First Capital Insurance Limited (FCIL), a Company incorporated in Singapore on 9 December 1950 under the name of The Public Insurance Company Limited, has been writing non-life insurance business for more than 55 years now.  The Public Insurance Company Limited changed its name to British American General Insurance Company Limited in July 1988 and this name was finally changed to First Capital Insurance Limited with effect from 4 July 1991.

In 2002, FCIL became a wholly owned subsidiary of Odyssey America Reinsurance Corporation (Odyssey Re). Odyssey Re is a company listed on the New York Stock Exchange with “A” (Excellent) Stable rating by A M Best and “A-“ (Strong) Stable rating by Standard & Poor’s (S&P) and with shareholders’ equity of USD 2.8 billion and nearly USD 3.0 billion in statutory surplus as at end 2008. Odyssey Re in turn is a subsidiary of Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited, which is a Canadian financial services holding company with shareholders’ equity of nearly USD 5.0 billion and assets in excess of USD 27.3 billion as of end 2008 and is listed on the New York Stock Exchange and Toronto Stock Exchange.  Through its various subsidiaries Fairfax group is engaged in property / casualty insurance and reinsurance, claims management and investment management.  The group has operations in Canada, USA, Europe and at Lloyd’s (Newline Syndicate) as well as in Asia. For the purpose of streamlining the group’s corporate structure in Asia and make it more tax efficient and also to focus on further developing the group’s insurance business in Asia, Odyssey Re’s shareholding in FCIL was transferred to FAL Corporation in December 2004 and again was transferred from FAL Corporation to Fairfax Asia Limited in April 2009. However the ultimate ownership of the Company still rests with Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited. Besides FCIL in Singapore, Fairfax Group has within its fold Falcon Insurance in Hong Kong, Falcon Insurance in Thailand (a joint-venture) and ICICI Lombard General Insurance (which also is a joint-venture with the largest local private sector bank) in India. After becoming part of the Fairfax group, FCIL acquired Singapore-based Winterthur Insurance (Far East) Pte Ltd (WIFE) in 2003. All the assets and liabilities of WIFE were taken over by FCIL in January 2003.

FCIL is engaged in writing both personal and commercial lines of non-life insurance business across various classes such as Fire, Marine Hull, Marine Cargo, Engineering, Bond, Professional Indemnity, Motor, Public Liability, Worker’s Compensation, Personal Accident and other Miscellaneous Accident classes with the support of its large pool of dedicated agents and all major brokers as well as direct clients. Mr. R. Athappan is the Chief Executive of FCIL and he has been a well-known lead Marine Hull underwriter in this part of the world for more than two decades now. Arising out of this FCIL is currently one of the leading companies for writing Marine Hull insurance and this class of business forms a significant segment of the Company’s well balanced overall business portfolio. Mr. Athappan is ably supported by an experienced team of senior underwriters and claims personnel.

A. M. Best Company (USA) has affirmed FCIL’s financial strength rating of ‘A (Excellent)’ with ‘Stable’ outlook. FCIL is a stable and reliable provider of innovative insurance solutions to meet the needs of a wide cross-section of individual, commercial and industrial clients not only in Singapore but in the adjoining region and beyond. As a member company of the large Fairfax Group, FCIL is focused on consolidating its position even further as an important player among the non-life insurance companies in Singapore and in the region.

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