Set for an IPO, LIC has been losing market share to rivals for years

India’s biggest life insurer may be struggling against private players.

The Life Insurance Corporation has been consistently losing out to the likes of SBI Life, HDFC Life, ICICI Prudential and Max Life, according to GlobalData, a data and analytics company.

“Except for LIC, all the top four life insurers have registered double-digit growth during 2016-’20,” GlobalData stated. The life insurance market in India is highly concentrated. The top five accounted for 87% of it in 2020.

“LIC’s sales growth has slowed down during the past few years due to its high dependence on the traditional agency-led distribution model,” said Swarup Kumar Sahoo, Senior Insurance Analyst at GlobalData. “Whereas private insurers have a more diversified distribution network.”

“As LIC prepares for its IPO [initial public offering] in 2022, the continuous decline in its market share could negatively impact investor sentiment,” Sahoo said.

LIC is preparing for its mega-IPO launch, which has been postponed due to market volatility following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

This article first appeared on Quartz.