Alexander Forbes East Africa Ltd, Kenya’s largest pension administrator has now re-branded to Zamara. This was done in a colorful ceremony held at the Intercontinental Hotel yesterday. The rebrand came after there was a change in the ownership structure whereby Alexander Forbes Group South Africa reduced its stake in the company. The new entity Zamara, is now majority owned by Kenyan investors and its employees via the Employee Share Ownership Plan (ESOP).
Alexander Forbes E.A now Zamara started its operations back in 1994 as a niche actuarial firm initially operating as Hymans Robertson. The firm became part of the Alexander Forbes Group in 2003. From its humble beginnings, the firm has now grown to be the largest pension scheme administrator in Kenya with an asset base of over Ksh. 240 Million. They serve about 160,000 Kenyans which is basically a 1/3 of all pension membership in Kenya.
Zamara Kenya has a product portfolio that includes financial services like insurance consulting, investment consulting, retirement benefits consulting, death and disability benefits and healthcare benefits among many others. The company also has products like political risk and terrorism insurance and crop and livestock insurance to guard against business interruption.
Insurance penetration on the African continent with the exception of South Africa is at 3 per cent with the exception of South Africa. Due to this, Zamara now has its sights trained on other African markets where it seeks to capitalize on the growing demand for insurance, brokerage and similar services. They are currently looking at establishing a presence in Rwanda and Nigeria and at the same time looking at further opportunities in East, West and Southern Africa to expand their business model.
In the Kenyan market, Zamara is exploring alternative and new long term saving strategies. This is with the aim of increasing of products for financing home ownership, medical care, education and retirement plans.