IF OTTO Thoresen is worried about how the precarious economy will affect his business over the next 18 months, he's good at not showing it. Although Dutch-owned Aegon's interim results next week will unfailingly be affected by the downturn, the life and pensions business Thoresen runs in the UK is in an enviable position.
Profits across the group's international operations are hit when downturns mean people put off spending on savings or insurance. Likewise, as an increasingly significant asset manager, when the stock market falls Aegon's earnings fall, too.
But a
s Thoresen often likes to point out, the demographics are in his favour. This year the eldest of the post Second World War baby boomers just turned 62.
As they are increasingly not likely to have final salary schemes, they will be buying annuities – a significant and growing market for Aegon.
A self-described "elder statesman" of the business, the compact but robustly built Thoresen, 51, has lived through a few downturns. In 2002, he was finance director when bear markets and the government's introduction of stakeholder pensions slashed profits. The group cut its workforce by 650.
In that difficult period, the group had to reorganise and cut costs so when Thoresen took the helm in 2005, they were ready to move strongly into the market.
Thoresen was decisive, splitting the pension business into two divisions for corporate customers and personal customers. He replaced the head of the asset management business Colin McLatchie with investment hotshot Andrew Fleming and he consolidated the group's growing IFA division. He set up a distribution deal with Barclays.
Since the group moved into the UK market in 1994 with the acquisition of Scottish Equitable, at last under Thoresen the company rebranded its pension product from Scottish Equitable to Aegon Scottish Equitable.
Thoresen started his career as a trainee actuary with Scottish Equitable in 1978. A gifted maths graduate of Aberdeen University, Thoresen followed his law student fiancée to Edinburgh. His choice of the actuarial profession was almost an accident – what else could a maths graduate do, he reasoned.
Thoresen would become part of a generation of young Scottish actuaries, like Standard Life chief executive Sandy Crombie and Scottish Widows chairman Sandy Leitch, who would rule the industry 30 years on.
Perhaps unusual for a maths nut, Thoresen discovered he had a facility for marketing. It allowed him to move his career on faster than he otherwise might have done.
After his first marriage failed he left Scotland, working with Abbey Life and then Royal Insurance.
He got his first big break with an opportunity to run Royal Life's offshore business in the Isle of Man. Work involved travelling to Hong Kong and the Far East, so he started thinking on a much more global level.
It came as a complete surprise to him when he ended up back in Scotland and back at Scottish Equitable. He came back to a much different business.
Its then chief executive, David Berridge, had seen the future and it wasn't as a mutual pensions group. Instead, ScotEq became part of Aegon, which fitted into Thoresen's new globalised view.
Since taking the helm, Thoresen has made a series of high-profile appointments, including Feilim Mackle, who was poached from Royal Bank of Scotland to run the individual life and pensions business.
He also brought in Steve Clode, formerly marketing director with Nationwide to drive expansion of Aegon as a brand.
Despite Thoresen's best efforts , Aegon is still considered by some to be the biggest company you have never heard of.
For Thoresen, the big challenge is not to merely get through this next 18 months, although the challenge of the faltering economy is huge.
His professional challenge is to make Aegon a much bigger name, both to companies that are buying group employee pension schemes and people buying the new range of variable annuities.
And personally Thoresen has been putting vast effort into the cause. While leading Aegon in the UK, he undertook the strenuous 18-month task of heading a government-backed review.
The Thoresen review of generic financial advice was unveiled in March, which advocated a £50 million per year advisory service available by phone, internet and in person.
Many such reports that end up collecting dust on a shelf somewhere in Whitehall, but in this case the government welcomed the review with a £12m pilot programme.
Although he doesn't say it, Aegon should be gaining on the larger, more established UK life and pensions brands like Standard Life. But Standard Life is currently a touchy subject for Thoresen.
Rumours are swirling that he might be the successor to the top job there when Crombie, who is seven years older than Thoresen, decides to take a step back.
Thoresen has put a crack team in place, but denies he has built in a succession plan. He points out that there is no vacancy for his job and that he has been invited on to the board of the Dutch parent company Aegon NV.
Thorensen still feels his success or failure will be measured by how well he does at Aegon.
