@Risk

Focused on supplier risk issues for business leaders

Vermont Is Number One State for Embezzlement

January 23, 2012 | No Comments →

Vermont is known for maple syrup, fall foliage, covered bridges and now . . . embezzlement?

As strange as it sounds, Vermont topped the list of states with the highest risk of loss due to embezzlement in 2011, according to new research from Marquet International Ltd.

The 2011 Marquet Report On Embezzlement, examined 473 major employee theft cases active in the US last year and found that: (more…)

European Insurers Face Challenges to Solvency II Compliance

January 20, 2012 | No Comments →

European insurers are racing to meet Solvency II requirements by the January 1, 2014 deadline, and many are facing a stiff head wind, particularly with respect to their reliance on third parties for data, the sophisticated risk modeling requirements and the difficulties associated with obtaining sufficiently detailed fund data.

More specifically, a new study by BNP Paribas Securities Services and InteDelta found that insurers are facing key challenges around: (more…)

Executives Concerned About Leadership Shortage

January 18, 2012 | No Comments →

How will your company find the leadership talent it needs to retain its competitive edge?

Unfortunately, the search may be more difficult than you realize.

Results from a  new study by Deloitte indicate there’s both a growing shortage of executive leadership and evolving regional differences in talent needs around the globe. Consequently, organizations are going to have to invest more in talent priorities and initiatives in order to find the appropriate executive leadership required for continued success.

Here are a few key finding from Deloitte’s new report, Talent Edge 2020: Redrafting Talent Strategies for the Uneven Recovery: (more…)

USP Proposes Best Practices to Help Ensure Integrity of Pharma Supply Chains

January 13, 2012 | No Comments →

The US Pharmacopeial Convention (USP) has proposed a set of recommended best practices to help the pharmaceutical industry improve supply chain integrity and reduce risks of counterfeit or mishandled medicines.

Improvements like these are long overdue. As I reported last spring, research from PwC concluded that many pharmaceutical supply chains have suffered from what amounts to benign neglect. As a result, they are inefficient, under-utilized and ill-equipped to cope with new medicines, cost pressures and health reform expectations.

Sure, in today’s global economy relationships between suppliers and other business entities are often opaque and difficult to track, but clearly, it’s time for the pharmaceutical industry to step up to better ensure that medicines can be traced back to their original manufacturer, are not adulterated or counterfeited and are transported to their intended destination with their quality intact.

Too many companies have discovered the hard way that “willful blindness” only increases their culpability in the eyes of Federal agents, regulators who now are cracking down on businesses that aren’t compliant with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA).

Don’t take that kind of risk. Resolve that this is the year to start better managing your multiple supplier master databases as you monitor and mitigate supplier risk in a global operating arena.

“There is incentive for all players in the pharmaceutical industry—large and small companies, regulators and standards-setting bodies—to come to some agreement on hotbutton issues such as track and trace technology and, at the larger level, to codify what constitutes a solid, universal approach to global supply chain integrity,” said Praveen Tyle, Ph.D., chief science officer for USP.

USP’s proposed standard covers four main areas: (more…)

UPS Study Shows Exports Bring Value to SMBs

January 11, 2012 | No Comments →

The vast majority of the world’s consumers are located beyond the borders of the US, and yet only 24 percent of the nation’s small and medium-sized businesses currently are engaged in global commerce, according to new research released a few weeks ago by UPS.

The online survey, which polled 1,082 US small-and medium-sized businesses last August, was designed to measure current perceptions of global trade, identify export barriers and uncover potential strategies to overcome these barriers so SMBs can become more engaged in global trade. The results showed that:

(more…)