Takaful Malaysia eyes 50% market share in 2-3 years

By T Vignesh
Syarikat Takaful Malaysia Bhd (Takaful Malaysia) expects to capture slightly more than half of the takaful industry's total asset market share in the next two to three years despite the current economic crisis. Managing director Datuk Mohamad Hassan said the industry's total assets have reached RM12 billion and the company's share currently stands at RM4.05 billion.
"We are confident of achieving slightly more than the current takaful market rate, which is between 22% and 25% per annum," he told reporters after a signing ceremony with Standard Financial Planner Sdn Bhd (SFP) in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.
Takaful Malaysia became the first in the takaful industry to add professional financial advisors to its existing portfolio of distribution channels following the appointment of SFP to market its products. SFP has a nationwide network of more than 300 representatives of whom 75 are licensed financial advisors with Bank Negara Malaysia.
Mohamad Hassan said that this will enhance the penetration of the company's family and general insurance products into the middle-upper Malaysian market, thereby makes Takaful Malaysia's products more accessible to a wider customer base.
He said the company is confident of the selection of SFP due to its position as a market leader and largest independent financial advisory group in Malaysia. S FP is also the first financial planning group in Malaysia to hold both Financial Advisors (FA) and Corporate Unit Trust Advisor (CUTA) licences.
At the signing ceremony, SFP's CEO Alfred Sek said the past ten years have witnessed fresh changes to the financial planning industry and its delivery of financial advice in Malaysia.
He said that Takaful Malaysia will greatly benefit from this arrangement as its potential customers will develop full confidence in the products offered, through high quality independent advice from these Financial Advisors.
Meanwhile, Takaful Malaysia has plans to undertake a rebranding exercise to reflect its fresh characteristics in conjunction with its 25th anniversary this year.

(This story appeared in The Malaysian Reserve on July 9, 2009. The Malaysian Reserve is a daily business/finance newspaper published out of Kuala Lumpur, with a sectoral page on Islamic finance on Mondays, edited by Habhajan Singh)