(Bloomberg) -- Hastings Insurance Group increased its customerbase by 20% in 2014, boosting profitability and setting the U.K.car insurer on track for a potential initial public offering thisyear.

Hastings, which generates 90% of its business fromprice-comparison websites, gained 290,000 customers last year to1.71 million, a statement showed Thursday. Gross written premiumsincreased 19% and adjusted pretax profit rose 29% to 69.3 millionpounds ($103 million).

“Everyone is very pleased with the way the company isprogressing, but at some stage it’s appropriate for shareholders tobe able to get a return on their investments,” Chief ExecutiveOfficer Gary Hoffman, 54, said in a telephone interview. “There aredifferent ways of doing that and an IPO is an obvious way.”

Hastings’s results sit in contrast with competitors, which havebeen writing less business in the U.K. amid falling insurancerates. The secret is not having “international distractions” andemploying an “agile” digital business model to capitalize on thepopularity of price-comparison websites, Hoffman said.

Shareholders including Goldman Sachs Group Inc.’s private-equityunit, which bought a 50% stake for about 150 million pounds at thestart of 2014, are confident with the company’s pricing andreserving policy, Hoffman said. The CEO also said the insurerdoesn’t need to raise more capital after selling bonds in 2013.

“Our focus is to continue to produce good results and in doingthis we give our shareholders options,” the CEO said. “We areexamining and assessing all options to us that includes a potentialIPO, but we are are in no rush and no deadline or definitivetimetable has been set.”

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