Founding of the predecessors from 1858 In 1858, Helvetia was established by Eastern
Swiss business people and entrepreneurs as
Allgemeine Versicherungs-Gesellschaft Helvetia in St. Gallen. It was the first company in Switzerland to offer an insurance against risks of transport by land, river, and sea. Three years later, the private insurance company
Helvetia Feuer was established in St Gallen. The occasion was the fire of Glarus, which revealed shortcomings in the building insurance system.
Expansion from 1862 Over the course of its history, Helvetia expanded into all five continents and thereby laid the foundation for its business activities outside of Switzerland. In 1862,
Helvetia Feuer established its first branches in
Germany and expanded from 1876 into the
US, where it opened branches in
California and
New York. In
Austria, the history of Helvetia goes back to the establishment of
Der Anker, Gesellschaft von Lebens- und Rentenversicherung in 1858. Until 2006,
Helvetia Austria also operated under this name. The establishment of subsidiaries in
Spain, Italy and Germany took place between 1986 and 1988.
Corporate consolidation in the second half of the 20th century In the years after 1945, the goal of all major Swiss insurers was to become an all-sector company. In this context,
Helvetia Transport became a subsidiary of
Helvetia Feuer in 1961, In this constellation, it was not possible for
Helvetia Feuer to enter the field of accident liability and automotive insurance, as this was operated by
Helvetia Unfall. The same applied in reverse for
Helvetia Unfall with its subsidiary
Helvetia Leben.
Helvetia Feuer and
Helvetia Unfall hindered each other "with their common name and saw their freedom of movement restricted in view of the transition to an all-sector society". An agreement between
Helvetia Feuer and
Helvetia Unfall followed. Closer cooperation was sought, but the independence of both partner companies was preserved. As a result,
Helvetia Feuer cooperated with
Helvetia Unfall between 1968 and 1988 by creating dual shares. In 1986,
Helvetia Feuer and
Helvetia Unfall started to separate from their partnership. On 11 October 1988, the shareholders decided in an extraordinary general meeting of
Helvetia Feuer and
Helvetia Unfall to completely separate the two partner companies.
Helvetia Feuer was renamed as
Helvetia Versicherungen and the company received a new mission statement and branding. The three-dimensional triangular symbol was introduced.
Helvetia Unfall took the name of its travel insurance subsidiary
Elvia (now part of
Allianz Global Assistance). One year later,
Helvetia Insurance in Switzerland branched out to include the accident, liability and motor vehicle sectors. In 1996, the company cooperated with the long-standing Basel-based life insurer
Patria. The beginnings of
Patria go back to the establishment of
Basler Sterbe- und Alters-Kasse in 1878. The charitable pension fund was the first to insure the life of socially disadvantaged people with the aim of being an actual national insurer. After numerous changes in name and mergers,
Schweizerische Lebensversicherungsgesellschaft Patria was established in 1910. In 1992,
Helvetia and
Patria decided to develop the Swiss market jointly in the future and enter into a strategic alliance; joint management began in 1994. In June 1996, the companies have been merged and established as
Helvetia Patria.
Alte Leipziger, for example, took a 10% stake in ''Helvetia Patria's
share capital. Through its cooperation with Alte Leipziger
, Helvetia Patria
transacted business in the areas of health insurance, legal protection insurance and building society savings with companies in the Alte Leipziger Group
in Germany. In 2001, Alte Leipziger
sold its shares again. As a result, the Swiss Association of Raiffeisenbanken
became a new shareholder in the Helvetia Patria Group
with a two percent share. The cooperation with the Raiffeisen group'' was subsequently expanded. In Austria,
Der Anker, Gesellschaft von Lebens- und Rentenversicherung became a wholly owned subsidiary in 1993. In Italy,
Helvetia Patria took over
Nordstern Danni in 1998 and acquired
Norwich Union Vita in 2001. In 2005, the group bought the insurance portfolio of
Sofid Vita and three years later they acquired
Padana Assicurazioni and the majority of
Chiara Vita. In Spain, at the end of 1998,
Helvetia Patria acquired the northern Spanish
La Vasco Navarra LVN, a medium-sized all-sector company. In 2000, the takeover of
Previsión Española was completed. In 2003, the two companies merged into
Helvetia Previsión, based in Seville. The position in the transport insurance area was expanded through the purchase of the transport insurance area of the cooperation partner
Royal & Sun Alliance in 2002 and further acquisitions.
Helvetia Patria withdrew completely from the Netherlands, Greece and Canada by 2000. In 2010, Helvetia bought the Swiss insurers
Alba Allgemeine Versicherungs-Gesellschaft AG (Alba) and
Phenix Lebensversicherungsgesellschaft AG (Phenix). The
Alba/Phenix range in sickness/accident insurance was sold to the two insurance companies
Innova and
Solida. In 2014,
Nationale Suisse and Austria's subsidiary of
Bâloise were taken over. For this acquisition, Helvetia increased its stake in
Nationale Suisse to more than 98 per cent and then initiated the procedure to declare the remaining shares void.
Nationale Suisse consisted of
smile.direct, Switzerland's leading online insurer. It also became part of Helvetia Group with the takeover. The acquisition was one of the biggest insurance takeover in recent years in Switzerland. In 2016, Helvetia took over 70 per cent of the shares in the online mortgage broker
MoneyPark. The purchase price was about 107 million francs. With this majority stake, Helvetia entered the Swiss mortgage business. At the beginning of 2017, the company announced that it would invest in
startups, which support the transformation of the existing core business or develop new business models, via their own
venture fund. The fund is endowed with some CHF 55 million and plans to invest in some 25 new companies. Among other things, the venture fund has invested in
Volocopter,
Flatfox,
Pricehubble,
Baufi24.de or in the Insurtech
Inzmo.
Recent developments With the takeover of
Caser in 2020, the group entered the health & care sector, as
Caser operated six hospitals and around 24 dental clinics as well as retirement and nursing homes in addition to the insurance business. The company's first real estate fund was set up in April 2020. Further capital increases followed, as a result of which the fund had 47 properties with a market value of around CHF 1.09 billion as of 1 April 2023. Since March 2022,
Helvetia Liechtenstein has been operating under the name
Helvetia Global Solutions (HGS).
Merger In April 2025, Helvetia and
Baloise announced a plan to merge to create Switzerland's second-largest insurance group with a combined business volume of 20 billion Swiss francs ($24.69 billion). The new group would be called Helvetia Baloise Holding. The merger is expected to conclude in the fourth quarter of 2025. File:Helvetia St.Gallen Eingang.png|Head office of Helvetia Group on the Girtannersberg, St. Gallen in 2012. File:Helvetia Insurance.jpg|Head office of Helvetia Group in St. Gallen in 2013. File:Helvetia St.Gallen Girtannersberg Abend.png|Building the extension for Helvetia Group on the Girtannersberg, St. Gallen in 2012. File:Helvetia Logo Singlebrand.png|Helvetia has been operating under a uniform image throughout Europe since September 2006. File:Hauptsitz Helvetia Basel.png|Head office of Helvetia Switzerland in Basel in 2012. == Group Executive Board and Board of Directors ==