KUALA LUMPUR: Berjaya Sompo Insurance Bhd aims to hit a premium value target of US$320 million by 2023 for its general insurance segment and climb into the top five in Malaysia.
Chief executive officer Tan Sek Kee said the insurer is currently working towards its goal with several initiatives including investing into the right channels, innovating existing products and focusing on digitalising business operations.
"We feel that we have invested in the right areas this year for our products innovation, our people, and digitalisation. We would offer products that suit the market needs and gauge with clients’ requirements. We hope this paves the way for our success in the next year,” he told New Straits Times in an interview recently.
However, he remained cautious that the general insurance growth might be flattish this year, citing that the industry could face lower premium tariff.
“We did our price calculations correctly. The central bank also ensured that the de-tariffication environment was well under control in comparison to other countries like India and Indonesia, which ended up in price wars.
“Since a year ago, a lot of new product features have been included across the industry, such as additional protection for e-hailing vehicles and lower premiums for flood coverage,” he added.
On other targets, Tan said Berjaya Sompo also aims to reach one million customers by 2023 from the current 700,000 customers in Malaysia, while commanding up to eight per cent market share.
“If we are able to reduce the management cost by five per cent, we can sell five per cent cheaper premium than our competitors.
“We also intend to recruit more talent people and spend more on processes using robotics to keep our operation efficient,” he said.
Tan said Berjaya Sompo currently employs 651 people and five per cent of its workforce employed in information and technology (IT) division. The company had previously spent RM39 million on IT infrastructures since 2016.
He said Malaysia currently contributes about 20 per cent in revenue of the total US1.2 billion in the Southeast Asia region.
“We target a seven per cent growth for 2019 driven by bancassurance segment with the potential of 150 million new businesses with CIMB Bank and other agency business,” he said, adding that currently the insurer has over 2,800 agents in Malaysia.
In 2018, Berjaya Sompo achieved RM150 million in gross written premiums, contributing significantly to its total gross written premiums in its first full year of partnership with CIMB.
Sompo Holdings (Asia) Pte Ltd chief executive officer Daniel Neo said Malaysia is a key market for the company’s growth with an opportunity to provide customers with more competitive products, despite of the recent de-tariffication.
“We have strong presence in both corporate and retail business lines across the region. Next, we will focus on the retail segment, as we see that it has more room to grow aggressively including our travel, motor and health insurance,” he said.
Neo said the insurer would embark on several initiatives for travel insurance, specially tailored plan for travelers to Japan with cashless services, free translation services over the phone.
On the motor insurance, Neo said it the appointed officer will arrive at the accident scene within 20 minutes to provide assistance, advice and perform E-filing of claims on behalf of customers.
On the overall retail products, he said the insurer would introduce a mobile app to enable consumers to buy most personal lines products 50 per cent faster, while making their claims 50 per cent faster.
Neo said the insurer would improve its customer experience in phases through digitalisation, enabling customers to easily purchase and renew insurance online.
“We will only pilot new technology when we have done sufficient tests and studies to ensure that it will benefit our customers,” he said.