Marking the next phase of Australian Life Insurance’s (ALI) expansion, Tasso Papachatgis will assume the role of CEO, it was announced today.

Company founders and directors Keith Cohen and Brian Pillemer, who have grown the business from inception in 2002, have sold their investment to current shareholders Yarra Capital Partners and will step away from the business.

Papachatgis, who joined ALI in November 2008 as head of sales and distribution, takes the helm from outgoing CEO Cohen and is tasked to maintain the business’ recent solid growth.

In January this year ALI achieved its strongest sales figures to date, which were bettered by 20 per cent in February as broker pick up of mortgage protection insurance accelerates.

Papachatgis was quick to praise the roles Cohen and Pillemer have played in establishing ALI, pointing in particular to their groundbreaking success in taking mortgage protection insurance to a broker market hungry for a total mortgage solution.

The company, Papachatgis said, is now poised to build on these solid foundations, harnessing its key strengths of product innovation, broker/client engagement and excellent customer service.

“I look forward to driving the development of ALI during what are unprecedented market conditions,” Papachatgis said.

“We’ve seen broker demand for mortgage protection insurance soar and I’m excited about the potential there is for us to partner brokers in growing their businesses through including an independent mortgage protection solution in their mortgage process.”

Pillemer, ALI’s outgoing head of distribution, said he has seen a lot of changes take shape during the birth and development of ALI.

According to Pillemer, the broker case for offering mortgage protection insurance has grown significantly.

“It gives me great pleasure to see our vision being fulfilled - many more Australians are insured now than they were six years ago when we commenced operations.”