Looking to expand its presence in the North American market, Lyon, France-based
The companies say the combined offerings will bring a unique combination of products to property/casualty insurance companies that span policy administration (Sword Intech) and multi-channel CRM (Sword Ciboodle) with AgencyPort’s distribution technology (the renamed Sword AgencyPort). While assigning resources to realize product integration, the company says each of these three components will retain its own product development strategy to remain best-in-class.
In addition to a widely installed software base, Sword Group also acquires AgencyPort’s management team, including co-founder Steve Hauck, who was tapped lead Sword’s insurance division as CEO in the Americas, and AgencyPort co-founder Eric Harnden, who will take on the Global role of CTO for Sword in insurance.
“The acquisition of AgencyPort is a strategic step for the Group and our customers,” Heath Davies, Sword Group’s CEO, said in a statement. “We are moving towards our goal of providing an impressive a-la-carte portfolio of leading software solutions encompassing policy administration, CRM and distribution technology to the global insurance marketplace. AgencyPort’s customer base in the Americas, ACORD-based product suite and over 100 professionals trained in insurance IT delivery, will be a strong addition to our existing operations, and key ingredients as we grow our U.S. and global market footprint.”
Harnden added the deal will help AgencyPort products find a global audience.
“This agreement brings together a unique combination of best-of-breed components,” he said. “Our team, our culture, our focus on innovation and our ability to execute for customers have been the key drivers for our success and these won’t change. Sword brings us both a complementary suite of proven products, and the resources needed to help us scale on a global level such as internationalization of our products, 24/7 hosting services, offshore development and a global delivery infrastructure.”
