Allianz SE (AZ), Europe's biggest insurer by gross premiums, plans to increase its distribution channels and agency force in Taiwan through 2010, Werner Zedelius, the management board member responsible for insurance growth markets, said Tuesday.

"The financial crisis affected growth overall, and we need to compensate for that with our distribution strength," Zedelius told reporters in Taipei. The company has no acquisition plans for Taiwan and wants to grow organically, he said.

Allianz is "not excluding acquisitions in Asia, but it's not at the top of our priority list," Zedelius added.

Chris James, chief executive of the company's wholly owned Taiwanese unit, Allianz Taiwan Life Insurance Co., said the company increased its agency force on the island by 30% last year, bringing the number of agents in Taiwan to 1,680.

The company plans to increase the number of agents to 2,200 this year and to 3,000 in 2010, James told reporters.

Allianz Taiwan Life was the island's eight-largest life insurer by premiums at the end of 2008, with a market share of 4.4%. It is also Taiwan's biggest seller of bancassurance and investment-linked insurance products, James said.

The unit is the seventh-largest life insurer in Allianz Group, he added.

Allianz Taiwan Life's gross premiums fell 23% last year to NT$46.7 billion. But gross premium revenue "more than doubled" to NT$19.8 billion in the January-April period, James said.

The unit's customers increased by more than 10,000 to 276,000 last year.

  -By Alex Pevzner, Dow Jones Newswires; 8862-2502-2557; alex.pevzner@dowjones.com