Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Friday, Jan 25, 2002
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Friday, Jan 25, 2002 |
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Money & Banking
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Life Insurance MetLife eyes break even -- To raise capital base to Rs 450 cr Our Bureau
KOLKATA, Jan. 24 LIKE all private sector life insurance players, MetLife India Insurance Co Pvt Ltd is hoping to break even in its seventh year. But before that the company would increase its capital base to Rs 450 crore from the existing Rs 110 crore. Mr Venkatesh S. Mysore, Managing Director of MetLife India, said the capital would be needed mostly for promotional campaigns and for creating the necessary infrastructure. "The capital base would be increased over the next five to six years, but certainly not now,'' Mr Mysore told presspersons. MetLife India is a joint venture between the US-based life insurance company, Metropolitan Insurance Company. It holds 26 per cent stake through MetLife International Holdings Inc. Apart from that J&K Bank holds 25 per cent, M Pallonji Group holds 31 per cent and the rest 18 per cent is held by four other investors. According to Mr Mysore, unlike other foreign insurance players, MetLife insisted on a distributed Indian holding. When asked whether fresh partners could be co-opted in the venture, he said that there was hardly any such possibility. "The partners are ready to bring in the necessary capital whenever required,'' he said. After Bangalore, where it is headquartered, MetLife India opened its office in Kolkata. The next stop will be Chennai, followed up by offices in Kochi, Hyderabad, Mumbai and New Delhi. Currently, MetLife India has three products — whole life, endowment and money back — with three riders and they are accidental death benefit, waiver of premium and term rider. Mr Mysore said that the company has applied for 12 more "innovative'' riders. "Once they are cleared, we will have more interesting and customer friendly products in our basket,'' he said. He also said that MetLife is interested in the group insurance business and may launch one such policy in the second half of 2002. It is also interested in the annuity business. The company is targeting to sell 15,000 policies in the first year and the premium income would be Rs 15-16 crore. However, in the next five to seven years, it hopes to have a "five per cent market share of new premium business''. Currently, it has 300 financial advisors and it will go up to 1,000 by the year-end. MetLife is also talking with three "South India-based banks'' for tie-ups. Mr Mysore preferred not to disclose their names, but the company has similar arrangements with Karvy Consultants, Geojit Securities and a few others.
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