Insurance providers are basically of two broad kinds - Life Insurance providers and Non-life Insurance providers. Life Insurance providers deal with Life Insurance, so to speak and cover the cost of life for the insured. It basically makes good for the financial loss for the nominees of the policy, in the event of death of the insured, since it is basically assumed that the Insured has also been an asset since he/she has the ability to make money. Non-life insurance providers on the other hand provide insurance covers to all assets apart from human life itself. The broad range of covers non-life insurance companies provide would auto ( Car Insurance ), health insurance, Pet insurance, Home Insurance etc. Among the non-life insurance providers and life insurance providers, there is one thing that runs common for them - their business models.

Insurance providers or Insurers have a business model quite different from most other businesses. It isn't just a simple equation of Profit is equal to Revenue minus expenses. Insurance providers' business model runs primarily on basis of the following equation: Profit = earned premium + Investment gains - Claims - Incurred Losses - Underwriting costs . If one looks at the equation clearly, it can be deduced that the insurance providers make money in two ways. One way, the most difficult and demanding way, is to through the  insurance provider's underwriting capabilities - The ability of the insurer to predict the probability of the risk that is expected to occur and assign proper premiums for the insurance policies, with respect to the particular asset class, given all conditions attributable, using probability sciences and statistical data by highly trained competent people called actuaries. The other way is to earn income through interest by routing all the premiums or at least a part of the premiums collected to be invested in some investment vehicles such that these premiums keep earning interest until they are called back to be paid as claims.

From the Insurance provider's view point, hence, some policies would naturally be profitable - that collect more premiums and pay out less claims along with incurred expenses and some of them are less profitable - that pay out more claims and carry incurred expenses more than the premiums it can collect relatively. Some kinds of insurance policies however are major contributors to the cash flow for the insurance providers like Auto insurance policies due to them being mandatory in nature.

AXA Financial Inc, AMP Limited, Bajaj Allianz Insurance Co, Chubb Group of Insurance Companies, Prudential Group etc are all indisputable leaders among the world's best insurance providers. A lot of activity has been noticed in the recent past with regards to the Insurance providers moving into markets like India and China and has seen a lot of high-profile mergers and acquisitions in the insurance business. The Insurance sectors is still untapped in these markets  unlike the markets in U.S and Canada and spell out a huge potential for the above mentioned Insurance providers.