Brokerage acquisition activity continues unabated

This year's early surge of merger and acquisition activity continued to gain steam this week as two major brokerages announced new acquisitions.

On Thursday, Daytona, Fla.-based -Brown & Brown, Inc. announced that one of its wholly owned subsidiaries has acquired substantially all of the assets of O'Fallon, Mo.-based Independent Pharmaceutical Consultants, Inc.

IPC, which was founded in 1991, has annual revenues of approximately $1.8 million, according to Brown & Brown. IPC provides pharmaceutical benefits management consulting and compliance services to clients throughout the county, said Brown & Brown in a statement announcing the acquisition. “As part of this transaction, IPC's operations will join with Evergreen Rx, a division of Brown & Brown's Evergreen Re profit center, to form a new combined specialty pharmacy benefit consulting department,” said Brown & Brown in the statement.

Also last week, Itasca, Ill.-based Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. announced that it had acquired Riley & Associates Inc. of Mt. Pleasant, S.C.

Riley & Associates,, established in 1936, is a retail brokerage providing property/casualty insurance and risk management services to clients largely in the southeastern United States. Riley & Associates specialize in insurance for the hospitality, moving and storage, transportation and marine industries

. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.