The chief executive of Edinburgh-based Aegon UK on Thursday apologised to financial advisers and customers affected by large-scale problems experienced in the migration of Cofunds clients to Aegon.

As he announced first-half results, Aegon UK CEO Adrian Grace said: “The first half the year has been extremely busy with a number of major milestones for the business.

“Three major projects have been delivered with the transfer of both Cofunds’ institutional and retail businesses to new technology and also the final element of the legal process to take on the policies of customers we acquired through buying BlackRock’s defined contribution platform right at the beginning of July.

“The combination of this activity provides us with a scalable platform business, centred on serving the needs of intermediaries.

“It has not been without its challenges and the upgrade of the Cofunds retail book has resulted in service and operational issues for advisers and their customers, for which I am sorry.

“This is not what we planned to deliver and advisers and brokers have our commitment that we are fully focused on resolving the problems and providing the resource to ensure this is done as soon as possible.”

On the first-half results, Grace said: “We’ve built on last year’s financial performance with earnings of £57m and both our older book of traditional policies and our newer platform services are profitable.

“The two areas of the business have separate management teams and business plans, with Dougy Grant, Managing Director for Existing Business and Mark Till, Managing Director for Digital Solutions.

“The total assets under administration in the business includes £35bn on our traditional book and a growing platform portfolio of £120bn, where £3bn was added in the first six months of the year.

“Inclusive of £16bn Blackrock DC assets following acquisition in July, the total assets under administration in Aegon have reached £171bn (up from £145.5bn last year).”