Aegon Life to invest Rs 200 cr in IT to push online sales

Aegon Life Insurance has also changed its strategy to become a direct-to-consumers company and exited agency channel in August this year

Aegon Life plans to invest Rs 200 crore in digital technology in the next two to three years as it looks to tap growing online retail channel as part of its strategy to become a 'direct-to-consumers' company.

"We believe retail is the way to look at in terms of sustainability of the future of the industry. According to trends, people have now started looking at life insurance as pure life insurance and not as investment options," said K S Gopalakrishnan, MD and CEO, Aegon Life Insurance Company.

"We are seeing a lot of people researching online. Buying online is a small percentage, but it is happening. Roughly in next two to three years, we will invest about Rs 200 crore towards digital technology."

Aegon Life Insurance has also changed its strategy to become a "direct-to-consumers" company and exited the agency channel in August this year.

"We have exited agency channel. We had about 6,000 agents but we have shut that channel. We have also exited tele-sale model, and as a result our topline has come down but we want to become a direct-to-consumers company," Gopalakrishnan said.

He said the idea is to directly deal with the customer, driven by technology.

Aegon Life is also investing a lot in digital marketing as well as in analytics. "So that's where lot of our investment is going into," he said.

This year so far, the company's claim settlement rate has been 100 per cent, which also means people are coming to know what they are buying, he added. The company's customer retention rate is also about 94 per cent.

Aegon Life, which started its business in 2008 in India aims to break-even in next two years and turn profitable, he added.

Aegon Life Insurance is a joint-venture between the Netherlands-based Aegon and India's media conglomerate Bennett, Coleman & Company.

The Mumbai-headquartered company has over 4.4 lakh customers across India.