Philadelphia Insurance Cos. has long been known as a primarycarrier that will provide coverage for specialty lines that areotherwise unavailable except through the excess-and-surplus market.This spring, though, it decided to go a step further and instituteits own E&S division.

“The E&S market represented growth last year for the firsttime in a number of years,” explains John Glomb, executive vicepresident and chief underwriting officer. “That dynamic made itsomething we wanted to consider. It’s an exciting time in ourhistory.”

Although it’s too early to give details, Glomb adds,Philadelphia’s new E&S division will work more closely with itssister companies under the Tokio Marine umbrella.

“We had an E&S company earlier, but it was more of anopportunistic play, not a concentrated focus on growth,” he says.“The attempt now is to build an E&S company that is going to beable to help fuel our growth and distribution with our agencypartners.”