ReliaStar Life

ReliaStar Life Insurance Company (NAIC 67105) is the legal entity California insurance records identify at a Georgia administrative address, with an old legal name of Northwestern National Life Insurance Company.[1] Voya's corporate history explains that Northwestern National Life was founded in Minneapolis in the 1880s and expanded into group insurance and reinsurance as it grew, before becoming part of ING's U.S. insurance and retirement operations.[2] In the 2010s, those U.S. operations were rebranded as Voya Financial.[2] This lineage helps explain ReliaStar's market role. As employer benefits and institutional retirement channels grew, large carriers with group capabilities found opportunities in workplace life and disability offerings, supplemental benefits, and retirement-plan administration. Marketing moved away from purely local agency networks toward national broker and consultant channels, supported by significant back-office administration.[2] Industry-wide, the 2008 crisis and the low-rate era that followed increased scrutiny on capital, asset-liability matching, and product guarantees. Reinsurance is one lever for managing those pressures, and Voya's history explicitly references reinsurance as part of earlier growth and risk management.[2] Today, ReliaStar is best understood as a legacy life insurer within the Voya family - a platform built through decades of brand changes and corporate ownership shifts, designed to support long-duration promises at scale.[1][2]

Sources: [1] https://interactive.web.insurance.ca.gov/companyprofile/companyprofile?doFunction=getCompanyProfile&event=companyProfile&naic=67105 (CA Dept. of Insurance - Company Profile (NAIC 67105)) ; [2] https://www.voya.com/about-us/our-company/company-history (Voya - Company history)