ICICI Lombard General Insurance Co eyes big

Kochi, Jun 3: ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company Ltd, the largest private sector player in the field, is set to expand its operations to 600 locations by the year end, from the present 350 areas of sourcing the business.

Company marketing head Kartik Jain, at a press conference here last night, said the number of employees would also go up to 3400 from the current strength of 2883, with more thrust given on retail products.

The general insurance company, with an overall market share 7.8 per cent in the country, was planning to cross Rs 100 crore mark in premium collections from Kerala during the next fiscal, from Rs 30 crore mark of March 2006.

A joint venture between ICICI Bank and US-based 26-billion dollar Fairfax Financial Holdigns, the company has already grabbed 27 per cent share among the private players in the field.

In the year 2005-06, the company collected gross written premium of Rs 1592 crore, registering a growth of 80 per cent. They issued over 14,61,000 polices in the country, he said.

The company also insured 132,000 acres of land and 115,000 farmers for their different crops like groundnut, castor, orange, cotton, coriander and black gram in 13 States, as of March 2006.

In collaboration with 13 State governments, the company brought 126 million people under the group personal accident coverage and in six States, 3.3 million workers in the cotton industry were brought under the medical insurance scheme, Mr Jain said.

UNI