Overseas Partners Re has repositioned itself to be a specialty reinsurer in the property cat, accident and health, workers comp, finite risk and aviation sectors. The company has been rebuilt and its new specialty underwriting strategy was formally launched at a large reception in London.

The company is focusing on a few lines of business emanating principally from Europe and the United States and taking substantial positions in those lines of business. The Bermuda operation will concentrate on semi finite, finite, accident and health, aviation and space and property catastrophe.

The Philadelphia operation will concentrate on working layer casualty and agricultural treaties and facultative.

Last year OP Re bought Reliance Re in Philadelphia and renamed it Overseas Partners US Reinsurance - OPUS Re. The company came with a full complement of staff and already had the authority to write reinsurance in all 50 states and insurance in more than 40 states. This acquisition provided the company with access to technical expertise that allows it to expand its business with key clients in the world's largest reinsurance and insurance market.

Mary Hennessy, president and chief executive officer of OP Re, said: "We have now completed the first phase of the company repositioning; a new management team, new teams of seasoned underwriters, new underwriting focus and strategy and new claims and servicing infrastructure. "We retain our historical asset strategy that distinguished us as a convergence reinsurer long before the term was coined.

"We are very proud of our balance sheet and underwriting platform. We want now to be recognised as the `specialty reinsurer' with a strong presence in our key lines of business.

"We have hired the very best, technically competent and experienced underwriters in our targeted specialised lines. We believe this new specialist strategy will be valuable to those who trade in the London market and elsewhere.''

Overseas Partners began life in 1983 providing reinsurance of packages shipped by United Parcel Service - UPS. This business was high frequency, low severity and it provided stable, predictable results and around $240 million income annually. The company's initial capital base of $50 million rose to $1.75 billion on the back of this business. The current restructuring and repositioning began in earnest when UPS cancelled this shippers risk programme in September 1999 as a result of a US tax court ruling.

From the mid 1990s OP had begun writing business outside the shippers risk programme, but following cancellation of the programme the company needed to be a far more aggressive marketer of its services. At the beginning of 2000 three new highly experienced people were recruited and changes began. Ms. Hennessy joined as president and CEO. Mike Cascio, a co-founder of Stockton Re, also joined the company together with Mark Bridges who had 16 years' reinsurance experience.

Ms. Hennessy said: "The reality in Bermuda is that a company can only do so many lines. The talent, local or imported, just isn't available. That means you can't be a multi-line insurer with a strategy of writing every line and being in every major market. You've got to focus on four or five lines, the things that you do well.''

Jed Rhoads, executive vice president of reinsurance, said: "Playing off our strengths as a very large ($1.8bn surplus), well rated (Best's "A") reinsurer operating in Bermuda's favourable regulatory environment, we are concentrating on business that makes sense to do from Bermuda.

"We believe that channelling opportunities to underwriters with line specific expertise is more valuable to our clients, brokers and shareholders than simply geographical delineation. I don't want us to `quietly reinsure' any more. I want us to be an `in your face' reinsurer.''