The trek from Eagle to AIA

Hearing about yet another change of hands for the highly successful insurance company, which to me is still ‘Eagle’, my mind went back 25 years – or even a little more. I was part of the planning team at CTC (Ceylon Tobacco Company) to set up an insurance company when it was announced that the state monopoly of insurance would be over.

The private sector was permitted to enter the insurance industry. That was in 1986. Leading the CTC team was Planning Director Chandra Jayaratne who was later to become Managing Director of CTC Eagle. As CTC’s Publicity Manager, it was my task to work on the communications for the new company.

British American Tobacco (BAT), the parent company of CTC, was by then well into the insurance business with Eagle Star Insurance Co. Ltd., UK forming part of the group. We were to receive technical assistance from Eagle Star which was a big advantage to kick-off.

After the CTC Board of Directors (S.K. Wickremasinghe was the Chairman then) decided to get into the insurance business, the first task was to find a name. The combination of CTC and Eagle Star being so powerful, naturally we wanted to make capital of it.  The names were combined and the new company was to be known as ‘CTC Eagle Insurance’. The logos of the two companies were merged to form the CTC Eagle logo.

We had the planning meetings at the Horton Place office of CTC Services, a subsidiary of Ceylon Tobacco, which handled the foliage business. A building had been earmarked on Kumaran Ratnam Road, Slave Island as the insurance company’s office – the same place where the head office functions to this day even after several changes of the management. The office was to be called ‘Eagle House’ for quick and easy identity.

An advertising agency had to be selected to handle the communications creating awareness of the new company. At least four agencies were invited to make presentations and the final selection was Thompson Associates (presently TBWA/TAL which still handles the company’s communications).  The agency was then handling CTC’s corporate communications. (That was the time there were no restrictions on tobacco advertising or promotions and brand advertising was handled by Grants, de Alwis Advertising and Garrads).

The eagle, being a bird of prey, is not much admired in Sri Lanka. One of the challenges was to create a positive image erasing off any negatives that may affect the image of the newly formed company.   The communications campaign spoke about the eagle as a symbol of courage, majesty and vision.  It talked about its “unwavering quality in its pursuit of goals, acting with foresight and precision.”

Insurance then was looked at as something where the benefits would come after the death of the policyholder. This notion made many stay away from insuring themselves. Eagle changed this view by introducing life policies based on a totally new concept – ‘Insurance for Living’. It was described as something which “brings a new dimension to life assurance by introducing high life cover and investment opportunities in one unique package.” Judging from the results, it certainty paid dividends for Eagle Insurance.

Eagle gave the lead in using Sinhala terms to identify the different life policies. ‘Ranptha’, ‘Dashaka’, Piripun’, Sarva Samuha’ and ‘Apeksha’ were the first lot.  Today virtually all products by banks and other financial institutions use Sinhala and Tamil terms.

That was the start. In a few years, BAT Industries t divested its financial services business. This resulted in Eagle becoming a member of the global insurer, Zurich Financial Services Group. National Development Bank (NDB), Sri Lanka’s leading development bank became the company’s major local shareholder.

CTC moved out of the scene. In 2003, Zurich withdrew its operations from Sri Lanka, leaving NDB the majority control of Eagle. Three years later, Eagle became an Aviva company and until AIA came on the scene, Aviva and NDB remained the major shareholders.

And now over to AIA – American Insurance Association – a big name in Asian insurance.