Great Hill Partners Announces Strategic Investment in Aurenity

Investment to Accelerate Underwriter Recruitment, New Program Launches, and AI Enablement Across Growing E&S Platform

BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Great Hill Partners (“Great Hill”), a private equity firm that invests in high-growth, disruptive companies, today announced a strategic investment in Aurenity (the “Company”), a technology-enabled excess & surplus (“E&S”) managing general agent (“MGA”). Agman, Aurenity's founding investor, and the Company’s management team will retain a significant portion of their equity stakes in connection with the transaction. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Great Hill's investment is designed to accelerate Aurenity's next phase of growth: expanding its underwriting talent base to fuel the launch of new specialty programs, while continuing to invest in the automation and systems infrastructure that enables the Company to scale efficiently with disciplined underwriting.

Founded in 2022 and headquartered in West Hartford, Connecticut, Aurenity operates as a technology-enabled MGA in the E&S insurance market. The Company was founded by executives with deep collective experience across underwriting, operations, and technology: Nick Davies (Chief Executive Officer), Doug Trainor (Chief Underwriting Officer), Pat Safino (Chief Operating Officer), Janet Beaver (EVP Excess Casualty), and Mark Fuderanan (EVP Primary Casualty). Aurenity has grown to six core E&S programs spanning primary, lead, and excess casualty, public entity and religious (led by EVP Kevin Thommes), and property (led by EVP John Woie), with a diverse panel of high-caliber carrier partners.

"From the very beginning of Aurenity’s journey, our team has been focused on building a business that earns the trust of our carrier partners through disciplined risk selection," said Nick Davies. "Great Hill's investment and experience in both the insurance and technology sectors give us the capital and partnership to continue expanding our underwriting team and bring new programs to market. It also allows us to further invest in AI to enable smarter and faster decisions while preserving the expertise-led underwriting culture that’s been central to our success. We look forward to partnering with Great Hill to capitalize on the significant opportunities ahead."

"Aurenity is exactly the kind of company we look for, with a high-caliber founding team, a track record of earning the trust of its carrier partners, and the technology infrastructure to continue scaling," said Bob Anderson, Principal at Great Hill. "The structural shift of complex risks into the E&S market and toward specialized underwriters gives us strong conviction that Aurenity is well-positioned for the near and long term, and we look forward to partnering with the Aurenity and Agman teams to build on what they have already accomplished."

"When we backed Aurenity at inception, we saw a founding team with the operational discipline to build something differentiated and durable in the E&S market," said Scott Silverman, Agman’s Founder and CEO. "Since our investment, the Company has demonstrated a unique ability to scale while maintaining strong underwriting discipline. We are proud to partner with Great Hill as we continue to support Aurenity’s next chapter."

As part of the transaction, Matt Vettel and Nick Cayer, Managing Directors at Great Hill, along with Bob Anderson, will be joining Aurenity’s board of directors. Great Hill’s other insurance investments include One Inc (the leading insurance payments network), Pareto (the leading provider of employee benefit group captives), and Second Nature (the leading provider of tenant insurance solutions to the single-family rental market).

Ardea Partners and Oliver Wyman served as financial and actuarial advisors and Goodwin Procter LLP acted as legal counsel to Great Hill. Evercore served as financial advisor and Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP acted as legal counsel to Aurenity.

About Great Hill Partners
Founded in 1998, Great Hill Partners is a private equity firm targeting investments of $100 million to $750 million in high-growth companies across the financial services, healthcare, technology, business services, and consumer sectors. With offices in Boston and London, Great Hill has raised funds with over $19 billion in commitments and invested in more than 100 companies since 1998, establishing an extensive track record of building long-term partnerships with entrepreneurs and providing flexible resources to help middle-market companies scale. Great Hill has been recognized for its industry leadership, ranking in the top 5 of HEC Paris-Dow Jones’ Mid-Market, Large Buyout, and Upper Mid-Market Performance Ranking lists for five consecutive years (2021–2025). For more information, including a list of all Great Hill investments, please visit www.greathillpartners.com.

Disclaimer: Great Hill Partners did not provide any compensation to HEC Paris-Dow Jones to be considered for any of these rankings.

About Aurenity
Aurenity is blending market-leading talent with cutting-edge underwriting analytics, bringing a different MGA approach to the E&S market. Founded by underwriting experts with a common interest in innovation, our team shares over a century of experience at top-tier carriers. Harnessing our sophisticated ‘Augment’ risk models, our underwriters have access to better data and smarter analytics to deliver cross-cycle profit for our partners.

Aurenity, where expertise meets innovation.
Learn more at www.aurenity.com.

About Agman
Agman leverages its permanent capital base to partner with exceptional entrepreneurs building enduring businesses. Since its humble origins more than a century ago, Agman has grown into one of the largest family-owned investment firms in the United States, with thousands of employees, activities across the country, and expertise in a range of industries. Agman’s portfolio includes hospitality, real estate, and insurance. In addition to its investment in Aurenity, Agman is the principal investor in Omaha National, a leading provider of workers’ compensation insurance; and Virtus, a fast-growing specialty retail broker. For more information on Agman, please visit www.agmanpartners.com.