$136-million deal closed.

• Author: Sitter, Ken
• Position: Equisure Financial Network Inc - Brief Article

Equisure changes ownership, founder remains with company

The moment George Hutchinson erected the "Sold" sign on Equisure Financial Network Inc., he erected another sign "Under old management."

An ING Canada Inc. affiliate, co-owned with seven other Canadian insurance brokers, closed a $136-million takeover of Canada's largest publicly-held insurance and financial services network in early December.

But the change in ownership, a move initiated by Equisure's board of directors last March, does not mean a change in operations, says Hutchinson, who will stay as chief executive officer of the company he founded in 1987.

"I'm remaining with the company and we're going forward," Hutchinson says. "We don't expect any significant changes in the future."

The Dutch-based bank, ING, is a world class financial organization with $194 billion US in assets worldwide, and its Canadian operations are a good fit with Equisure. ING Canada is the second largest insurance product manager in Canada.

"They put their money down because of its (Equisure's) success, its location, personality and Northern entrepreneurial spirit," Hutchinson says, noting the success of the North Bay company. Equisure employs more than 120 people in North Bay and almost 700 elsewhere across Canada.

"We have a very, very secure cash flow. We're a very profitable company" and shareholders have been rewarded since the company went public in 1992 at a share price of $1.05, he says. The deal set the share price at $7, at the high end of its price range during the last two years.

In recent years the company has consistently ranked near the top of Canada's fastest growing companies, as measured by revenue growth, 11th in 1999, second in 1998, and fifth the previous year.

For the first nine months of 2000, revenues rose to $60.7 million, an increase of 40 per cent from the same period a year earlier.

In 1999, the last full year for which results...