocation of contractual risk for a variety of business lines including Power, Oil and Gas, Government and Infrastructure and he has worked extensively in both the USA and London with additional time living in Singapore, Dubai and Zurich.	Fireside discussion: Leadership approach to managing risk on large construction projects Panel discussion: Emerging risks and insurance market response Panel discussion: Professional Liability – What does the London Market have to offer?
Bechtel	General Manager – Commercial Infrastructure	Mike Wilkinson	Mike is a Partner at Bechtel, having joined in 2004 as the Global Head Counsel for the Mining & Metals business. Since then, he has served in various legal, financial, operational and management roles across the company. For several years, Mike was Bechtel’s Global Head of Risk Management, which included responsibility for Bechtel’s global insurance program. Before joining Bechtel, he specialised in front end project work in the motorway, rail, ports, water, power, mining and defence industries, largely working for owners, developers and financiers.	Fireside discussion: Leadership approach to managing risk on large construction projects
Bechtel	Global Head of Big Data & AI	Fatemeh Mirrashed	As the global head of Big Data and Artificial Intelligence (AI) at Bechtel Corporation, Dr. Fatemeh Mirrashed is at the forefront of driving AI adoption strategy and execution within the enterprise. She leads a team of world-class data scientists and data engineers to devise and deploy AI-powered digital solutions that aim to increase productivity and enhance data-driven decision-making in the complex work processes of planning, execution, and delivery of Bechtel's mega-scale Engineering, Procurement, Construction, and Management (EPCM) projects. Before her tenure at Bechtel, Dr. Mirrashed has a proven track record in applying innovative AI solutions across various industries, including e-commerce, healthcare, education, and visual surveillance and intelligence.	Case study: How AI is being adopted within the EPCM industry