Locke Lord’s Zach Lerner, Associate in the New York office, Authors “As Science Evolves, So Must Political Risk Insurance” for Law360 on July 15, 2016

The explosion of scientific achievement and international interconnectivity over the last decade has provided increased opportunities for businesses worldwide. However, with global reach comes global risk as well. Individuals, corporations and conglomerates face increasing pressure to mitigate risk beyond the walls of their homes and headquarters and to consider all possible contingencies that may occur to their businesses and their interests around the world. Enter political risk insurance, a type of coverage specifically designed to help hedge against an international event that would disrupt a company’s operations, such as the occurrence of political violence, nationalization of assets or currency conversion disruption. In recent years, even traditional political risk coverage has proved insufficient to address the increasing needs of life science companies that require a nuanced underwriting process to address their specific risk factors. Against this backdrop, the insurance industry continues to evolve at a rapid pace, opening up opportunities for both the admitted and surplus lines markets to expand beyond the scope of traditional political risk coverage and to craft unique and new forms of coverage. (more)