Recent developments in Taiwan’s life insurance market point to a bright future for an industry in good health already, as the country seeks to cement its status as one of the hottest markets in Asia for insurance. At 15 percent, the country’s life insurance penetration rate ranks among the highest worldwide, and studies show that its growth will outpace that of the economy for some time. In the region, only China, Japan and South Korea can speak of a more formidable insurance market, and continuous improvements throughout mean that Taiwan will no doubt attract expertise ahead of what it can speak of currently.
With an ageing population and a low interest rate environment, Taiwan’s market properties feed comfortably into what is a glittering life insurance market, and the sector today accounts for approximately 80 percent of total premiums written – 90 percent when including the health and personal accident segments. The high net worth population in Taiwan, and in Asia generally, will continue to grow, and this, combined with a greater knowledge about the importance of insurance and retirement planning, will do much to boost the industry’s prospects moving forwards. In this fast-growing market are a number of notable domestic players, not least Fubon Life, which characterise much that is positive about Taiwan’s budding insurance industry.
In doing so, Fubon Life has claimed the Insurance Company of the Year in Taiwan for the fourth time. Receiving votes from 120,000 members from over 50 countries, Fubon Life has become the only life insurer in Taiwan to receive this honour for four consecutive years, and, in light of this recognition, will continue with its goal to become a first class financial institution in Asia.
Widespread sponsorship
Without enterprises such as Fubon Life, the insurance sector would not have made the progress it so clearly has done over the past few years. The company has demonstrated its innovative streak in the fields of human resource development, service optimisation and charitable contribution in 2015. In addition to cultivating young talent and strengthening local services, the company has also enhanced service efficiency and diversified the distribution channel by engaging with cloud services. As a benchmark enterprise, it joined forces with the Fubon Charity Foundation in conducting charity campaigns and supporting the underprivileged members of society. It also diligently fulfils its corporate social responsibility initiatives and aims to become a first class life insurance brand in Asia.
The company has been actively involved in charity activities, supporting underprivileged groups that include children, teenagers, those with mental and physical difficulties, the elderly and indigenous people to the Australian continent. The ‘Make Friends with Love’ scholarship programme – sponsored by Fubon Life and Fubon Charity Foundation – has helped to support the education of more than 143,000 children in nearly 2,200 schools around the country.
It is also a pioneer in incorporating local sports events within a charity campaign. In addition to being the long-time title sponsor of the Taipei Marathon, Fubon also sponsors the Fubon Braves basketball team of the Super Basketball League – a semi-professional basketball league in Taiwan; the and the LPGA golf tournament and baseball tournaments, allowing it to stand out in the life insurance industry with sports sponsorship.
In 2014, Fubon Life posted an after tax profit of TWD 35.367bn ($1.06bn), with an EPS of TWD 8.04 ($0.24) per share, equating to an annual growth rate of 41 percent and topping the life insurance industry in Taiwan for the sixth year in a row. A focus on people and a commitment to human capital is perhaps the foundation of Fubon Life’s impressive financial performance. In addition to providing a professional career-training programme, the company also places a great deal of emphasis on recruiting local talent.
In doing so, last year Fubon Life introduced a No Boundary recruiting programme, which focuses on recruiting new agents from cities and townships around the island to further expand its reach. In recent years, the company has also encouraged its agents to establish their own sales branches via internal entrepreneurship, which not only helps to expand the sales force, but also provides these agents with abundant resources to help them in their career path.
Fubon Life firmly believes that employees are the most important assets of the company. The professional training programme and attractive career prospects have made Fubon Life Taiwan’s favourite employer among college graduates majoring in finance and insurance for five years running. The company’s achievements are not due solely to a focus on people however, and attention paid to the issue of diversification and expansion has done much to improve Fubon’s international standing.
Garnering tailored insurance
Highly responsive to market change, Fubon Life has gone about constantly adjusting its product portfolio to meet customers’ changing requirements. In view of the low birth rate (see side bar) and growing single population, the company has introduced annuity, health and long-term care insurance products to offer clients better protection. The company also launched new products such as foreign currency denominated policies to meet ever-changing customer demands and prepare for a future in which its influence will expand far beyond Taiwan.
In terms of distribution channels, with the emergence of bancassurance and insurance brokerages in recent years, Fubon Life – in addition to distributing its products via its other subsidiaries – has also actively developed strategic alliances with other banks and medium/large insurance brokerages to offer exclusive products for these channels. This year, Fubon started to work with Ping An Insurance in China to this end. Its policyholders who may or may not have an incident in China can now have his or her claim application processed at Ping An’s service counter as a result of this partnership.
In view of the changes sweeping across financial services, particularly in the form of globalisation, Fubon Life has also led the industry in acquiring the OIU license. It is planning to take advantage of its flexible product strategy, extensive distribution channels, solid balance sheet and capital adequacy performance to further expand its business and providing foreign customers with a more competitive product portfolio to satisfy their needs in both protection and investment.
Fubon Life has been actively expanding its reach to Mainland China and other Asian markets for some time. In addition to the subsidiary in Vietnam and the Hong Kong insurance market – which Fubon has already planned to enter – the company also subscribed to shares issued by Korea’s Hyundai Life Insurance in order to expand its business in Northeast Asia. This is the first time ever that a Taiwanese life insurer has invested in the insurance business in Korea. In the future, Fubon Life will continue to study and evaluate the market potential of other countries in order to further integrate its resources on a regional financial service platform, and in doing so to truly become a first class financial institution in Asia.
On top of globalisation, the development of cloud technology has dramatically changed consumer behaviour. How to leverage the trend and technology to provide the customers with a more convenient service and satisfy their needs is a challenge, as well as a new opportunity, for the life insurance industry. Fubon Life has led the industry by introducing an online proposal processing system. Agents equipped with mobile devices can take advantage of the cloud database and back-end system to create a proposal for prospects during the first visit, based on their own individual needs and budgets. The immediate and timely service allows the prospects to have a more comprehensive understanding of the coverage and terms contained in the insurance policy.
The online application system and the policy service platform over the cloud also help to simplify the current application process. Policyholders will be able to complete the process with their mobile devices, and the platform has been widely recognised for its innovation and convenience. In the future, Fubon Life will continue to expand and optimise the cloud service system to provide customers with the most comprehensive digital service in the market.
Looking to the future, Fubon Life will continue to strengthen its business in Taiwan while extending its global reach. The company intends to constantly improve on its customer service and fulfil its corporate social responsibilities to move towards the goal of becoming a first-class life insurer in Asia.
