Kajima USA’s Vermont captive provides a “competitive advantage” for its six construction and five development companies, according to risk manager Mike Brown, speaking exclusively in an interview with the Global Captive Podcast.

Brown said the captive allows the group to pursue projects that they may not have been able to in the past and gives it more influence in claims handling procedures.

He explained that the companies in the group have a “great loss history” but the commercial insurance marketplace will only “reward you so much”.

“They never really want to fully reward you for the loss history that you achieve, and as a result of that, we’re missing some savings,” he said.

“We’re able to bring this same coverage, and better coverage in some cases, to our constituent operating companies through this captive for a much lower price and with a good deal more flexibility.”

He said the captive was formed in July of this year so it could ultimately bring some of the “profitability back in”.

The captive will begin by writing general liability, automobile and workers compensation insurance, but Brown said once they are comfortable with the operation of the captive, there are other lines that could be added.

He also detailed the reasons behind the decision to domicile the captive in Vermont.

“Well, we wanted to locate in the United States for sure,” he said. “On our original list, we probably had about 20 potential states.

“One of the things that we were looking for was a group of regulators that had a productive look at bringing new captive business into their state.” He concluded that it was decided that there was “none better than Vermont” when it came to potential US domiciles for its captive.