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September 15, 2020

Enfield mayor hopes for best on MassMutual

By Skyler Frazer | Journal Inquirer

Mayor Michael Ludwick hopes that the recently announced sale of Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co.’s retirement plan business to Empower Retirement means good things for the employees who worked at the company’s Enfield offices.

But Ludwick said Friday that he has little information about Empower’s plans.

MassMutual had announced in February 2018 that it would be moving the 1,500 employees who worked at 100 Bright Meadow Blvd. campus to offices in Springfield by 2021. It’s unclear how many employees have been moved from Enfield.

This week Empower Retirement and MassMutual announced that they’ve entered into an agreement for Empower to acquire MassMutual’s retirement plan business for more than $2 billion. Empower is based in the Denver area, but its parent’s headquarters are in Winnipeg, Canada. The deal had been rumored since June.

In a joint press release, the companies said the business has approximately 2,000 employees, a majority of them based at MassMutual’s complex in Enfield.

Representatives from Empower Retirement and MassMutual did not return calls for comment.

Ludwick said Friday afternoon he was still waiting to find out more information about what the acquisition means for the town and the affected employees.

“I obviously don’t want to speculate, because I really don’t know, but I hope it’s positive for those workers,” Ludwick said.

Ludwick said that MassMutual and its employees have been a great corporate partner in Enfield for years.

“Their employees have volunteered in numerous nonprofit special events,” he said. “I certainly hope it’s good news for them.”

Since that announcement in 2018, MassMutual has put the massive Enfield property on the market for an undisclosed price. Ludwick said that he and town officials look forward to working with whatever business wants to come to town and take over the complex.

“It’s a beautiful building, it’s a perfect location, and if Empower decides to move some business there, we’d be more than willing to work with them,” Ludwick said.

MassMutual was the town’s top taxpayer as recently as 2018, with a net value of $45.85 million, although it fell to second place in 2019.

According to the terms of the agreement released by both companies, Empower Retirement will purchase the section of MassMutual’s business for a “ceding commission” of $2.35 billion. The companies added that “balance sheet of the transferred business would be supported by $1 billion of required capital when combined with Empower’s existing U.S. business.”

The current MassMutual retirement plan business comprises 26,000 workplace savings plans with roughly 2.5 million participants that have $167 billion in assets saved, the companies said.

The transaction will increase Empower’s participant base to more than 12.2 million and retirement services record-keeping assets to approximately $834 billion administered in approximately 67,000 workplace savings plans, the companies said.

The transaction is expected to close by the end of the year, pending regulatory approvals.

In 2014, MassMutual completed renovations totaling $38 million at the three-building Enfield site. The project included upgrades to infrastructure and technology, improvements to common areas of the office such as lobbies and conference rooms, and a new data center that would also deliver standby emergency power to the rest of the campus.

The company received a 10-year tax abatement worth roughly $13 million from the state Department of Economic and Community Development to help with the work. After MassMutual announced it would be shuttering its Enfield office, a DECD spokesman said the firm wouldn’t receive those tax credits.

The company first opened its 100 Bright Meadow Blvd. offices in 2004 after buying the property from the Phoenix Home Life Insurance Co. for $74 million.

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