Insurance brokers EPIC and Arthur J. Gallagher settle lawsuit

San Mateo-based insurance brokerage and employee benefits consulting company also recognized as EPIC, said late Thursday it's settled a pending lawsuit by Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. Inc., Adding the dispute to a “mutually agreeable and confidential resolution.” Arthur J. Gallagher, one of the nation’s largest insurance brokerages, filed the late 2007 lawsuit in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, alleging that startup EPIC raided its Bay Area staff, ultimately hiring away 47 of 76 employees in Gallagher’s San Ramon office, including its top two executives there. The suit, by Gallagher and its California subsidiary, alleged that EPIC engaged in a “sneak attack” on Gallagher’s personnel and proprietary information leading up to early December 2007, when more than half of Gallagher’s San Ramon employees defected to EPIC. Charges in the now-settled suit included misappropriation of trade secrets, misappropriation of employer property, breach of contract and fiduciary duty, unfair competition and fraud. Privately held EPIC has offices in San Mateo, San Francisco, San Ramon, Folsom, Irvine, Los Angeles and Orange. No further details were disclosed in the Jan. 8 statement by Edgewood Partners. EPIC, launched in mid-2007 by Dan Francis and John Hahn, grew rapidly by recruiting senior executives from a number of local rivals, including ABD Insurance and Financial Services (now part of Wells Fargo), UnionBanc Insurance Services Inc., Brown & Brown Inc. and others. It acquired then-70-year-old Calco Insurance Brokers & Agents Inc. in July 2007 to serve as its statewide base of operations. Francis was previously ABD’s chief executive officer; Hahn was the founder and former CEO of San Francisco’s Tri-City Brokerage.