Sure Kamhunga
Companies Editor
THE joint venture between Discovery Health and UK insurer Prudential, formed to market health insurance in the UK, has been so successful it now covers more than 160000 lives in just under four years of operation, PruHealth chief operating officer Trent Rossini said yesterday.
He said he expected a solid showing in the coming months as the company grew and consolidated its market share.
The UK business was being backed from Discovery head office, in Johannesburg, from where all operations and software development were run.
“The (UK) business fundamentally relies on software to support its offshore nature," he said. The partnership with Prudential was based on leveraging the UK company's brand, its financial credibility and established distribution relations.
In turn, Discovery brought its expertise in management of consumer healthcare, “specifically adding wellness and product innovation as a competitive advantage", he said.
In the past six months, the key technological focus had been to migrate the website to a more sophisticated platform.
Rossini said the company had managed to respond to the demands of the UK market partly by gaining insight into the target market characteristics and by product innovations.
“The year ahead promises to be as challenging as we offer more services online,” he said.