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India's first standalone health insurance provider Star Health and Allied Insurance plans to raise an additional capital of Rs 100-150 crore after being hit by loss of key business from two State Governments to drive the private retail segment, a top official said. The company's CMD V Jagannathan said the plan is to raise the monies in order to grow the business by 50% in the next three years. It has a capital base of Rs 438 crore now. Star Health Insurance had to tap the private retail market after it lost about Rs 1,400 crore worth of business from Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, which are implementing insurance schemes for the poor and low income groups. Jagannathan said, "We are very much affected by the loss of business from the States. We are struggling to grow. We hope to make good the loss by our focus on market segment." The public sector company United India insurance won the bid floated by the Jayalalithaa led Government in Tamil Nadu, which had revamped an existing scheme after it came to power last year. In Andhra Pradesh, the government decided to implement a similar scheme without any insurance partner. The change in business mix started to kick off last year itself. In 2011-12, it collected about Rs 1,100 crore in premium monies, of which Rs 500 crore came from the private retail segment. This year, Rs 800 crore out of a total premium of Rs 1,000 crore is likely to come this segment. The company was making a profit six years ago but it was dented last year due to the loss of the government business.
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