Reliance Life on lookout for strategic investor, plans IPO


Shimla: The Anil Ambani Group's life insurance venture, Reliance Life, today said it is looking for a strategic investor and also proposes to come out with an initial public offer (IPO) once the guidelines are put in place by sectoral regulator IRDA and market watchdog Sebi. The private sector insurance company is talking to a number of foreign players to sell a 10 to 15 per cent stake, Reliance Life President and Executive Director Malay Ghosh told PTI. "Ideally, it would be 10-15 percent strategic divestment and remaining 10 per cent through IPO... we have prepared ourselves for the red herring prospectus to be submitted to SEBI. Once the IPO guidelines are in place, we will look into the guidelines and do the final brushes," Ghosh said. He further said Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) Chairman J Harinarayan had indicated that the IPO norms will be ready in a couple of weeks. Meanwhile, IRDA said that it has finalised the IPO guidelines for insurance companies and has referred the same to Sebi for final approval, which is expected soon. "We are expecting the guidelines shortly. We have given our observations. The matter is currently with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi)," Harinarayan said. Reliance Life could be the first life insurance company in the country to come out with an IPO once the guidelines, on which market regulator SEBI and insurance watchdog IRDA are jointly working, are framed for public offer and listing of insurance firms. On selling a stake to a foreign partner, Ghosh said, "We are talking to companies which are abroad and have interest in India. There has been significant discussion with number of players." Earlier, there were reports that Reliance Life is in talks with Swiss Re for sale of a 10-15 percent stake for an estimated 1,500 crore. Talking about the company's growth plans, Ghosh said that Reliance Life mopped up new business premiums worth 603 crore in the first quarter of the current fiscal. "First quarter, we have done 603 crore of premium and this is a 20 percent growth over what we did last year. We also have a growth of 21 percent on the number of policies and most important part is that 50 per cent of it is from traditional products," he added.
Source: PTI