Optimization continues after VIG has laid off half of the employees in the past seven years.
“The optimization process never comes to an end,” Peter Hagen, VIG CEO told ZF.
VIG cannot say it is done optimizing in Romania, because there is always room for improvement, but can say that it does not see any reason for another big action as has taken after 2008, he added.
The Austrian group shed 190 jobs in the first half so it is now employing 2,160 people in Romania, half as many as it had at the end of 2008. Most of the optimization is being done at Asirom at the moment, as this is the biggest local headache for the Austrian group.
VIG underwrote EUR194 million gross premiums in Romania in the first half, an increase of 18% on the year-ago period and posted EUR3.5 million gross profit.
The group is willing to come up with capital to help its insurers in Romania meet the Solvency II standards that will come into force at the beginning of next year, Hagen says.
“We have a rule within the VIG group (…) that we want to have each company in the group fulfill the solvency to standard model requirements by at least a ratio of 125%. Wherever we see a need to increase the local capital in order to achieve this target, we do.”
Asirom is one of the companies that need capital but not the only one and VIG will also come up with funds for Omniasig if needed, Hagen added. VIG will contribute 110 million lei (EUR25 million) to Asirom’s capital this month.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)