Blackstone to acquire Alliant Insurance

Blackstone Group on Sunday announced that it will acquire Alliant Insurance Services Inc., an insurance brokerage firm for $1.1 billion in cash and stock. The deal comes nine months after Alliant announced plans to buy the U.S. operations of London-based Jardine Lloyd Thompson Group for $100 million.

Spokesman, Mike Simmons said that Alliant Insurance Services, brokerage firm which is now owned by private equity firm Lindsay Goldberg & Bessemer of New York will have its current management, employees and headquarters intact.

The market analysts though surprised are watching the deal closely as the the Blackstone Group is otherwise known to buy companies worth tens of billions of dollars and the Alliant transaction is hence a very small transaction.

But the statement made by the Senior Managing Director Chinh Chu suggested that Blackstone may just be beginning on a well thought of plan to launch more insurance brokerages.

"Alliant is an attractive platform due to its market leadership in its core segments (and) superior growth prospects," Blackstone's Senior Managing Director Chinh Chu said.

The sector of the Insurance brokerages which is fragmented and divided into small, medium and large players is spread throughout the United States.

Two similar deals have occurred in this sector already involving Goldman Sachs' private equity group which said it would pay $1.4 billion to acquire USI Holdings Corp. and another landmark deal of the Apax Partners and Morgan Stanley deciding to buy Hub International a Chicago based broker.

Alliant happens to be a leader in the field of brokerage operations, providing employee benefits and insurance services to more than 20,000 commercial clients worldwide.

Alliant distributes its customized products to public entities, law firms, real estate and other industry groups. The Blackstone Group shall now be using the platform that has been established by Alliant to spread into the brokerage business trying to establish its supremacy even in the field of insurance brokerages.