Indiabulls Financial Services Ltd (IBFSL) has signed a joint venture agreement with Sogecap, the life insurance arm of the French major Societe Genarale (SocGen) for its life insurance foray.

To be named “Indiabulls Societe Generale Life Insurance Co Ltd”, IBFSL will hold 74% stake in the company while Sogecap will own the balance 26%, an official release said.

Under the agreement Sogecap has already paid Rs 150 crore (including premium) to pick up its 26% stake in Indiabulls SocGen Life, whose current equity is Rs 300 crore, it added.

The Sogecap is present in over 10 countries and is the third largest insurance major in France. It is among the largest players in Eastern Europe and has presence in many West Asian countries, Russia and now in China.

SocGen has a 35 % stake in the SBI Mutual Fund. The company had recently also bought out Apeejay Finance, the Kolkata-based NBFC now called Family Credit.

Gagan Banga, CEO, Indiabulls Financial Services, said, “Thanks to a strong partner like SocGen, who already understands the Indian landscape because of their long-standing JV with SBI, we will be among the top three life insurance players within three years.”

We hope to secure all approvals in three-and-half months and kick-off operations by May 2008, he added.

The Indiabulls group has already got permission from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for investing in the JV and has also initiated the approval process with Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA).

Indiabulls Financial Services has a pan-India presence in over 200 cities and this distribution network will help the life insurance company to start operating at a large scale very rapidly, an analyst said.

The insurance JV plans to target premium income worth Rs 1,000 crore in the first year and Rs 5,000 crore of first year premiums by 2010.

The stock of IBFSL closed on Friday at Rs. 982 on NSE, down by 2% compared with previous close of Rs. 1004. It touched an intraday high of Rs. 1010 and low of Rs. 973.