Zurich Financial Services
Zurich Financial Services Group is a major financial services group based in Zurich, Switzerland.
Global operations
United Kingdom
It operates under several different brands, providing insurance (general, car, home, life), pensions, investment services and internet banking.
Zurich Insurance has been a presence in the UK for many years, particularly in the local government or municipal markets. In approximately 1996, British American Tobacco merged their financial operations into a single operating unit, British American Financial Services (BAFS). Until that point the three main companies had been fairly independent. They were:
- Eagle Star: general and life insurance
- Allied Dunbar: life insurance and pensions
- Threadneedle Asset Management: wholesale funds management
BAFS was sold to the Zurich Group in the late 1990's, and since then a series of consolidations and rebrandings has taken place to improve the efficiency of the merged companies. The most public of these has been the promotion of the Zurich brand, through such activities as the sponsorship of the Zurich Premiership rugby union competition in the UK from 2000 to 2005.