Berkshire Hathaway is a holding company, domiciled in Delaware with its headquarters in Omaha, Nebraska, that owns subsidiaries across many different industries. Its principal operations are insurance, conducted on both a primary and a reinsurance basis, freight rail transport, and utility and energy generation and distribution. It also runs a range of manufacturing, services and retailing businesses.
The insurance arm, which includes GEICO, the Berkshire Hathaway Primary Group and the Berkshire Hathaway Reinsurance Group, earns premiums by covering property, casualty, life and health risks for individuals, businesses and other insurers worldwide; GEICO mainly sells private passenger car cover directly by internet and telephone. Freight rail, operated by BNSF Railway, charges customers to move consumer, industrial, agricultural, energy and coal products. Berkshire Hathaway Energy runs regulated electricity and gas utilities and pipelines, earning regulated tariffs from retail customers.
The group is managed on an unusually decentralised basis, with subsidiaries run independently. GEICO is the third-largest US private passenger car insurer. At the end of 2025 Berkshire and its subsidiaries employed about 387,800 people worldwide, roughly 80% of them in the United States.
Based on Berkshire Hathaway's 10-K filed March 2, 2026.