Inga Beale to step down as Lloyd’s CEO in 2019

Lloyd’s of London said Friday that CEO Inga Beale will leave her post in 2019 after leading the market for five years.

Ms. Beale’s exact date of departure next year “will be confirmed in due course,” Lloyd’s said in a statement.

The pioneering CEO joined Lloyd’s in January 2014 and forged change both culturally and operationally.

She was named the market’s first female chief executive in its 325-year history at the end of 2013.

Earlier this year, she mandated that 80% of Lloyd’s trading be accomplished electronically by the end of 2019, pushing the market forward technologically.

In 2015, Ms. Beale was named the world's most inspiring LGBT business executive for 2015 by nonprofit business network OUTstanding, reflecting her dedication to diversity and inclusion.

The Inclusion@Lloyd’s initiative, which Ms. Beale founded in 2013, “has embedded diversity and inclusion as a business imperative across the global insurance sector,” Lloyd’s said in its statement.

Ms. Beale was also one of Business Insurance’s 2006 Women to Watch.

“The decision to leave has been a tough one, and when the time comes I will miss the energy, innovative spirit and expertise that I come across every working day,” Ms. Beale said in the statement.

“In her five years at Lloyd’s, Inga has set in motion a series of changes aimed at modernizing the market and making it more efficient and inclusive,” Bruce Carnegie-Brown, chairman at Lloyd’s, said in the statement. “Her boldness and persistence have generated the momentum required to bring about real change.”