M&G’s Life Insurance Business today announces the appointment of Chris Hudson as Director of Distribution, as the firm ramps up its ambitions for distributing its flagship £62 billion PruFund range of funds.
Chris will be responsible for driving the growth of M&G’s Life Insurance’s UK distribution strategy across all channels, with a particular focus on the UK intermediated market. He will lead the team responsible for the distribution of the company’s individual life and pensions products.
The appointment comes as Rob Hickson, Managing Director of UK Distribution, has decided to leave M&G after a successful 32 years at the company. Rob Hickson’s leadership was instrumental in the launch and development of PruFund, which has gained 450,000 individual policyholders over the last 20 years, the vast majority of which were recommended the product through intermediary distribution relationships.
Reporting to Anusha Mittal, Managing Director – Individual Life and Pensions, Chris joins M&G on 10 March from Standard Life UK (part of Phoenix Group), where he was Managing Director – Retail & Intermediary, responsible for propositions, marketing and distribution for its retirement business. Prior to this he held senior sales and distribution roles at LV=, Aviva, Friends Life and Aegon.
Anusha Mittal, Managing Director, Individual Life and Pensions, said: “I’m delighted we have attracted someone of Chris’s calibre to M&G. His track record of leading high-performing teams, bringing new products to market, and delivering profitable distribution strategies, will be a huge asset as we maintain our focus on expanding the reach of retirement solutions for advisers and their clients.
“We have big ambitions for our market-leading PruFund range, whose long-term investment approach continues to provide good customer outcomes, supported by its smoothing mechanism that protects against short-term volatility.
“I want to thank Rob Hickson for his incredible career with us and wish him well for the future. He leaves a fantastic legacy – the success of PruFund over the last twenty years is in no small part due to his leadership and the strong relationships his team has built with advisers and their firms.”
Chris Hudson, incoming Director of Distribution, said: “I am excited to be joining M&G and to lead the team behind the distribution of the UK’s leading smoothed fund range. PruFund is well regarded by Intermediaries across the market, has an enviable track record and I look forward to working with the team to grow our distribution footprint as we develop our product range and deliver outstanding customer outcomes in partnership with Intermediaries across the UK.”
