Esure boss Vann departs amid strategy rethink, sale speculation

Vann, who joined the company in 2000, became CEO in 2012 and led the stock exchange flotation the following year, will be replaced by chief financial officer Darren Ogden on an interim basis.

Esure issued a short trading update to assure that the reshuffle was not connected to any financial trouble, revealing that gross written premiums rose 25% to £820m last year and profit before tax is expected to be up 30% to £95-98m, with 2018 having starting "positively" and in line with board expectations.

As reasoning for his abrupt departure, the company said the board "continues to evolve its long term strategy" and it agreed with Vann "that this will be best achieved through new leadership with significant expertise and experience in a broad spectrum of customer facing businesses, in an increasingly digital and data driven world".

Last autumn 30.7% shareholder Wood, who also founded rival insurer Direct Line, was reported in the Sunday Times as looking to orchestrate a sale of his controlling stake, which would trigger a bid for the whole business.

But the company stressed that Wood would be taking a "more active role" in the business, with a spokeswoman for the company playing down the speculation and assuring that that 71-year old Wood was not showing any signs of slowing down and remained very engaged with the company.

Since joining the market at a share price of 290p the shares flirted with higher levels but have spent most of the time underwater, standing at 244.81p at the previous day's close, down 16% since the IPO.

Wood, who said the process of finding a successor had already begun, pointed to the "successful footprint expansion programme" under Vann and that the business had increased in-force policies 9% to 2.4m and was on track to deliver 3m by 2020. Esure will release its 2017 preliminary results on 7 March 2018.

Shares in the company increased 1.3% to 248.2p in early trading on Friday morning.

Analyst Nick Johnson at broker Numis said it could see that "now might be a sensible juncture to introduce a new skill set to the company’s leadership we are a little surprised that this seems to be a sudden rather than a smooth change" but was encouraged that current trading is at least in line with expectations.

Eamonn Flanagan at Shore Capital was shocked at the departure of the "impressive" Vann and in putting two and two together over the speed of his exit, pointed to the sale speculation in September.

Amid the omnipresence of founder Wood, Flanagan said Vann had "delivered a strong UK personal lines player leveraging off its strength in the price comparison website space, albeit one, in our view that is overly reliant upon ancillary and instalment income for its profitability".