Lewis Ellis acquires Alan Gray and its subsidiary A.G. Risk Management from Premia Holdings.

The South Carolina Department of Insurance promotes Hinal Patel to chief financial analyst for its traditional division, with effect from October.

Lockton appoints Cristina Scenna as chief operating officer for its Canadian business.

AM Best revises the outlook on the Long-Term Issuer Credit Rating of the two Vermont captives of US food retail group Kroger to negative from stable, citing deterioration in underwriting performance.

The Central Bank of Ireland publishes consultation paper CP173, seeking views on proposed Guidance on Good Practices for the Sound Management of Third-Party Risks.

Aon appoints Maxime Manderlier as employee benefits (EB) captive manager, a role Manderlier took up in October.

Hylant Global Captive Solutions appoints Sheril Samson as senior captive account manager, a role Samson took up in September.

KeyState appoints Ian Podmore as vice president of captive solutions. Podmore is based in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Higginbotham converts its transportation specialty practice into a full division, which the broker says gives the team greater capacity to invest in transportation-specific staff, services and industry initiatives.

SIAA acquires Canopy Specialty Insurance, a transatlantic specialty commercial property and casualty managing general agent (MGA) with operations in the US and the UK.

Sapiens International Corporation appoints Maroun Mourad as chief executive officer for North America. Mourad joins the senior leadership team of the insurance software provider.

Insurance Ireland and law firm William Fry have launched an initiative to strengthen Ireland's position as a captive insurance domicile.