Prudential Teams up With Sacombank in Vietnam

Prudential Vietnam Assurance, a subsidiary of the U.K.-based Prudential plc [85925], has teamed up with Sacombank to provide life insurance policies to the bank's consumer loans customers in Vietnam.

The bancassurance partnership will enable Prudential to offer life insurance policy to the bank's customers in addition to mortgage and automobile loans.

Jack Howell, chief executive officer of Prudential Vietnam, said the cooperation will help both companies develop their business with a combined financial solutions package for the convenience and protection of customers.

"Through our loan insurance-linked approach, Prudential will be able to offer insurance-linked services to all the products of Sacombank," said Howell in a statement.

Bancassurance has a high demand in Vietnam and the launch of this loan insurance-linked product is a timely approach to market trend, said Tran Xuan Huy, chief executive officer of Sacombank. The commercial bank has a network of 270 transaction ports in 45 cities and 63 provinces in Vietnam.

The publicly listed Sacombank offered 47.6 trillion billion dong (US$2.7 billion) in loans for the first half of this year, with consumer loans representing 25.6%.

Prudential is the leading life insurer in Vietnam with premium income of 3.95 trillion dong and 4.27 trillion dong in 2007 and 2008, respectively, according to the Ministry of Finance. With a network of more than 139 customer service centers, branch offices, agencies and business partners, the life insurer accounted for more than 41% of market share in terms of premium income in Vietnam.

(By Iris Lai, Hong Kong bureau manager: [email protected])