Managing Director and CEO, Max New York Life

Gary Bennett is the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Max New York Life Insurance Company. In 2005 he joint Max New York Life from New York Life Insurance Worldwide in Hong Kong, where he was President and Chief Executive.Under his tutelage Max New York Life has further widened and deepened the pan India distribution network. The company is one of the leading players in new individual life policies sold.

A true Asia life insurance veteran, Gary has over 25 years of experience in the industry and has worked for a number of companies in Australia and across Asia Pacific. Before joining New York Life, Gary was Managing Director North Asia of Prudential Corporation Asia. During his tenure, he was also a member of the PCA Regional Board, Life ExCo and Chairman of the Life Insurance Companies in Japan and Korea as well as a Director of PCA Asset Management Japan.

Prior to this, he was of Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of CMG Asia Life in Hong Kong where he led CMG's substantial growth in Hong Kong from 1997. He was also instrumental in establishing CMG Asia Pensions and Retirement Co. and CMG Asia Trustee. Gary also held a number of senior management positions for Colonial (CMG) in the Asia-Pacific region, including CEO & Chairman of Jardine CMG Consulting in Singapore where he worked on the China Licensing Team and headed the team that saw Colonial receive the first Australia Joint Venture Life Insurance License in Vietnam and China.

Executive Director & Chief Operating Officer

As a member of the Board of Directors of Max New York Life Insurance Company, Sunil Sharma's primary responsibility is the development and implementation of the Max New York Life overall business strategy. In his role as the Chief Operating Officer, his responsibilities have included the management and leadership in the areas of Marketing, Operations, Customer Service, Technology, Quality and Facility Services.

As a founder team member at Max New York Life, Sunil led the successful launch of the company in 2001. He has been instrumental in the company following the Total Quality approach to business ensuring Max New York Life Insurance become the first life insurance company in India to be ISO certified, use the Six Sigma methodology to establish best in class customer delivery processes and successfully implement a new core technology system.
Sunil has 28 years of work experience in line and staff roles across Sales, Marketing, Human Resources, TQM, Re-engineering and Business Development. Prior to joining Max New York Life, Sunil was the Head of Sales & Service - Middle East and South Asia, and the Change Manager for the India business of ANZ Grindlays Bank. In this role, he was responsible for customer acquisition and retention processes as well as the Bank’s Business Re-engineering and Change agenda.

Sunil earlier worked with Bank of America where he held concurrent roles of Country Sales and Service Manager and Retail Banking Business Head - North India. He has also held various positions in Sales, Marketing, Human Resources and Quality Management, with the Oswal’s, Duncan Agro Industries Ltd., Modi Xerox Ltd. and American Express.

Deputy Managing Director

Rajesh is a founder team member of Max New York Life Insurance Co Ltd (MNYL), a joint venture formed in the year 2000 between Max India Ltd and New York Life International of USA, to establish life insurance operations in India. In his current role as Deputy Managing Director, Rajesh is a member of the company’s core management team who, along with the CEO, is responsible for designing and implementing business strategies for the rapid growth of MNYL’s insurance business in India and contributes significantly to achieving the company’s vision of becoming the Most Admired Life Insurance Company in India. His specific deliverables are to steer the overall distribution network of the company and oversee the product management, marketing, corporate affairs and Customer relationship management functions.

Rajesh has worked extensively in building the distribution network of the company since inception and in his last role was the Executive Director – Distribution. He built a strong tied agency force that is widely recognized as “best-in-class” in the industry and has systematically diversified into new channels such as Bancassurance, Direct Sales Team, Emerging Markets and Partnership Distribution. Under his leadership, Max New York Life has grown rapidly and in seven years of business has provided the benefits of life insurance to over 2.4 million satisfied customers, recording a sum assured of INR 71,000 crore (USD 17 bn) and distributes 38 products through a field force of nearly 40,000 licensed agents, 34 Bank partners and 10 Key Corporate Agents. MNYL currently employs over 8,000 employees across 248 office locations, of which over 6,000 employees are in the Distribution function.

Prior to joining Max New York Life, Rajesh worked as Head of Asset Finance business and CEO and Managing Director of Esanda Finance Ltd., a subsidiary finance company of ANZ Grindlays Bank, the largest foreign bank in the country at that point of time. Rajesh started his career as a management trainee at Bank of America, New Delhi and grew to position of Vice President and Head - Sales for Consumer Banking Products, India. In his various roles with the bank, he was a key member of the start-up team for the retail division and successfully launched various retail loan products for the Bank. Rajesh was chosen as a critical member of the transition team that successfully transited this business upon its sale to ABN Amro Bank.

Rajesh has completed his Advanced Management Program from Wharton Business School, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA and is a MBA in Marketing and Finance from Faculty of Management Studies, Delhi University. He holds second rank in his Bachelors of Commerce (Honours) from the same University. Rajesh was awarded the Chairman’s Award from Max India Ltd in 2004 for his contributions to the business and MNYL was recently awarded the New York Life International Chairman’s Award for the second year in a row. Rajesh is married to Simi, who is a homemaker and adores their daughter, Aishwarya and son, Adhiraj. His other passions are golf and traveling.

Senior Director - New Markets SBU

Anil Mehta has successfully led the company’s sales efforts to large corporate houses. He earlier led the company’s Product Management team through coordination across all functions and transfer of best practices from New York Life. Prior to his appointment at Max New York Life Insurance, Anil was regional Head of Credit, Personal Finance Services, Middle East and South Asia at ANZ Grindlays Bank. He has been responsible for Risk Management and Product Development Support for Personal Financial Services. Anil has also worked as Director Risk Management, Personal Financial Services at American Express Bank Limited .He also worked at Bank of America in the Consumer Credit and Operations.

Senior Director & Chief Financial Officer

Sunil Kakar is in charge of finance, accounts, investment management and risk management. Prior to joining Max New York Life , Sunil has 20 years of diversified banking experience with Bank of America in areas of Financial Control, Branch Administration,Operations, Risk Management and Treasury. Sunil was the Vice President (CFO-India), Bank of America and was responsible for strategic planning, asset management liability, annual budgeting, Accounting and Taxation, Regulatory Reporting and MIS. He was also Director on Board of companies where Bank of America was a shareholder. He monitored risk management systems and introduced new treasury products like currency options.

Senior Director- Legal & Compliance

Ajay Seth joined the company in April 2003 and in a short period of time he has helped evolve the company’s legal and compliance strategy, striking a balance between business objectives and statutory and regulatory requirements.
Ajay was earlier with Madura Coats Limited in Bangalore. He has also worked with Unilever Group in Mumbai, Silicon Valley Technology and Max India Limited. Ajay is a Graduate in Law & an Associate Member of the Institute of Company Secretaries of India and Institute of Cost & Works Accountants of India. He has over 15 years of experience which includes exposure to all legal matters in connection with tax, excise, risk management, structuring of partnerships, business alliances, foreign exchange and foreign investment, and litigation related to contract, property, civil, competition, labour and corporate laws.

Senior Director & Chief Marketing Officer

 Debashis Sarkar is responsible in strengthening and steering the Max New York Life’s marketing programme with a vision towards building India’s most admired life insurance company. He was also instrumental in establishing additional channels of distribution across the country.
Under Debashis’s leadership, the team also built an alternative distribution to control mass of Rs. 100 crore and designed a lead generation capability. He has launched products like Life Invest, Life Maker, Smart Steps, Smart Invest Pension, Max Vriksh and Max Mangal, and has been responsible for strategic alliances with Pearless and Nirmal Chhaya.

With an experience of over 20 years in marketing both in India and abroad, he brings a wealth of expertise to the challenges of building a life insurance brand. Debashis now leads the marketing, corporate communications, products, pricing and CRM teams within MNYL supporting both distribution expansion and value creation within the company.

Prior to joining Max New York Life, Debashis was with Reckitt Benckiser, the global household products MNC where he was responsible for new products, innovation and profitability as Marketing Controller (Households). He has played a key role in developing the marketing strategies of well-established brands including ‘Dettol’, ‘Mortein’, ‘Cherry Blossom’ and ‘Harpic’.

Appointed Actuary

John Poole is the Chief Actuary at Max New York life and is also the Appointed Actuary for the Company in terms of Indian insurance Regulations.
John joined MNYL in early 2005 following an 18th month sabbatical at his home town in Cairns, Far North Queensland, during which time he was studying at James Cook University and working on a contract basis for Sydney based Citicorp Life – the reinsurer for all Citibank generated business in Asia.
Prior to that John’s career was spent mainly with the AMP – Australia’s largest life insurer. He held a number of actuarial and finance positions in AMP including CFO and Actuary for the largest of AMP’s Australian business units.
Following AMP’s demutualization in 1998, John headed a project that restated AMP’s financial statements under US GAAP as a prelude to a possible listing in New York. After that he became Finance Director for AMP’s Asian operations during which time he spent many months working closely with China Pacific – the 3rd largest life insurer in the People’s Republic of China and was involved with start-up operations in Japan and India.
John attended London University and then qualified as a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries (UK) before moving to Sydney in 1974. He is also a Fellow of the Australian and Indian actuarial bodies and a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.