Role, scope and operation of a captive insurance company in large technology-based multinationals: A case comparison
The boom of the so-called captive (re-) insurers which has taken place over the recent years is linked directly to the need to respond to the demands of firms for more advanced and sophisticated risk financing instruments which help them to become more efficient and effective in meeting their goals. The real needs and possibilities which each firm has for the utilization of this instrument must be specifically evaluated within the firm's global strategy. When dealing with the decision process leading to the establishment of an insurance captive, it is important to consider experiences and not models, given that these latter are not easily or automatically transferable to the reality of the firm, which is conditioned to an economic, political and legal environment which will not be exactly the same for any two firms. For this reason, a comparison is made of the experiences of two large technology-based multinationals in the establishment of a captive company, including differences in the role assigned to t...
Cost Effectiveness of Risk Management Practices
Despite the increasing importance of risk management in a successful business organization, virtually no research has been undertaken to evaluate the effectiveness of various risk management practices. Through analysis of data obtained from a survey of risk management professionals, such an evaluation has been made and is reported here. Results include the expected effects of lower costs associated with higher levels of retention, increased size, and less risky industries. The relationship of higher costs with the use of a captive, and the ineffectiveness of centralization or use of analytical tools were unexpected.
Working Knowledge: Employee Innovation and the Rise of Corporate Intellectual Property, 1800-1930
This book presents the legal and business history of corporate ownership of employee knowledge. Skilled workers of the early nineteenth century enjoyed a degree of professional independence because workplace knowledge and technical skill were their 'property,' or at least their attribute. In most sectors of today's economy, however, it is a foundational and widely accepted truth that businesses retain legal ownership of employee-generated intellectual property. In "Working Knowledge", Catherine Fisk chronicles the legal and social transformations that led to the transfer of ownership of employee innovation from labor to management. This deeply contested development was won at the expense of workers' entrepreneurial independence and ultimately, Fisk argues, economic democracy. By reviewing judicial decisions and legal scholarship on all aspects of employee-generated intellectual property and combing the archives of major nineteenth-century intellectual property - producing companies - including DuPont, Rand McNally, and the American Tobacco Company - Fisk makes a highly technical area of law accessible to general readers while also addressing scholarly deficiencies in the histories of labor, intellectual property, and the business of technology.