GNW Company Profile

Looking at the markets we serve, we see aging populations with inadequate savings and rising health care costs, where burdens are increasingly shifted from governments and corporations to individuals. In addition, we see initiatives by governments to foster individual ownership'from homeownership to providing for one's own financial security. We are dedicated to helping individuals succeed financially in this world of shifting burdens through our focus on protection, retirement income and investments, and homeownership. We deliver protection, helping people build a personal safety net through life and long-term care insurance, payment protection coverage, and benefits for employees of small companies. We concentrate on retirement income, helping people create an income annuity for life or other desired periods, while also helping them invest to achieve their financial dreams. We also enable homeownership, helping people achieve this dream with lower down payments through the use of mortgage insurance. Across our businesses we link valued services such as education, wellness programs, and technology to our insurance products in order to differentiate ourselves, make us easier to do business with, and help our business partners grow and succeed.

We have three operating segments:

' Protection. We offer U.S. customers life insurance, long-term care insurance and, primarily for companies with fewer than 1,000 employees, group life and health insurance. In Europe, we offer payment protection insurance, which helps consumers meet their payment obligations in the event of illness, involuntary unemployment, disability or death. In 2005, we were the leading provider of individual long-term care insurance and a leading provider of term life insurance in the U.S., according to LIMRA International (in each case based upon annualized first-year premiums). Our leadership in long-term care insurance is based upon over 30 years of product underwriting and claims experience. This experience has enabled us to build and benefit from what we believe is the largest actuarial database in the long-term care insurance industry. We are a leading provider of term life insurance through brokerage general agencies in the U.S. which we consider to be the largest distribution channel for term life insurance.

' Retirement Income and Investments. We offer U.S. customers fixed and variable deferred annuities, fixed immediate annuities, variable life insurance, asset management, and specialized products, including guaranteed investment contracts, or GICs, funding agreements and structured settlements. We are an established provider of these products. In 2005, according to VARDS, we were the largest provider of variable income annuities in the U.S., and according to LIMRA International, we were the second-largest provider of fixed immediate annuities in the U.S. (in each case based upon total premiums and deposits).

' Mortgage Insurance. In the U.S., Canada, Australia, Europe, New Zealand, Mexico and Japan, we offer mortgage insurance products that facilitate homeownership by enabling borrowers to buy homes with low-down-payment mortgages. These products generally also aid financial institutions in managing their capital efficiently by reducing the capital required for low-down-payment mortgages. According to Inside Mortgage Finance, in 2005, we were the fifth-largest provider of mortgage insurance in the U.S. based on flow new insurance written. We also believe we are the largest provider of private mortgage insurance outside the U.S. with leading mortgage insurance operations in Canada, Australia, Europe and New Zealand and a growing presence in Mexico and Japan.

Our principal mortgage insurance customers are originators of residential mortgage loans, such as mortgage banks, savings institutions, commercial banks, mortgage brokers, credit unions and other lenders, who typically determine which mortgage insurer or insurers they will use for the placement of mortgage insurance written on loans they originate. To obtain primary insurance written on a flow basis, a mortgage lender must first apply for and receive from us a mortgage guaranty master policy.

Competition

We face significant competition in all our Protection segment operations. Our competitors include other large and highly rated insurance carriers. Some of these competitors have greater resources than we do, and many of them offer similar products and use similar distribution channels. We also face competition in our life, long-term care and group insurance product lines from independent sales intermediaries and our dedicated sales specialists. This competition is based primarily upon product pricing and features, compensation and benefits structure and support services offered. We continuously provide technology upgrades and enhanced training, and we seek to improve service for our independent sales intermediaries and dedicated sales specialists.

We face significant competition in all our Retirement Income and Investments businesses. Many other companies actively compete for sales in our markets, including other major insurers, banks, other financial institutions, mutual fund and money asset management firms and specialty providers. In many of our product lines, we face competition from competitors that have greater market share or breadth of distribution, offer a broader range of products, services or features, assume a greater level of risk, have lower profitability expectations or have higher claims paying ratings than we do. Many competitors offer similar products and use similar distribution channels. The substantial expansion of banks' and insurance companies' distribution capacities and expansion of product features in recent years has intensified pressure on margins and production levels and has increased the level of competition in many of our business lines. We compete primarily with U.S. and state government agencies, other private mortgage insurers, mortgage lenders and other investors, the GSEs and, potentially, the Federal Home Loan Banks. We also compete, indirectly, with structured transactions in the capital markets and with other financial instruments designed to mitigate credit risk.

U.S. and state government agencies. We and other private mortgage insurers compete for flow business directly with U.S. federal and state governmental and quasi-governmental agencies, principally the FHA and, to a lesser degree, the VA. In the aggregate, the FHA and VA had a 23.5% market share in 2005 and a 32.8% market share in 2004, according to information published by Inside Mortgage Finance.

Loans insured by the FHA cannot exceed maximum principal amounts that are determined by a percentage of the conforming loan limit. For 2006, the maximum FHA loan amount for homes with one dwelling unit in 'high cost' areas is $362,790 and the maximum VA loan amount is $417,000. We and other private mortgage insurers are not limited as to maximum individual loan amounts we can insure.

In addition to competition from the FHA and the VA, we and other private mortgage insurers face competition from state-supported mortgage insurance funds in several states, including California, Illinois and New York. From time to time, other state legislatures and agencies consider expansions of the authority of their state governments to insure residential mortgages.

Government entities with which we compete typically do not have the same capital requirements and do not have the same profit objectives as we do. Although private companies establish pricing terms for their products to achieve targeted returns, these government entities may offer products on terms designed to accomplish social or political objectives or reflect other non-economic goals.

Private mortgage insurers. The private mortgage insurance industry is highly competitive. The private mortgage insurance industry currently consists of seven mortgage insurers plus our company.