President and CEO of Sagicor Group Jamaica Richard Byles has indicated that one of the major goals for his company in the coming years is delivering double digit year-on-year growth in profits.

Addressing shareholders at the Sagicor Annual General Meeting last week, he indicated that some of this growth will come from acquisitions, selling ‘big, new’ business by coming out with new products constantly, conservation, growing the bank and incorporating new technology.

2016 Strategy
Byles says the selling of ‘new, big’ business will be a major for the 2016 financial year. “We are a selling machine and we have to be a selling machine in this company….and we can’t sell ‘pyaa pyaa’ new business, we have to sell big, new business”. He says to this end, marketing efforts are focused on being good at that.

To support this aim, he says there has to be a constant suite of new innovative, value added products in individual life, investment business, banking business and in the employment business.

Meanwhile, Byles says while the concept of conservation may not be an important factor for smaller entities, as a company that boasts approximately 70 percent of the market share, conservation has to be a major part of company strategy to ensure that costs are kept under control.

The Sagicor CEO and President says approximately US$100 Million into the bank so far. He says this represents a major investment for the group and hope is that the company will see a commensurate return on its investment.

Ease in Banking
The Sagicor Head says while he will not share the Group’s full strategy, the focus will be on being more aggressive in areas where other banks are not strong, such as the service area. Byles says his aim is for Sagicor to build on that aspect by making the bank more personable and easy to deal with.

Byles says he believes the market is there to accommodate this growth; however, the team at Sagicor will be who must be held responsible to achieve it.

For the 2015 financial year, Sagicor Group outperformed the prior year and met several key business objectives. In his report to shareholders, Byles indicated that the growth trend continued with the team producing improved financial results for the sixteenth consecutive year. Net profit for the year was $9.79 billion, which is 15% above 2014. Revenues were 21% ahead of prior year, reaching $55.00 billion.

Meanwhile for the first quarter of 2016 (January to March), Byles said consolidated net profit attributable to Stockholders was $1.90 billion, a 40% improvement over Q1 2015’s $1.36 billion.

History of Sagicor

The group’s history began in 1849, when the Barbados Mutual Life Assurance Society was established and branches of the organization were opened in St Vincent, Trinidad and Tobago, Grenada, St Kitts, Antigua, Montserrat, Jamaica and Guyana.

Later, the Mutual Finance Company Ltd established and acquired the Travellers Portfolio, rebranding same in Aruba, Bahamas, Belize, Cayman Islands, Curacao, St Maarten and Haiti to Capital Life.

This was followed by the establishment of the Mutual Bank of the Caribbean in 1993, the first indigenous bank to Barbados, followed in 1994 by Mutual Financial Services and Caribbean Caricard Services.

The years 1996 to 1999 saw the establishment of Capital International Management Services established, Mutual Asset Management Inc, Mutual Funds Inc, the acquisition of the Panama branch of Atlantic Southern Insurance Company and in 1999 the acquisition of Island Life in Jamaica and Nationwide Insurance Company in Trinidad and Tobago.
Sagicor’s history provides textbook reading for any organisation in the services sector which wishes to grow both organically and by acquisition, as this company has done.

Overall, the trajectory of strategy-driven growth is instructive.

For an in depth look at “The Sagicor Story of Diversification” visit Businessuiteonline.com