Aon's New Ventures Group accelerates the firm's Intellectual Property Solutions

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Mar 12, 2019, 09:17 ET

New Ventures Group appoints Brian Cochrane as CCO

LONDON, March 12, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Aon plc (NYSE: AON), a leading global professional services firm providing a broad range of risk, retirement and health solutions, today announces its commitment to further develop its innovation portfolio and deliver new sources of value to clients through the New Ventures Group (NVG). The NVG is now formally sponsoring the firm's Intellectual Property Solutions (IPS) to help manage clients' intangible assets and expand the marketplace.

The NVG, which comprises a team of senior leaders, was formed in Q4 2018 to help realize the full potential of the Aon United growth strategy. The NVG focuses on the rapid incubation and delivery of new high-impact sources of value for clients.

Aon's new IPS offerings exemplify this approach, as IP is more important than ever as businesses recognize a paradigm shift from tangible to intangible assets. Firms need to both identify and manage risks surrounding business-critical and proprietary data, and develop and execute strategies for maximizing shareholder value from their IP portfolios. The IPS team has developed a set of consulting, valuation and risk transfer offerings to establish Aon as the trusted global authority in the intellectual property asset class.

To drive this and future initiatives, the NVG recently appointed Brian Cochrane as its Chief Commercial Officer. Brian previously served as Aon's Executive Vice President and Global Leader of M&A and Transaction Solutions and he will continue to oversee the unit as Executive Chairman. In his new role, he will be responsible for assessing the commercial feasibility of new solutions and collaborating with Aon's Operating Committee to ensure successful go-to-market for newly developed capabilities for clients.

The IPS team is led by CEO, Lewis Lee, founder of 601West, the IP consulting business within his former law firm, and President, Dennis Gaughan, who has ten years with Aon's M&A and Transactions Solutions team. Lewis and Dennis combine to bring distinctive IP, business, and risk management knowledge, experience, and capabilities. The IPS team is working closely with Brian Cochrane, Tony Goland, and the full NVG team to accelerate development and go-to-market of their initial offerings, while exploring the much more expansive commercial opportunities related to the rapid expansion of intangible assets across Aon's client base.

Tony Goland, Chief Innovation Officer and overall NVG leader, commented: "We have long recognized there is a critical need to innovate at scale on behalf of clients and create new opportunities for growth. The NVG has already made important strides in this regard, and we are excited Brian has joined the team as Chief Commercial Officer, with a current primary focus on our Intellectual Property Solutions."

Brian Cochrane, Chief Commercial Officer of the NVG, added: "This is a very exciting era for the firm as the NVG seeks to identify and develop new, high-impact sources of value for Aon's clients; accelerate our ability to scale these high-impact solutions; and meaningfully contribute to Aon's growth and performance. This approach is enabling Aon to go 'bigger and faster', driving growth-stage opportunities that have the potential to deliver meaningful value to clients."

Aon's NVG leadership team includes:

Greg Case, Chief Executive Officer
Tony Goland, Chief Innovation Officer
Christa Davies, Chief Financial Officer
Bryon Ehrhart, Global Head of Strategic Growth and Development
John Bruno, Chief Operations Officer and Chief Executive Officer, Data & Analytic Services
Brian Cochrane, Chief Commercial Officer, NVG and Executive Chairman, M&A and Transaction Solutions

About Aon

Aon plc (NYSE:AON) is a leading global professional services firm providing a broad range of risk, retirement and health solutions. Our 50,000 colleagues in 120 countries empower results for clients by using proprietary data and analytics to deliver insights that reduce volatility and improve performance.

Aon announced in May 2018 it will retire the business unit brands of Aon Benfield and Aon Risk Solutions, which follows the retirement of the Aon Hewitt business unit brand in 2017. This move was designed to increase the rate of innovation across the firm and make it easier for colleagues to work together to bring the best of Aon to clients. Aon has five specific global solution lines: Commercial Risk Solutions, Reinsurance Solutions, Retirement Solutions, Health Solutions and Data & Analytic Services.

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