2008-10-06 16:47:00 -

- AIR Worldwide Corporation (AIR) today announced that Dr. Akshay Gupta, PE, SECB, has joined AIR as Principal Engineer and Director of its Catastrophe Risk Engineering (CRE) practice. Based in San Francisco, Dr. Gupta will be responsible for managing and developing the CRE practice. The CRE practice provides property owners and insurers with detailed structural, earthquake, and wind engineering services coupled with state-of-the-art risk modeling both for pre-disaster planning and risk mitigation and for post-event damage assessment and repair development. Clients depend on these analyses to make informed decisions regarding insurance purchase, retrofit investments, and tradeoffs between insurance and retrofit.

"Dr. Gupta brings a wealth of engineering consulting experience to AIR," said S. Ming Lee, President and CEO of

AIR Worldwide. "Along with analysis and design of a variety of structures, he has investigated hundreds of structures damaged by various earthquakes, hurricanes, and man-made hazards such as explosions, fires, and construction vibrations. His engineering risk analysis and mitigation work extends from individual buildings to portfolios of building structures and large industrial facilities at risk from earthquakes, wind, or ocean storm surge."

Dr. Gupta also brings to AIR extensive experience in the evaluation of behavior and response of structures using finite element models and employing linear and nonlinear static and dynamic analysis techniques. Prior to joining AIR, Dr. Gupta was with Exponent Failure Analysis Associates for about ten years, where he most recently held the position of Principal Engineer in the Buildings & Structures practice. His continuing research focus is in the area of Performance-Based Engineering as applied to structural risk assessment and mitigation. Dr. Gupta has authored more than twenty-five technical publications including peer reviewed journal articles, conference articles and publicly available reports. Dr. Gupta is a Licensed Professional Engineer, is Certified in the Practice of Structural Engineering, and holds a Ph.D. and M.S. in Structural Engineering from Stanford University. He is a member of various national professional organizations.

"AIR's CRE services provide property owners, risk managers, brokers, insurers, attorneys, and government organizations with comprehensive engineering and risk evaluation for their particular assets," explained Dr. Gupta. "Combining detailed engineering analyses with AIR's state-of-art probabilistic hazard, risk, and network modeling creates a unique service offering that allows us to provide clients with in-depth information that can be used for risk mitigation decision making in the form of physical improvements, insurance, retention, or combination thereof."

AIR's CRE practice consists of highly qualified engineers and scientists who are experts in the fields of structural engineering, structural dynamics, meteorology, seismology, geotechnical engineering, risk and decision analysis, and probability and reliability theory that allows them to collectively address all aspects of the performance and reliability of lifelines and residential, commercial, and industrial structures to an uncertain loading environment.

AIR's Catastrophe Risk Engineering services are available immediately in the US, Europe and Asia.

About AIR Worldwide Corporation

AIR Worldwide Corporation (AIR) is the scientific leader and most respected provider of risk modeling software and consulting services. AIR founded the catastrophe modeling industry in 1987 and today models the risk from natural catastrophes and terrorism in more than 50 countries. More than 400 insurance, reinsurance, financial, corporate and government clients rely on AIR software and services for catastrophe risk management, insurance-linked securities, detailed site-specific wind and seismic engineering analyses, and property replacement cost valuation. AIR is a member of the ISO family of companies and is headquartered in Boston with additional offices in North America, Europe and Asia. For more information, please visit www.air-worldwide.com.

AIR Worldwide Corporation
Kevin Long, 617-267-6645
klong@air-worldwide.com