The chief executive officer of Centre Solutions (Bermuda) Limited, Paul Hellmers will be departing from Centre in the new year as the insurance company closes six offices around the world and makes "significant staff reductions globally".

The company said however that fewer than 20 percent of the approximately 80 staff in its Bermuda office will be made redundant in the cuts.

This follows an announcement on December 3 that Centre was exiting the credit enhancement business and that the group's chief executive officer, Tom Dickson was being replaced by Joel Klaassen. Centre will be closing their offices in Paris, Hong Kong, San Francisco, New Jersey, Sydney and Zurich.

After a strategic review, Centre has decided to continue their structured finite risk insurance and reinsurance business and they will retain offices in Bermuda, Dublin, London and New York.

In Centre's Bermuda office more than 80 percent of the staff will be retained and there are no Bermudian staff in the overseas offices that are closing.

"For those staff whose positions will be made redundant, the company is committed to ensuring that assistance, including outplacement services, will be provided in securing new jobs during the transition period. Each individual will be offered severance packages which will exceed minimum requirements," said George Hutchings, Vice President, Centre Solutions (Bermuda) Limited.

A management shake up puts Joel Klaasson leading the charge overall as CEO of Centre in the US, while on a local Bermuda level, George Hutchings and Mike Crow will be handling the new business generation side.

Asked if the company will remain in their current offices in the Waterfront Development on Pitts Bay Road, Mr. Hutchings said: "We're going to look at it - nothing has been decided yet".

Centre received a vote of confidence from Standard & Poor's last week which said that despite recent developments they would not be reducing the Centre group rating from A+.

An S&P statement said it believed Centre's broad distribution base and willingness and ability to model financial solutions in the property/casualty and life and health areas would continue to provide a solid business position.

The S&P statement also said Centre's capital adequacy was expected to be maintained at "its historically excellent level".