ING Vysya Life Insurance to infuse fresh capital

ING Vysya Life Insurance plans to augment its capital base to meet the growing requirements of its life insurance business. After infusing Rs 50 crore this year to build up a capital base of Rs 440 crore, it proposes to bring in Rs 100 crore every year, its managing director and CEO Frank Koster said.

He told reporters after launching the blogging portal - www.pickuradvisor.com - here on Tuesday: "We wish to pump in more money into our life insurance business and aim to breakeven in seven to 10 years in India."

ING Vysya Life recently witnessed two significant share transactions. Gujarat Ambuja and Exide Industries picked up 14.8 per cent and 50 per cent stake respectively in the company. The ING Group holds 26 per cent.

Exide Industries recently bought the GMR Group's stake in the company and has nominated four directors on the board. They are Rajan Raheja as chairman of the board of ING Vysya Life and S B Ganguly, chairman of Exide as director, Satish Raheja and Rajesh Kapadia as directors. Gujarat Ambuja is represented by Anil Singhvi on the board of ING Vysya Life.

Koster said though the company entered the business late, it has picked up. Its premium income expanded by 318 per cent in the last fiscal-ending March 2005.

It has 13 life insurance products including two unit linked products and a single premium unit linked plan.

In what could be considered the first in the life insurance industry, ING Vysya Life on Tuesday unveiled its blogging portal to give an online presence to its top insurance advisors.

Using the service, customers can interact with top life insurance advisors online, get answers to their insurance queries and engage in a conversation with their chosen advisor through a private blog the customer and the advisor start together on the site.

On the occasion, Koster said, "The company has developed a unique blogging technology which helps customers choose their advisor and interact with them. The service empowers potential customers to view various featured advisor profiles on the site and then choose the advisor they would like to interact with and later meet. Our top advisors get a chance to leverage their knowledge and advisory capabilities to a larger group of potential customers."

The company has featured 27 of its advisors on the site based in six cities, such as Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad and Pune. These advisors are rated by the company based on their sales performance and internet savvyness.

Pallavi Chopra, manager, e-business at ING Asia Pacific in Hong Kong, who has been the key architect of the project in India and Hong Kong said, "The blogging portal will empower new age insurance customers, just in the same way that internet banking or online shopping is doing. We built the technology locally in India, using the considerable IT skills available in Bangalore and Mumbai. Based on the success, we will take it to other markets of ING Group."