In Forbes’ ranking of the top 2000 public companies in the world, the two largest insurance companies are Allianz at number 23 and AXA at number 28. Both appear as strong, solid companies, committed to excellence and leadership, though challenged by the financial downturn. I see both of them working to mark out high ground in terms of customer service and a principled way of doing business. In both cases their business is founded on Europe, branching out into the developed world, but not yet deriving strongly from emerging markets.
Here are some headline figures on each company (financials as per the Forbes listing, other items from company disclosures)
Allianz
- Revenues $130.1 billion
- Profits $6.2 billion
- Market value $52.7 billion
- Employees 153,000
- Represented in 70 countries
- Revenues from outside Europe 19.5% in property/casualty and 21.5% life and health
AXA
- Revenues $145.9 billion
- Profits $ 5.2 billion
- Market value $ 46.0 billion
- Employees 135,000
- Represented in 48 countries, including 21 countries in Europe, 13 countries in Asia-Pacific, 3 countries in North America (none in South America), 5 countries in Africa, and 6 countries in the Middle East
- Revenues from outside Europe; 24%
Alliance (Michael Diekmann, Chairman of the Board of Management) says: “Our goal is to the be the most trusted financial services company throughout the world.” It cites its fundamental principles as Expertise, Integrity and Sustainability. There is interesting material on its website about Allianz’s work on microinsurance in India, via its joint venture there, Bajaj Allianz. It claims 2.5 million microinsurance customers there.
AXA’s warchwords (English version) are “redefining standards.” Chairman and CEO Henri de Castries, says this about AXA’s vision: “We have chosen a demanding business. If we do it right, then we enable our clients to be life confident because they feel reassured, protected and supported as they undertake important projects at various stages in their lives. Our vision of the business is what guides our daily work. It reflects the social and human aspects of Financial Protection, whose value to people has never been greater.”
Insurance is a huge global service market; I will be interested to see how these two players continue their globalization and find ways to cope with newly developing markets away from Europe and North America, and how their principles evolve as they do.
The growing list of Interesting Communities of Leadership is athttp://lovingwork.org/interesting-communities-of-leadership
Scott is scott@lovingwork.org and @scottdowns3 on Twitter.
Allianz · AXA · business · customers · emerging markets · global · leadership · service · sustainability · values · work
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