Mainland Chinese internet giant Tencent has partnered with Taiwanese insurer Fubon Property and Casualty Insurance to sell insurance products online, using popular internet messaging app WeChat’s mobile payment function.
The partnership will include the development, importation, and sale of property and casualty insurance products, which are popularly sold online, as well as life insurance, which is less popular online but comprises a larger part of the insurance market.
Fubon Property and Casualty Insurance, a subsidiary of Fubon Financial Holdings, the second-largest financial group in Taiwan, will underwrite the general insurance policies, including short-term health and accident insurance. It will also offer long-term life insurance on behalf of Sunshine Life Insurance.
Tencent-owned WeChat has an estimated 890 million monthly active users a nearly 11-fold increase over the past two years. According to market research firm Analysys Mason, WeChat’s user ecosystem of almost 900 million may be the key that allows Tencent to crack into the insurance market.
Additionally, WeChat Pay, WeChat’s mobile payments system is familiar to many users, and it provides a method for targeted distribution of insurance products by providing customers with sales scenarios and product information, a representative told All Weather TMT.
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