One year on from Zywave’s acquisition of the company, WCL’s managing director James Willison looks back on objectives that have been achieved and looks forward to next year. I’m delighted to report that we’ve had an exceptional year.
Some acquisitions focus on saving costs and this time last year there was a certain amount of apprehension at WCL about being bought by a large American company. But our trust has proved well founded, and we have been able to achieve significant growth.
Zywave said they would provide WCL with the resources to grow the business – and that has happened with a 30% increase in staff at WCL and a larger client base.
Both companies have benefited from the acquisition, with Zywave having greater access to the carrier market and WCL gaining greater access to the US market as well as the capacity to scale its operations.
Zywave offers a cloud-based platform with sales enablement, client delivery, content and analytics solutions. It partners with more than 15,000 insurance businesses in more than 10 countries across the globe, including brokers, carriers and HCM service providers.
WCL provides the ability for firms to connect to and integrate with multiple placing platforms, implement electronic accounting & settlement and claims solutions, greatly speeding up premium and claims payments, and provides links to bank statements to automate the movement of money.
There has been a welcome consistency and mutual understanding between the two firms that has allowed us to continue to support our clients and grow our client base. The partnership with Zywave gives WCL the ability to pinpoint those messaging solutions and integrations that will make the biggest impact in the insurance market and scale offerings appropriately.
With Zywave’s continued international expansion, they have established their European base right in the centre of London. It’s great having a central office in the heart of the City for Zywave and WCL staff, presenting a crossover of clients and opportunities.
The working cultures have aligned well and Zywave have been inclusive with monthly stand-up meetings. WCL are playing an increasingly important role in the Zywave group. We have direct weekly communications with Zywave’s CEO, Jason Liu, who takes an active interest in expanding international operations with WCL.
We’ve exceeded expectations in 2021, and next year we aim to build on our financial success and accelerate growth, particularly with the use cases in the US where we can bring our technical capabilities, and by leveraging the additional resources the acquisition has made available.
It’s been gratifying to see our plans for 2021 come to fruition and look forward to even more success next year.