Dutch insurance group ANV aims to almost double the premium income of its life business from £13m currently, to £25m and beyond in the next 3-5 years, if market conditions allow.
Cathy Garner, who was recently appointed active underwriter at ANV Syndicate 779, explained the provider’s plans and growth strategy for its life business to Life Insurance International.
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Garner said that although it is a long-standing, well-understood and in many ways a standardised area of the insurance market, the life sector contains many "extremely interesting niches of opportunity" for new approaches, new risks and new structures that are not provided by the mainstream market.
Garner said: "What is unique to the life market is the unavoidable reality that no one of us will live forever. These dynamics mean that small niches in a market of this size offer a volume of business and an opportunity for innovation to rival any class of specialty lines.
"The life market is an open field for innovation and provides global opportunity for ANV underwriters to apply their skill."
Garner added that although it is well understood that life business is traditionally less volatile than many other lines of business, ANV views the life portfolio as effective diversification from the more catastrophe-exposed part of the Lloyd’s arm.
Aviva’s proposed £5.6bn ($8.8bn) takeover of Friends Life has been one of the major developments of 2014, and Garner has described it as "almost the end game" of consolidation in the UK life market.
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By GlobalDataOpportunity from consolidation
In Garner’s view, such consolidation brings many opportunities for more niche players.
She said: "Larger players concentrate heavily on market share and reinsurance arbitrage, and the very real needs of the "less than vanilla" are ignored.
Couple this with the fact that some protection products have become unnecessarily complicated in the drive to differentiate – for example, the arms race of endlessly increasing numbers of critical illnesses covered – and it takes very little effort to see that conditions are producing a market where simplicity and ease of access will be a real asset. Ideal, in fact, for us."
Asked what new life insurance products and services ANV is working on, Garner said ANV has designed a product called "Simple Life", which is structured so that, for example, small businesses who do not currently buy life cover for their employees can immediately get a defined level of benefit, for everyone, at one simple rate.
"It’s estimated that a quarter of employees in the UK have no access to workplace protection products, so there is a significant potential market for this type of product," said Garner.
She added that ANV is also very proud to offer the largest per-life capacity of any Lloyd’s syndicate, standing at £10m. "Our high life products are designed specifically to cater for the high net worth individuals and groups, who are likely to have multiple needs for life insurance, but may not be able to access the high total levels required."
Garner also stressed that ANV does not just see itself as adding to the offerings of the UK market. For example, she said it has been working in tandem with Aon and Swiss Re to produce an ultra high net worth product for UK and European expats.
Looking ahead, Garner said in 2015, ANV is looking to use the breadth of its offices and relationships across borders to access risks more broadly; and to extend the access to its London operation to a wider footprint of markets than has been traditionally considered in the past for its lines.
