OREANDA-NEWS. As previously announced, ING’s preparations for the base case plan to divest the European insurance and investment management businesses through an Initial Public Offering (IPO) are on track. A transaction is planned for 2014, depending on market conditions. In this context, ING Insurance announced today its plans to rebrand in the future as ‘NN’, a new identity that balances the heritage and Dutch roots with the requirements of an international and future-proof brand.

Although the future brand of ING Insurance is announced today, the operational rebranding process will take time and will only start after ING Insurance has been successfully brought to the market. In the meantime, the business units including ING Insurance, ING Investment Management and Nationale-Nederlanden will continue to operate under their current brands. Today’s announcement has no impact on the branding of ING Bank’s operations or the investment management businesses that are part of ING U.S., Inc., ING’s U.S.-based retirement, investment and insurance subsidiary which plans to rebrand in the future as Voya Financial.

Ralph Hamers, CEO of ING Group, said, “ING Insurance progresses well with its preparations to become a stand-alone company. Today’s announcement of the future brand ‘NN’ is an important milestone and underscores that we are in the end phase of the restructuring of ING Group. Through this period of change we will continue to build strong, sustainable futures for our businesses, while placing the highest priority on the needs of our customers.”

ING’s insurance roots date back 170 years. Over the years Nationale-Nederlanden, ING Investment Management and ING Insurance have built leading positions in Europe with a strong presence in more than 15 countries. More than 12,000 employees offer retirement services, insurance, investments and banking to more than 15 million customers.

Lard Friese, vice-chairman of ING Insurance, said, “We are very pleased to announce today ‘NN’ as our future name and brand logo. We are building a new company that brings together three market-leading European insurance and investment management brands under one compelling brand. Although NN is a new brand, it is based on a rich heritage. Because we want to stay close to our customers in different markets, we will add local business descriptors to the NN brand in different countries. ING Investment Management will rebrand as NN Investment Partners. This underscores its distinct business proposition but is clearly within the same brand family. We believe this is the right way forward for our company, and for our customers. We are a company for the future: NN.”