http://www.aviva.com/index.asp?PageID=552&subsection=financial_review


UK
2005 has been a year of great achievement for our UK general insurance business. Norwich Union Insurance (NUI) delivered another outstanding result, with an operating profit of 970 million (2004: 788 million). Our COR improved to 96% (2004: 97%), underlining our commitment to the market to meet or beat a worldwide COR of 98%. This performance has been achieved against the backdrop of the RAC acquisition in May and the subsequent integration activity during the rest of the year. Our balanced portfolio supports sustainable, profitable growth, with a 3% year on year underlying growth in net written premiums (excluding RAC) and 15% in our Direct operation, including over 200% growth in our internet-based sales, making NU Direct one of the UKs leading online insurers.

This excellent result reflects disciplined underwriting and cost control. Weather costs in the year were broadly neutral. We have delivered an additional 40 million of annualised savings in claim costs through effective supply chain management. Our focus on efficiency has enabled us to deliver a 10.5% expense ratio excluding the impact of RAC (2004: 10.6%). Including RAC, the expense ratio was 10.9%. We have achieved rate increases of 4% in personal motor (2004: 2%) and 6% in homeowner (2004: 6%), while commercial rates are holding up and profitability remains strong.

The RAC integration has largely been completed. As announced in October 2005, we now plan to achieve pre-tax savings of 100 million in 2006, at a cost of 130 million, exceeding the 80 million target announced when the RAC was acquired. We expect to deliver an annualised operating profit of 250 million on a like for like basis from the RAC acquisition, with an additional 1.4 million RAC customers by 2008. This acquisition will enable us to deliver an extensive portfolio of products and services to our customers. We have already launched motor and travel products under the RAC Direct Insurance brand and plan to launch a new homeowner product in March 2006.

RAC delivered a good performance in the year, with post acquisition profits of 59 million. The Rescue business, presented as general insurance, contributed 29 million to the insurance underwriting result.

During 2005, we signed a deal with Barclays to become its sole provider of homeowner, motor and travel insurance, and extended our long-standing agreement with Asda to be its sole provider of general insurance until the end of 2009. These deals underscore our position as partner of choice to the UKs top brands. We have achieved consistently strong customer satisfaction scores and won the Insurance Times General Insurer of the Year award for the third year running, underlining the consistency of our performance across the business.

We continue to invest in market-leading initiatives. Our digital flood map is being used in England and Wales, leading to a considerable decrease in the number of policyholders being declined homeowner insurance. We plan to install 100,000 Pay As You DriveTM devices by the end of 2006.

NU Healthcare is a leading UK health insurer providing private medical insurance (PMI) and income protection to over 750,000 customers. The PMI health result was 4 million (2004: 9 million) reflecting investment in the business and market conditions.
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and more... loads of news is going to be announed on tuesday as well as positive results ;0)

NAVIGATION: Destinator Technologies unveiled Destinator 6 for Windows Mobile
Posted by Arne Hess - at Wednesday, 15.03.06 - 13:39:55 CET under 2 - Pocket PC News - Viewed 593x

Destinator Technologies unveiled it's latest navigation software for Windows Mobile at this year's CeBIT: "Destinator 6". Destinator 6 is the latest in a long line of solid product releases, building on the award winning "Destinator PN", "ND" and "SP" software. Numerous enhancements make Destinator 6 faster and easier to use than ever. With more ingenious functions, features and a completely redesigned user interface, Destinator 6 delivers power and innovation that's accessible by all.

An extension of the TMC service will be introduced together with Destinator 6: Thanks to new technology it will be possible to have international, up-to-date traffic information for a one-time license fee. Destinator 6 will be the first mobile system to combine the use of freely available information broadcast by radio stations and realtime traffic flow data from premium specialist service providers (for example RAC Trafficmaster RDS TMC in the UK) transmitted straight to the navigation device. Only a one off fee is needed instead of the user paying for a rolling subscription. With road traffic volumes on the rise across Europe and some roads already at saturation point, this provides business and private users a crystal ball that enables them to save time and money by avoiding traffic jams long before actually reaching them

AND MORE!!!!

Garmin ni 350
In vehicle navigation devices have never been as popular as they are now. Not so long ago driving along with a box attached to your windscreen made you look a bit strange - now, its commonplace.
Garmin has been into GPS for longer than most but its forays into the world of portable navigation systems have not always been as successful its fans might have hoped. Its GPS-toting handhelds of both Pocket PC and Palm varieties have taken a while to bed down into usable devices. But with the ni, Garmin really does seem to have broken some new ground in a good way.






The ni 350 is not inexpensive though and your first question will be to ask what that hefty price tag buys you. Well primarily its a navigation system with 700MB of memory containing maps of the whole of Europe. However, its not just a navigation system. It can also handle MP3 music, pictures, audio books, currency conversion, calculations, travel dictionaries and city guides. Plug it into your PC and it acts as a USB mass storage device onto which you can pop files for playing through it, or simply files you want to carry from one place to another.
The 634 price tag is Garmins suggested selling price. Shop around and you should find it for less, but even so its still going to be a fair wedge and thats before you start buying the extras such as city guides, dictionaries, or the 196 on the live TrafficMaster traffic updates. On the upside, this is a lifetime subscription.

Garmin also has a cheaper alternative available the ni 300 at an RRP of 380. It looks very similar, but youll miss out on the ability to use quite as many extras, as the internal memory is limited to 200MB, and you dont get the maps of all of Europe, just a selected area.






The ni 350 is pretty thin and measures just 98.3 x 73.9 x 22.1mm and weighs 144g. The GPS antenna folds out of the rear, which negatively affects the neat look. The 320 x 240 display is touch sensitive and 2.8in in size. The sides house just a power switch, a USB jack for mains power, car power and PC connection, and 3.5mm earphones jack.

AND ALSO PEUGEOT IS EXPECTED TO GO STANDARD FIT BEYOND MARCH 2006, HIGH PROBABILITY THAT FORD WILL CONTINUE TO DO STANDARD FIT OF SMARTNAV ALSO ON THE FORD FOCUS AS FROM APRIL AND FORD FIESTA

This is on the move,takeover rumours.

Another one bites the dust. Bye-bye, TFC.