{"id":616098,"date":"2026-09-30T06:38:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-30T06:38:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/616098\/"},"modified":"2026-09-30T06:38:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-30T06:38:09","slug":"momentum-corporate-scoops-up-verso-to-boost-retirement-services","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/616098\/","title":{"rendered":"Momentum Corporate scoops up Verso to boost retirement services"},"content":{"rendered":"

Momentum Corporate has strengthened its retirement fund administration and consulting capabilities with the purchase of Verso<\/a>, a financial services group founded in South Africa about 26 years ago.<\/p>\n

Verso specialises in retirement fund administration, employee benefits consulting, healthcare broking and wealth management.<\/p>\n

Dumo Mbethe<\/a>, CEO at Momentum Corporate, said the transaction brings Verso\u2019s retirement fund administration and consulting expertise into Momentum Corporate, strengthening its employee benefits offering and supporting its long-term growth strategy.<\/p>\n

Mbethe added that Verso has built a strong reputation through its specialist expertise, experienced team and longstanding client relationships. <\/p>\n

\u201cAs part of Momentum Corporate, these strengths can be expanded to further develop the offering available to clients,\u201d Mbethe said.<\/p>\n

\u201cVerso has built a business grounded in specialist expertise, strong client relationships and service excellence. Bringing Verso into Momentum Corporate allows us to build on that foundation and create further opportunities to support the evolving needs of our clients.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the transition period Verso will continue serving its existing clients, and current service arrangements will remain in place, with both businesses focused on maintaining service continuity throughout the integration process.\u201d<\/p>\n

South Africa\u2019s retirement fund administration industry is a highly competitive sector, with the likes of Alexforbes, Liberty, Old Mutual and Sanlam vying for greater market share.<\/p>\n

Momentum Corporate delivers one of the market\u2019s largest and most established umbrella fund solutions, supported by digital capabilities that enhance the experience for employers and members.<\/p>\n

The business unit, part of the broader Momentum Group is prioritising ecosystem modernisation as a critical enabler of its growth strategy.<\/p>\n

In the group\u2019s annual report, published last week, Momentum Corporate said its right to win comes from its scale and strong market position and the digital transformation it has embarked on.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are advancing digital transformation by accelerating digital self-service, automation, adviser enablement and AI-driven productivity to reduce cost-to-serve, manage high service volumes and enhance client experience in a complex market environment,\u201d the company said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are scaling our WhatsApp self-service and member portals, with nearly all two-pot [retirement system] claims now processed digitally, delivering over 40,000 hours in efficiency savings and enabling 66% of service transactions to be self-serviced.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are enhancing the adviser experience through our Smart Quotes and Adviser Connect platforms, with 33% of new quotes and 51% of re-quotes now processed digitally, resulting in more than 7,000 hours saved and improved conversion outcomes.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the year ended June, Momentum Corporate reported normalised headline earnings of R1.4bn, a 12% drop from a year earlier. However, sales volumes surged 38% to R16.2bn, driven by robust new business volumes in the long-term savings business.<\/p>\n

The group, which also houses brands such as Metropolitan and Multiply, reported earnings of R7bn \u2014 a year ahead of its 2027 target \u2014 and is set to take a new strategy to market after a strong two years, with five of its nine business units reporting more than R1bn in earnings in the year under review.<\/p>\n

To retain its executives for longer, the group, headed by Jeanette Marais<\/a>, has increased its retirement age from 60 to 63, becoming the latest blue-chip company to hike the deadline as skills shortages in executive roles and a war for talent ramp up in the sector.<\/p>\n

The move by Momentum follows shortly after similar moves by Nedbank and Standard Bank over the last year as South African corporates increasingly question whether their retirement ages are still fit for purpose.<\/p>\n

Business Day<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Momentum Corporate has strengthened its retirement fund administration and consulting capabilities with the purchase of Verso, a financial…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":616099,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[303565,138,303560,303566,303563,303564,246,303567,303561,111,139,69,244,245,303562],"class_list":["post-616098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-ai-in-retirement-administration","tag-business","tag-corporate-talent-retention","tag-digital-transformation-financial-services","tag-digital-transformation-retirement-funds","tag-employee-benefits-consulting","tag-finance","tag-momentum-corporate-verso-acquisition","tag-momentum-group-strategy","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance","tag-umbrella-fund-solutions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616098","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=616098"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/616098\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/616099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=616098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=616098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=616098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}