Clare Bousfield, the CEO of retail and savings at investment and wealth management firm M&G plc, will step down in the autumn, the company announced today.

The company plans to create two new dedicated CEO roles to lead its wealth and life insurance businesses

Earlier today M&G announced it was axing 200 jobs, about 4% of the 5,000 total workforce. The jobs will be lost through voluntary redundancies.

Mr Bousfield has worked at M&G over the past seven years in several leadership roles. She was previously CFO at M&G plc and earlier held the role of CEO insurance UK and Europe at Prudential UK. 

The company said she was instrumental in the demerger and the "transformation" of Pru UK and over the last two years has played a key role in driving forward the retail and savings business at M&G.

M&G CEO Andrea Rossi said: “I am incredibly grateful for Clare’s hard work and support during her career with Prudential and M&G and wish her every success for the future.

“Clare will remain in role until the Autumn to ensure a smooth handover of responsibilities.”

In Q1 results announced today M&G said assets under management for the firm’s wealth business grew 1.7% to £84.8bn.

The wealth division reported net inflows of £0.2bn, and gross inflows of £2.2bn for Q1, with PruFund reporting gross inflows of £1.6bn.