Mumbai:
DHFL General insurance,owned by Wadhawan Global Capital (WGC) promoted by Kapil Wadhawan,has changed hands and has started functioning as NAVI General Insurance promoted by Sachin Bansal,a technoogy enterpreneur known co-founding Flipkart.
In Januray,Navi Technology, Bansal's financial servives holding company, had acquired DHFL General Insurance from WGC for around Rs.100 crore and had received all necessary regulatory approvals agterwards from the insurance regulator IRDAI to make a new begining.
G Srinivasan,former CMD of New India Assurance(NIA) and currently director of Pune based National Insurance Academy was acting an advisor to Bansal on the deal.
WGC,owned by Kapil Wadhawan,had to go for a distress sell of DHFL General Insurance after Wadhawan had faced severe financial crisis since his another company Dewan Housing Finance went insolvent and was referred to National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) last year.
Through Navi Technologies Bansal has continued to place large bets on India’s broader financial services segment, which includes microlending, general insurance and mutual funds, among others.
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Vijay Sinha,who was MD & CEO of DHFL General Insurance, continues in the same position with the new company.
NAVI General Insurance is expected not to adopt the traditional model of doing general insurance business and be a pure digital player.
“At the Digital Labs of COCO by Navi General Insurance, whiz kids and techno mavens are bringing the next generation of general insurance to you very soon. When buying general insurance, you often treat it like the unwanted relative on holidays – but that is about to change. We're bringing together new-age algorithms and technology, decades worth of experience, a pulse of what insurance you really need and an aggressive need to make insurance fun,’’ said the website of NAVI General Insurance about how the company wants to “Reimagine Insurance''.
It further says “What you’ll see with general insurance — in general — are bloated plans with add-on covers you don’t need, a sense of confusion, and a drab buying journey that’s only interested in getting you to buy. But is insurance that simple—or is it being rushed to make a sale? At COCO by Navi General Insurance,we think otherwise. Insurance can be a little complex and that’s okay—we’ll demystify it for you,’’.
However, earlier two other general insurers, Go Digit, set up by Prem Watsa,an Indian born Canadian billionaire and a few Indian insurance professionals led by Kamesh Goyal and Acko general insurance,backed by a clutch of private equity players and technology professionals including N. R. Narayana Murthy, which had promised to be digital players haven't succeeded in doing that.
NAVI General insurance after degrowing its book due to the financial crisis faced by its former promoters, has ended 20119-20
with a total premium of Rs157 crore as against Rs243 crore it had earned in 2018-19