ING Group has announced details of its ‘Back to Basics’ strategy for the global financial services organisation.
In an announcement at the bi-annual ING Investor Day just prior Easter, incoming global CEO, Jan Hommen, outlined measures the Group would adopt in order to position itself as an organisation with fewer, coherent and strong businesses:
“As the economic crisis is fundamentally changing the financial services industry, now is the time to choose where ING has the scale and strength to succeed in the current environment and to position the company to be a leader when the markets recover,” said Mr Hommen.
While ING will be reducing the complexity of its operations, including divesting itself of 10 to 15 businesses worldwide over the coming years, ING Australia’s head of Media Relations, Peter Hansen, said ”ING’s Insurance business in Asia-Pacific is an important building block of its global footprint and provides strong growth prospects.’
Mr Hansen added that the Group’s Australian operations are in a very solid position: “ING Australia is one of ING Group’s stronger businesses in the Asia-Pacific region, and our core business activities of retirement services, superannuation and insurance are a good fit with the “back to basics” strategy announced by ING Group.
The Group’s banking and insurance businesses are to operate separately under the Group ‘umbrella’, with its insurance business to focus on its long-term structural leadership positions in life and retirement services, according to the company.
The Group is also focusing on fostering an even closer relationship with its customers. Refering to the current global financial crisis, Mr Hommen said “The crisis has reinforced the need for us to be even more in touch with our customers. We need to put our customers first in everything we do and we will make the relationship with our customers our most important objective.”
