Sun Life CEO and president Kevin Strain said that he is confident of the insurer’s continued growth potential in Malaysia as the firm rides high on its strong bancassurance and banca-takaful distribution sales.
The company, which recently celebrated 10 years in the Southeast Asian country, has tripled its market share since its inception in 2013. It now serves over 1.2 million clients in Malaysia.
“We returned three times the growth in income and almost half of the investment Sun Life and Khazanah Nasional Bhd made in cash dividends,” Strain said in a report from Bernama. “So, we’ve been in an incredible investment here in Malaysia.”
Strain said that the country is special because it is the first in which he was able to bring Sun Life into. Despite the challenges, he said that the opportunity is great because of the firm’s partnership, strategy, and economic growth.
Sun Life Asia president Ingrid Johnson said that the country has always been a wealth in terms of its takaful offerings. The unit is the first in the country to offer takaful bancassurance with its products, and as such it is also a model for Sun Life to try in the rest of the region, which translates to 84 million clients for the Asian insurer.
“We’re serving nations like India and China but the 1.2 million clients in Malaysia are very sizeable in earnings. That’s the number we don’t disclose but from a sales perspective, Malaysia continues to be very important,” Johnson said.
Sun Life Malaysia country head Raymond Lew also chimed in, saying that the bancassurance partnership with CIMB Bank would be further strengthened over the next decade.
“Certainly, we will broaden our distribution network. What we want to do is to continue to work with them to collaborate and support each other. CIMB has eight million customers, so if we can provide for these people, we will be very, very sizeable,” Lew said.
The outlook for the Malaysian insurance sector remains optimistic as revealed by a recent study that forecasted $13.1 billion in gross written premiums by the end of the year.
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