FPI to rebrand as Friends Life next year
Friends Provident International will be rebranded Friends Life in the New Year under plans by Resolution Group, its owner, to consolidate its life and pension business interests.
Resolution, Clive Cowdery’s Guernsey domiciled holding company that last year bought Friends Provident Group and delisted it from the London Stock Exchange, also recently acquired much of Axa’s UK life and pensions business.
Resolution hopes to buy further UK life and pensions businesses in the next year, all of which are likely to be consolidated under the Friends Life branding.
Resolution envisages that it’s ‘UK life project’, which began with the Friends Provident acquisition in 2009, will take between two and four years to complete, at which time the new-look company will float on the stock market, most likely the London Stock Exchange.
Resolution has also revealed it is considering similar life and pension consolidation moves in the US and Eurozone. Rocco Sepe, managing director of Friends Provident’s international businesses, said this was a separate initiative to the UK project and did not involve Friends Provident International (FPI) or Lombard, Friends’ two largest overseas ventures.