The Guardian Life Insurance Company is offering a new employer-owned life insurance product aimed at nonqualified benefit plans.[@@]

The product, Executive Strategies Whole Life, is funded with a whole life insurance product designed for small business owners’ nonqualified plans covering 3 to 25 employees.

James Suslavich, a Guardian vice president, says the company designed the new product to provide higher cash values and offer a paid-up additions rider. The structure allows customers to arrange the funding of their nonqualified plans flexibly to fit their specific needs.

“Currently, all earnings on assets inside the policy grow tax-deferred for small businesses. In addition, the business owner is able to book an extremely attractive asset on the company’s balance sheet,” he says.

Lynn Stebbins, another Guardian vice president, says the policy can be “an ideal funding mechanism for business succession buy-sell agreements.”

The product is to be rolled out in all states over the next few months, the company says.