Data centers are becoming a battleground for global (re)insurers in the AI era
By Josh Recamara
Willis, a WTW business, has launched an eight-point “digital infrastructure” framework that treats data centers as a systemic insurance class.
Announcing the move on Jan. 28, Willis said it is responding to a fundamental change in the risk profile of data centers, which it now views as “critical, interconnected digital infrastructure” underpinning AI, cloud and the wider economy — and therefore far harder to serve with traditional, single-line placements.
Willis said it already secured more than US$3 billion in capacity for major hyperscale projects and expects the segment to throw off about US$10 billion of insurance premiums in 2026 alone.
“Data centers have become a critical part of the global supply chain, and with that evolution, they face a growing list of complex and integrated risks,” said George Haitsch, North America technology, media and telecoms industry leader at Willis. “A ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach is no longer a viable option. Our industry must switch from singular products to customizable frameworks that embed risk mitigation from the earliest stages of development — and that is exactly what Willis is doing.”
From property account to cross-class infrastructure portfolio
Data centers are moving from being treated as high-limit property accounts to being managed as cross-class infrastructure portfolios that cut across various risks, including property and construction risks, cyber and political risk.
Willis said its eight-point model is designed to address the full risk cycle. The framework is explicitly structured around balance-sheet protection and capital alignment. The company said the new solutions are designed to reduce operational disruption and optimize balance sheet protection, among others.
“From the construction phase through to long-term operations, we’re working with some of the world’s largest data center developers, owners, contractors and hyperscalers, and seeing firsthand how the sector’s unprecedented pace of growth is making risk more systemic, more interconnected and more material,” said Bill Creedon, chairman of Willis Global Construction. “These exposures extend well beyond the technology sector and demand a fundamentally different approach — one that looks across the entire data center lifecycle, not simply the placement of insurance capacity.”
Energy security, BI and contingent BI at the core of aggregation concerns
The most sensitive issue that Willis highlighted was energy security.
As power demand from AI-ready campuses accelerates, the risk of correlated business interruption (BI) claims from grid failures, localized blackouts our fuel-supply disruptions is rising sharply.
Industry studies underscored this concern: FM has said it now insures around 1,100 data centers with an aggregate insurable value of roughly US$250 billion, reflecting not only the high capital cost of facilities but also the business interruption and contingent BI exposures attached to their uptime commitments.
In parallel, dedicated data center business interruption cover is scaling quickly. One recent market analysis put stand‑alone data center BI premium at about US$3.9 billion in 2024, with forecasts for that niche to almost double by 2033 as reliance on digital infrastructure deepens and downtime becomes even more costly.
For now, Willis’ new framework is another signal that data centers – once viewed as a niche within commercial property – are rapidly becoming one of the defining growth and aggregation battlegrounds for global (re)insurers in the AI era, the company said.
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