Three years in the life of an editor

January is named after Janus, the two-headed Roman god who looked both forwards and backwards. This is particularly relevant for me this January as I am leaving PB and am, therefore, looking back over the past three and a half years, as well as forward to the year ahead.

I joined PB in summer 2000, when the dotcom boom was starting to hit the insurance market. Indeed, Sara Murray, managing director of online internet venture Inspop.com, was featured on the August 2002 front cover, accompanied by the question 'Is this the future of insurance?'

In hindsight, obviously not - Inspop.com was sold just one year later.

But online trading could still be the future of general insurance. Regional brokers are abandoning standard personal lines insurance en masse if they are not big enough to churn it out online or via the phone. Insurers' extranets ensure online trading is continuing behind the scenes too, and the Polaris imarket initiative, which launched in December, could revolutionise 2004.

Regulation is another area in which a failed initiative from 2000 signalled a sea change for 2004. The General Insurance Standards Council finally launched in summer 2000, only to be met with the Office of Fair Trading ruling that member insurers could not refuse to sell via non-member brokers.

Effectively pulling the regulator's teeth, the project's future was shaky from then on.

But brokers now face compulsory regulation by the Financial Services Authority from January 2005, and getting ready for it will no doubt be the number one story of 2004.

Insurer consolidation has settled down during the past three and a half years, though admittedly Independent Insurance was still going strong in summer 2000. Broker consolidation had yet to kick in and brokers of £1m premium income were still considered sizeable. These days, brokers under £5m are beginning to feel the heat. Consolidation will continue apace during 2004 and brokers able to take advantage of pre-FSA sales could make a killing.

In 2000, broker networks were still an outlandish concept, with Willis and the Broker Network the only organisations to have made inroads in the market. By 2003, networks were the flavour of the month, with Camberford Law, Layton Blackham and Total Broker Solutions all entering the fray.

It will be interesting to see how these initiatives pan out in 2004.

All in all, interesting times in an industry that has a reputation for being grey and dull. Equally undeserved is the industry's reputation for being cut-throat. In my experience, most brokers and insurers are professional, pleasant and down-to-earth. But, perhaps this is another recurring problem for the insurance industry - how to improve its image with a hugely suspicious public.