President Yoon Yeol-hyun of Kyobo Life Insurance Co. (Photos: Kyobo Life)

Kyobo Life Insurance Co. named advisor Yoon Yeol-hyun as its president on March 6, taking over some of the responsibilities from Shin Yong-gil, the life insurance firm announced on March 7.

The personnel move is intended to ease Chairman Shin’s burden as he grapples with responsibilities involving financial investors. The new CEO is expected to take over the life insurance side of the operation exclusively, while the chairman takes care of the rest of the company’s important businesses.

The new CEO has been known as “Marketing Man,” as he spent most of his time in the marketing sector as the vice president in charge of marketing and director of financial planners before being named as a permanent advisor, among other responsibilities, for the life insurer.
As the No. 2 man in the life insurance firm, he will try to set the company in order by stabilizing its operation and organization as it is about to go for the initial public offering soon.

President Yoon was recognized for his role in setting up branches dominated by financial planners back in 2005. In 2014, he was named as the head of the FP Channel before his promotion as the permanent advisor.

Yoon, 60, graduated from Chosun University with an economics degree and holds a master’s degree in trade from Sungkyunkwan University.

Kyobo Life Insurance, South Korea’s third-largest life insurance firm by total assets, announced it would seek an initial public offering by the second half of 2019 to raise capital in the face of new industry-wide regulations. The decision was made during a board meeting in Seoul. The volume of capital it will seek to raise has yet to be determined, the company stated.

Kyobo will become the sixth life insurance company to go public on the Korean stock market, following Tong Yang, Hanwha, Samsung, Mirae Asset and Orange Life.

This came months after the July board of directors’ meeting to discuss ways to increase capital buffer, including an IPO, to brace for tougher regulatory standards to measure financial strength of insurers.

Starting in 2021, Korea is poised to implement the new International Financial Reporting Standards, IFRS17, and Korean Insurance Capital Standard, or K-ICS in short, in the place of risk-based capital ratio. The RBC ratio of Kyobo Life Insurance came to 292 percent in September, above a recommended minimum level at 150 percent by Korean financial authorities.

Two investment banking entities - Credit Suisse First Boston’s Seoul branch and NH Investment & Securities - will underwrite the IPO. Kyobo said it is in search of more securities firms as an IPO underwriter.

Founded in 1958, Kyobo Life Insurance was Korea’s first insurance company. Its total assets stood at 107.8 trillion won ($95.4 billion) as of end-September.

Chairman and Chief Executive Shin Chang-jae is the largest shareholder, owning 33.78 percent of shares. Major shareholders also include foreign private equity firms. New York-based Corsair Capital owns 9.79 percent and Hong Kong-based Affinity Equity Partners holds 9.05 percent.

The company provides life insurance and asset management products to more than 10 million customers.
Its offerings include traditional life, health and disability, and retirement and pension products for individuals and businesses.

Products are distributed through financial planning agents. Kyobo Life also offers personal-use and mortgage loans, and it has some international operations. The company was founded in 1958 by Shin Yong-Ho, father of CEO Shin Chang-Jae. The Kyobo Group conglomerate (or chaebol) operates under a common management structure in a variety of sectors including real estate, investment banking and a bookstore.

A view of the Kyobo Life Insurance Co. building in Gwangwhamun, Seoul.