Sompo | Accelerating Sompo Group’s sustainable growth through the evolution of the P&C business

March 17 2025

Sompo Holdings is taking significant steps to enhance its organizational structure and business strategy to achieve its ambition to become a Japan-born truly global company.

In February, the company announced it is realigning its global operations into two distinct business segments – Sompo P&C and Sompo Wellbeing – starting from fiscal year 2025. Sompo P&C integrates the property and casualty insurance and reinsurance businesses in Japan and across the world. Sompo Wellbeing connects the life insurance business (Sompo Himawari Life Insurance) and nursing services business in Japan (Sompo Care), among others. The new structure is designed to foster innovation in both business segments, ensuring that the Sompo Group can adapt to rapidly changing market dynamics and increased stakeholder expectations around the world. By establishing a clear focus, the company aims to develop and further empower its specialist teams to become even more innovative.

Sompo Wellbeing’s initiative to collaborate as a unified group reflects a proactive approach to addressing Japan’s multifaceted challenges of an aging society, where the implications of a longer lifespan and declining birthrate pose significant demands.

The focus on developing products and services in health, financial stability post-retirement and nursing care is especially relevant given the increasing life expectancy in Japan and, by unifying these efforts, Sompo Wellbeing will provide a seamless experience for its customers. On the other hand, the strategic realignment also positions Sompo to make the most of competitive advantages in the global P&C market. As industries evolve, having a focused approach will help the company respond swiftly to emerging trends and customer demands across different regions.

As noted by Kenneth Reilly, Sompo’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Insurance, Asia Pacific and newly appointed Deputy CEO of Sompo Japan, Commercial Insurance: “This structural change is a pivotal step in our ongoing evolution, designed to enhance our resilience in the face of economic shifts. By simplifying our operations, we will strengthen connections and alignment across different regions, drive profitable outcomes for our shareholders and continue to cultivate an outstanding workplace within our industry.”

Strength in diversification

Sompo P&C’s portfolio showcases its strengths as a diversified organization, which allows it to capitalize on market opportunities and minimize risk exposure. With its footprint across various geographies and segments, Sompo P&C is well-positioned to mitigate risk by leveraging its broad portfolio to spread risk across various markets and products, allowing for more stable financial performance despite regional market fluctuations.

Importantly, within a complex and constantly evolving risk landscape, one of the key aims behind the establishment of the new global P&C segment is to make doing business with Sompo as simple as possible for its growing customer base, through what the company refers to as “the Ease of Expertise”.

Sompo P&C also leverages expertise in each segment — commercial, consumer and reinsurance. Its unique insights and expertise, shared across the organization, enhance its overall product offerings and services. Likewise, it works across the organization to enhance client solutions by identifying from its diverse portfolio, tailored insurance solutions that can meet the specific needs of different customer segments, improving customer satisfaction and retention.

Sompo is also adaptive to market dynamics and thus competitive, with operations in multiple geographies that help it quickly adapt to local market trends, regulatory changes and consumer demands. This drives growth opportunities as its presence in different insurance segments provides opportunities for cross-selling and expanding market share, further strengthening the organization’s position.

Mr Reilly believes these changes will power Sompo to greater success both globally and  within APAC. “By uniting our diverse skills, extensive scale and global relationships under a single umbrella, we can effectively serve our targeted customer segments. This integrated approach enables us to leverage a truly global product and underwriting platform, fostering ongoing innovation. As a result, we will be able to develop unique offerings and services that distinguish us in the market,” he says.

Benefits to the APAC Region

The APAC region already benefits from this unique blend of commercial and consumer businesses, which creates synergies and significant opportunities for shared learning and development across the organization. Sompo intends to continue strengthening its underwriting capabilities while accelerating efforts to deliver what Mr Reilly describes as “seamless offerings and efficiencies” to meet the evolving needs of its customers.

Through collaboration and innovation, Sompo expects to enhance its competitive position in the market while also driving sustainable growth across the region.

“We remain committed to strengthening our relationships with our distribution partners throughout the APAC region, including Japan,” says Mr Reilly. “Our goal is to deliver a unified approach to servicing and providing innovative solutions for our clients, ensuring that we meet their needs effectively and consistently.”

Beyond APAC – a truly global business

Sompo P&C represents a significant player in the global insurance market, with its combined businesses exceeding US $30bn in gross written premiums. The company’s workforce of more than 40,000 employees enables it to effectively manage and grow its diverse (re)insurance offerings.

With a well-balanced portfolio, Sompo P&C has strategically positioned itself to navigate various market dynamics across different regions. This measured approach allows the company to leverage opportunities in both business-to-business and consumer markets while maintaining a robust presence in reinsurance.

According to James Shea, newly appointed Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Sompo P&C business segment and current Chairman and CEO of Sompo’s global insurance and reinsurance business outside of Japan: “The strength of any company is its people. So it is important to make sure we have the right people in the right roles who understand the markets and the customers within them, wherever in the world we do business. Key to this for Sompo is bringing our organization closer together. By focusing internally on who we are and how we function prepares us to meet more efficiently and effectively the needs of our employees and all our stakeholders. We strive to strengthen engagement with our clients and business partners every day by using the in-depth knowledge and insights of our experts to respond to a rapidly changing risk environment in a fast and agile way, providing them with the products and coverages they need, underpinned by exceptional levels of service.”

Moving forward, Sompo P&C is focusing on enhancing its strategic initiatives, leveraging technology and innovation to improve client service, streamlining operations and developing new insurance products that cater to emerging market needs. The company’s geographic and product diversity not only provides stability but also opens up avenues for growth and expansion in an increasingly competitive marketplace.

“In a fast-moving world, we pride ourselves on the ability to distil complex risks, technical data and scenarios into straightforward information that is easy to understand. We constantly challenge ourselves by asking: ‘Is this the simplest, easiest and most efficient way to do this?’ The result means we are able to provide the right solutions and outcomes for our clients, partners and our employees,” Mr Shea says.

Overall, Sompo P&C appears well-suited to capitalize on both existing strengths and new opportunities as it continues to evolve within the global insurance landscape.

The bedrock of Sompo’s global achievements is its Japanese heritage, which Mr Shea describes as “incredibly important” as it “informs our outlook and is the basis upon which we have built our business philosophy”.

“Japanese companies stand for long-term commitment and support loyalty and, given the Sompo Group’s over 130 years of experience writing insurance and supporting customers, that reputation and brand comes through and is very favorable to us,” he says.

“We seek long-term relationships, reinforced by the primary characteristics of trust, integrity and transparency. The depth and extent of our commitment to our clients and partners further inspires their confidence in us and lays the foundation for long-term sustained success.”
Partner Content