Sony Life Insurance has established a local subsidiary in Singapore to sell life insurance products through via agencies in shopping malls.
The Japanese insurer aims to open nearly 50 agencies in the city-state over 10 years, starting as soon as summer 2018, said the Nikkei Asian Review.
The insurer will also establish a local joint venture with Tokyo-based Starts Securities Co Ltd to conduct financial advisory business. This will be a subsidiary of Sony Life’s Singapore subsidiary.
“Sony Life believes that its strength in selling insurance products through sophisticated consulting has a good chance of finding potential customers within the country,” the insurer said in a statement, adding that its strategy of agencies in malls is also based on Singapore’s dense population.
The agencies will sell other insurers' policies at first, but Sony Life aims to eventually offer its own products as well.
Sony Life has had several overseas ventures. It entered the Philippines market in the 1990s, only to pull out in 2012 after disappointing earnings. It seems to have turned its focus to developed markets. Last year, it acquired a substantial stake in diversified Australian financial services company ClearView Wealth, which offers life insurance among other financial products.
The insurer intends to make the Singapore business profitable in five years' time and to recoup accumulated losses by the ninth year, said the Nikkei Asian Review.