Chola MS eyes Rs 2,500 cr GWP in 2014-15

Chola MS General Insurance is aiming for a total gross written premium (GWP) of Rs 2,500 crore in 2014-15 on the backdrop of the industry pegged to grow by 15-20 per cent and formation of a new government at the Centre.
"We are quite bullish about next year(2014-15). If there is a stable government at the Centre and our expectation is that even in the worst case scenario, the industry growth is expected to be at 15 per cent and in the best case it should be 20 per cent.
"For our business plan, we are targetng Rs 2,500 crore GWP," Cholamandalam MS General Insurance Company Managing Director S S Gopala Rathnam told reporters here.

"It will be an important year for us. In premium we will be crossing Rs 2,000 crore and in PBT we will be crossing Rs 200 crore", he said.
The Chennai-based company, a Joint Venture of Rs 225 billion Murugappa Group and Japan-based Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Group, registered Rs 1,855 crore Gross Written Premium for 2013-14 with a Profit Before Tax of Rs 101 crore and Profit After Tax of Rs 70 crore.
Gross Written Premium for 2012-13 stood at Rs 1,620 crore with a PBT of Rs 89 crore and PAT of Rs 60.1 crore.

On future plans, Gopala Rathnam said the company would focus on retail insurance and commercial segment.

"We want the contribution of commercial segment increase to 20 per cent (from the current 10 per cent) of the total business of the company. We want to increase contribution of health insurance portfolio to 25 per cent from 11 per cent. With this, the portfolio of motor insurance will come down to 50 per cent from 67 per cent", he said.
The company also plans to double its insurance agents in 2014-15 to 9,000. In 2013-14, the company had scaled up 4,500 agents, he said.
Last year, the company paid claim of Rs 50 crore to a public sector company, whose corporate office was badly damaged due to Cyclone Phailin off Odisha coast.

To a query, he said the solvency ratio was 1.62 per cent for 2013-14 while it stood at 1.44 per cent in the previous year (2012-13).
The company planned to introduce four health insurance products and also received the approval from insurance regulator IRDA, he said.