The recently re-launched global brand, Lombard International, has combined assets under administration of €68bn ($75bn) following the integration of Luxembourg-headquartered Lombard International Assurance with US-headquartered Philadelphia Financial earlier this year.
Van Der Wielen left FPI in July, after shareholders backed Aviva’s takeover deal of Friends Life, but he continued as a Lombard non-executive director, a position he held for four years until assuming the role of chief executive of the integrated entity last week. He is also a non-executive director of FPI.
Speaking to International Adviser, Van Der Wielen said he replaced Claude Marx who had decided to retire and the board determined that “the most effective person to stand in was me”, given that he was a known executive who knew the business very well.
He emphasized that he had become chief executive on an interim basis though he would “stand in for as long as it takes”, working closely with John Hillman, executive chairman of Lombard International and previously the chief executive in Philadelphia.
This would delay his stated plan in March to return to Australia at the end of this year, he said.
Europe and the US were the two key markets for the business going forward given the enormous wealth in both regions, he said, with Van Der Wielen based in Luxembourg and Hillman in the US.
“We now have a Lombard brand in the US”, Van Der Wielen added, which he said made it much easier to do business over there, as well as the ability to service US citizens in Europe in a much more straightforward single company structure.
Hillman said: “Our ambitions for regional and global growth have been greatly reinforced by Blackstone, helping the re-branded business achieve our goal of providing best-in-class, holistic wealth planning solutions for clients across the globe.”
Blackstone Group bought Lombard International Assurance in October 2014 and completed its acquisition of Philadelphia Financial in July 2015.
Lombard has a significant reach into Asia, as well as across Europe, the US and Latin America.
