Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Group

The experience of being censured by the regulator has proved highly significant for the Japanese composite insurer

That the Japanese insurance group Mitsui Sumitomo increased its non-life gross premium income by 3.1% from Yen1,785.8bn in 2006 to Yen1,841.3bn in 2007 would pretty much suggest business as usual to the casual observer. (After all, a 3.1% increase in the top line figure is not that far off the 4.0% increase achieved by the group during the previous financial year; particularly in an insurance market which is not only coming to the end of a five year period of strong growth but one where several barriers to competition are literally being torn down each year by the regulatory authorities.)