AIA Sri Lanka announces new CEO

AIA Sri Lanka has announced the appointment of Pankaj Banerjee as its new Chief Executive Officer. The appointment will be effective 15 November 2016, subject to the approval of the Insurance Board of Sri Lanka. 

Pankaj Banerjee has over 15 years’ experience in the life insurance industry. His most recent role was CEO of Prudential (Cambodia) Life Assurance, where he successfully grew the company from a start-up position in 2013 to one with multi-channel distribution. Prior to moving to Cambodia, he was Chief Officer – Partnership Distribution at Prudential Vietnam, where he played a crucial role in the significant growth of the distribution channel. He has also held senior roles at MetLife, Bharti AXA, and ICICI Prudential in the areas of product development, marketing and strategy.

Banerjee is a qualified Chartered Financial Analyst from the Institute of Chartered Financial Analysts of Indiaand holds a PG Diploma in Business Administration. 

AIA Group Regional Chief Executive Bill Lisle said, “I am delighted to welcome Pankaj to our team and I am very confident that under his leadership together with his executive team, AIA Sri Lanka will reach new levels of growth and success. I want to take this opportunity to thank Shah for his invaluable leadership and many contributions while CEO of AIA Sri Lanka and congratulate him on his new position with the Group.” 

Pankaj Banerjee succeeds Shah Rouf, who, after leading AIA Sri Lanka for almost seven years, will be taking up the position of Chief Business Development Officer, Group Corporate Solutions at AIA Group. Rouf will be based in Hong Kong.  

During his tenure as CEO/ Principal Officer of AIA Sri Lanka, since 2010, Shah Rouf oversaw the successful acquisition of Aviva NDB by AIA and its subsequent brand change. Following the company’s integration into AIA Group, he led the development and execution of a set of clear strategic priorities including building a premier agency distribution force and a strong foundation in bancassurance. He also led the successful segregation of the composite insurance company to align with regulatory changes and the subsequent reorganisation of AIA Sri Lanka as an exclusive life insurance company.

During Rouf’s leadership AIA Sri Lanka has delivered consecutive years of significant value of new business (VONB) growth – AIA’s key performance metric – and the company has also been recognised for each of the last four years by Great Place to Work as being among Sri Lanka’s best employers. 

AIA Group acquired the business now known as AIA Insurance Lanka PLC (AIA Sri Lanka) in December 2012. AIA Sri Lanka is a top 3 life insurer measured in terms of gross written premiums and the No. 1 writer of regular premium new business. AIA Group Limited and its subsidiaries comprise the largest independent publicly listed pan-Asian life insurance group. It has a presence in 18 markets in the Asia-Pacific - wholly-owned branches and subsidiaries in Hong Kong, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, China, Korea, the Philippines, Australia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Vietnam, New Zealand, Macau, Brunei, a 97% subsidiary in Sri Lanka, a 49% joint venture in India and representative offices in Myanmar and Cambodia. The business that is now AIA was first established in Shanghai almost a century ago. It is a market leader in the Asia-Pacific region (ex-Japan) based on life insurance premiums and holds leading positions across the majority of its markets. It had total assets of $181 b as of 31 May 2016. 

Through an extensive network of agents, partners and employees across Asia-Pacific, AIA serves the holders of more than 29 million individual policies and over 16 million participating members of group insurance schemes.