Kotak Life Insurance is hopeful that the worst of the pain from the pandemic is over and is now working on an expansion strategy.

“We will be expanding our distribution footprint and add more branches. In calendar year 2022, we expect about about 30 per cent growth in our distribution footprints,” said Mahesh Balasubramanian, Managing Director, Kotak Mahindra Life Insurance.

In an interaction with BusinessLine, Balasubramanian, said, the insurer also plans to invest in data analytics and technology interfaces. It will be adding more partners on the agency side and bancassurance. It is also looking at a direct to customer digital play.

In terms of products, while the company intends to follow a balanced approach, but it would like to see the share of the protection business increase.

“We would like to grow all our businesses in a manner that the balance is maintained. If at all one area, we would like to increase it is in protection because we see an opportunity. And we believe that India will require more protection. Especially if one is focused on digital, on some of the new age channels protection becomes a very logical product to focus on,” said Balasubramanian.

The company is confident on growth prospects, and believes it will be able to grow at a faster pace than the industry rate.

Kotak Life registered a growth of 16.86 per cent in new business premium in 2021-22 to ₹6,142.77 crore against ₹5,256.51 crore in 2020-21.

He further noted that the life insurance industry went through one of its toughest periods in the last 24 months, especially so in the last 12 months when the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic struck.

“From our perspective, this has been a year where we have settled the highest number of claims, our total value of claims in terms of gross value, is almost two time of what it was in the previous year,” he said, but added that the industry has been able to deliver on its objective of protecting lives.

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