Cigna

They call it the Tree of Life. Philadelphia-based Cigna Corp. has adopted a new logo - one that features a tree trunk and multiple leaves. Cigna's old logo, or corporate signature, featured the word "Cigna," underlined, in a blue box. Not friendly enough, Cigna's senior marketers said. The Travelers, a rival insurer, is known by a picture of a sheltering umbrella. Prudential's logo includes a piece of a rocky cliff. Allstate's name is always topped by a pair of "good hands.

Insurance powerhouse Cigna is aiming to cut costs, a move that could affect some 6,000 workers in the Philadelphia area. Company spokesman Michael J. Monroe acknowledged that cost-cutting measures could mean job cuts at its Center City headquarters and its local satellite offices. "There is a likelihood that the number of positions in the Cigna Corp. will be reduced in the future," Monroe said. Cigna management has only begun its review, expected to last through the year, and no decisions have been made on how the work force might be reduced, he added.

Cigna Corp. yesterday made clear that Wilson H. Taylor, president of the multi-line insurance company's property and casualty unit, would succeed Robert D. Kilpatrick when he retires as chairman and chief executive officer early in 1989. Taylor, 43, an actuary who joined Connecticut General Corp. in 1964, will become vice chairman, chief operating officer - a newly minted title - on Jan. 1. Kilpatrick will reach Cigna's mandatory retirement age of 65 early in 1989. Like Kilpatrick, Taylor came to Cigna through Connecticut General, a life and health insurance company based in Bloomfield, Conn.

Mayor Goode and other city officials were scheduled to meet this morning with top Cigna Corp. executives in an attempt to convince the insurance giant to keep its massive work force in the city. Yesterday marked Cigna's deadline for the submission of development proposals. The company is looking for more than 1 million square feet of office space to house some 4,400 employees now working in Center City. Spokesman Michael Monroe said the company received 10 proposals, six representing sites within city limits and four from developers offering suburban locations.

The search for a successor to chairman and chief executive Robert D. Kilpatrick is getting under way at insurance giant Cigna. The head of the Philadelphia-based insurance and financial services firm, which employs about 4,800 locally, said yesterday that he expects the successor to come from within the company's ranks. His replacement will be appointed chief operating officer later this year and will succeed Kilpatrick in early 1989, when the current chief executive, now 63, plans to retire.

Sighs of relief at Cigna that Hurricane Gilbert didn't cause far more damage than it did were almost as powerful yesterday as the 200-mph winds Gilbert blew earlier this month. Cigna said that damages caused by Gilbert, primarily to property the company insured in Jamaica, would cost shareholders about $20 million in profits during the quarter ending today. The figure works out to about 26 cents a share that will be shaved from the estimated $4 a share in profits expected for all of this year, according to Ira Malis, analyst at Alex.

Cigna Corp.'s decision to take a charge of $1.2 billion in the fourth quarter to boost its property-and-casualty-claims reserves by 28 percent left some analysts questioning yesterday why management did not recognize the problem sooner. The charge, which the company is taking for the fourth quarter of 1985 and is expected to result in an operating loss of $853 million for the year, resulted in Cigna's being placed on the "credit-watch surveillance list" of Standard & Poor's Corp.

Even if the city finds no takers to help get it off the hook for its Cigna Corp. lease, it won't be the highest rental for city-leased space at privately owned Center City buildings. That distinction belongs to the ARA Tower - and may be for a long time to come, city records show. Under a deal cut in 1982 by Mayor William Green and his development aides, the city holds a 25-year lease on 200,000 square-feet of space in the tower, on Market Street at 11th. Rents in the ARA Tower will cost taxpayers $6.6 million this year, records show.

Cigna Corp. yesterday reported that profits dropped sharply in the third quarter because of worsening results in its property-casualty insurance unit. Net income dropped 40 percent for the company as a whole. Operating income for the property-casualty insurance segment was off 58 percent from the third quarter of last year, to $46.6 million from $110.4 million. "We are concerned that property and casualty commercial-line prices are nearing inadequate levels and we are prepared to reduce writings if the price declines continue," Wilson H. Taylor, president and chief executive officer, said in a statement.

Big gains in its property and casualty business produced a banner year for Cigna Corp., which yesterday reported a 24 percent increase in consolidated operating income for 1987 over 1986. But in announcing the results, chairman and chief executive officer Robert D. Kilpatrick cautioned that competition is heating up in the property and casualty business. That competition, together with continued losses in health- maintenance organizations and escalating health-care costs, will "constrain" 1988 earnings, Kilpatrick said.

John H. Adee, 71, a retired Cigna executive and vice president of West Conshohocken Borough Council, died of cardiopulmonary failure, Tuesday, March 20, at Presbyterian Hospital in Philadelphia. Mr. Adee became involved in borough affairs in 1998, after he and his wife, Annelouise "Pinky," built a home in the Merion Hills section of West Conshohocken. He served on the borough sewer commission and the zoning committee and had been a member of council since October 2010. He cared about borough workers and listened to their concerns, his wife said.

Attracted by the affluence of the country's growing middle class, Cigna Corp. announced that it would team up with an Indian conglomerate to sell health insurance in India. Cigna's partner in the joint venture is the sprawling TTK Group - known in India for selling items as diverse as condoms, lipstick, and pressure cookers. "For health insurance, for private insurance, India is very underpenetrated, only 4 percent," said Michael Ross, senior vice president for marketing at Cigna International.

Cigna Corp. plans to offer 15 million shares in a public offering to raise about $642 million for its announced deal to acquire Healthspring Inc., a health-care insurer. Cigna announced the $3.8 billion Healthspring deal last month. Underwriters for Cigna's offering have the option to purchase an additional 2.25 million shares, which could raise an additional $96 million for Cigna.    - Bob Fernandez

Being in the insurance business, Cigna Corp. knows all about weighing odds. Yes, funding for Medicare and other entitlements are on the chopping block, or at least on the trimming block, in Washington, but that did not stop Cigna, one of the nation's largest health insurers, from making a big cash bet on Medicare's future. Cigna said Monday it would spend $3.8 billion to acquire HealthSpring Inc., a Tennessee company that specializes in selling Medicare-managed care plans, known as Medicare Advantage plans.

Cigna announced yesterday that it will change its headquarters from Philadelphia to Bloomfield, Conn., and will add at least 200 jobs there in exchange for a $50 million package of tax credits offered by that state. Cigna's decision is important to Connecticut, which has seen much of its once-dominant insurance industry leave or be bought by out-of-state companies. Cigna's U.S. operations have been based in Philadelphia since 1982. David Cordani, Cigna's chief executive, who started his tenure in January 2010, is a Connecticut native with a master's degree in business administration from the University of Hartford.

City officials breathed a sigh of relief Tuesday. Cigna Corp., one of the nation's largest insurers, whose history in Philadelphia dates back to 1792, isn't packing up and moving its entire workforce from Philadelphia to Connecticut. It is retaining 1,100 jobs and using multiple floors of office space at Two Liberty Plaza in Center City. Cigna executives, however, are formalizing what had already been pretty much of a done deal - moving corporate headquarters to Bloomfield, Conn., taking that state's governor up on a $50 million economic incentive to bring 200 jobs to Connecticut.

Cigna Corp. will announce the addition of at least 200 jobs to its corporate headquarters in Bloomfield, Conn., on Tuesday, raising the question of how long one of the nation's largest health insurers will continue to maintain its corporate presence in Center City. Representatives for Mayor Nutter and Cigna Corp. both declined to comment, and Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy's spokesman, David Bednarz, was not immediately available. A source in Nutter's office said the mayor had conversations with Cigna officials Monday, in advance of a major noon announcement planned by the Connecticut governor at Cigna's complex on Cottage Grove Road in Bloomfield.

Cigna Corp. will announce the addition of at least 200 jobs to its corporate headquarters in Bloomfield, Conn. on Tuesday, raising the question of how long one of the nation's largest health insurers will continue to maintain its corporate presence in Center City. Spokespeople for Mayor Nutter and Cigna Corp. both declined to comment and Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy's spokesperson, David Bednarz, was not immediately available. A source in Mayor Nutter's office said that Mayor Nutter had conversations with Cigna officials on Monday, in advance of a major noon announcement planned by the Connecticut governor at Cigna's complex on Cottage Grove Road in Bloomfield.

In the Region Q1 profit drops at Urban Outfitters Urban Outfitters Inc. said Monday its profit fell to $39 million in the quarter ended April 30 from $53 million in the year-before period. The decline for the Philadelphia specialty retailer came even as it posted a sales increase to $524 million from $480 million. Its weakest performers were its Anthropologie stores, where comparable sales - those at outlets open at least a year - fell 6 percent, and Urban Outfitters stores, whose comparable store net sales increased by only a percentage point from a year ago. Free People comparables were up 30 percent.