Steadfast MD and CEO Robert Kelly will stay with the broker group until the end of 2020 at least.

His previous contract ran to December next year, but he has renewed for another three years.

In a presentation to a Macquarie conference last week, Mr Kelly outlined the importance of IT systems to the group’s strategy.

Technology is a competitive advantage because “it creates significant cost synergies and efficiencies”, he said. “We have elected to build our own systems – we don’t want to have a third party controlling our destiny or our data.”

Mr Kelly unveiled Steadfast’s independent Insight broking platform at last month’s group convention.

A co-founder of Steadfast, he has been with the group since 1996, managing it as it grew from a small cluster group to one of the largest diversified insurance operations in Australia.