Ground handling services at European hub airports: Development of a performance measurement system for benchmarking

The liberalization of ground handling in Europe forces airports to assess their performance relative to their competitors in order to remain competitive and sustain long-term competitive advantage. Together with main EU hub airports, action research was conducted for one year to develop a holistic performance measurement system (PMS) for ramp services. The resulting PMS entails a process-based perspective and reflects the supply chain of airport logistics. As the findings of an ex-post validation suggest, the system represents a suitable basis for competitive benchmarking activities.     

Public market finance for growth‐stage companies in emerging markets: The U.S. alternative IPO moves to fill the gap

Lacking from the options currently available to most growth‐stage companies located in the emerging markets of the world is effective access to public finance. Unlike the United States, these companies are shut off from access to their local public markets. Fortunately a solution exists in the form of an alternative initial public offering (AIPO) onto the over‐the‐counter bulletin board market of the United States (OTC BB). As the name implies, an AIPO is an alternative form of listing that allows companies in emerging markets to gain access to the deepest and most liquid capital market in the world. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Determinants of Success in the Development of Applications Software

In this article, the third in the trio of software innovation articles, Chris Voss outlines the key factors that determine whether a new software development is likely to be successful. His research draws on an innovation framework that has emerged from previous research. His results are similar to those of the earlier studies and suggest that the software innovation process has many demands that are common to innovation in other product areas.     

Work and The Most Terrible Life

Tolstoy’s Iván Ilych lies near death, regretting a terrible life but unaware of what he could have done differently while alive. Although motivated to work for all the wrong reasons–money, self-esteem, social acceptance, and escape from home–by all formal accounts he has been a highly responsible professional. This analysis of a work about work illustrates the relationship between meaningful work, professional responsibility, and meaningful life.     

Auditors' Affirmations of Compliance with IFRS around the World: An Exploratory Study*

It is widely believed that international financial reporting standards (IFRS) have been adopted in many countries, at least for the consolidated reporting of listed companies. However, in nearly all cases, what the rules require is some national or supranational version of IFRS. This might create problems for investor confidence and comparability. We examine what companies and auditors report concerning compliance with IFRS, focusing on the first full year of IFRS reporting by companies in the stock market indices of four major European countries and Australia. We find that, even when companies were complying with IFRS, they were generally not saying so, which seems to miss part of the point of the 35‐year project on international harmonization. In a small number of cases, auditors provided dual reports: on full IFRS in addition to the mandated reference to national GAAP where the latter corresponds with full IFRS. These cases were found only in Germany and the United Kingdom, and mainly related to companies that filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission as foreign private issuers. We propose explanations for the general lack of dual reports and for the exceptions. We call for widespread adoption of dual reporting where a plain report on IFRS is not yet possible.     

FINANCIAL INNOVATIONS IN LEVERAGED COMMERCIAL LOAN MARKETS

In the last decade, three innovations in commercial loan-based securities and derivative have enabled institutional investors to access commercial loan markets on leveraged terms : collateralized loan obligations (CLOs); loan-based total return swaps; and leveraged loan-based structured notes (LLSNs). These innovations have been driven by a combination of structural changes in the banking industry, enhanced technology for securitizations, reformed banking regulations, and the advent of credit derivatives.
Besides providing new investment opportunities for institutional investors, these recent innovations in loan markets also promise to reinforce the existing trend in banking away from financial intermediation and toward information intermediation. Such a trend, the authors argue, is helping to ensure the long-run viability of commercial banks. By transforming loan assets in the ways described in this article, banks can generate fee income instead of interest income (thus limiting their capital requirements and interest rate and credit exposures) while still exploiting their comparative advantage in credit analysis and monitoring.     

An analysis of the cost of providing ancillary services to skilled nursing facility patients in New York State

Currently, nursing homes can arrange for the provision of ancillary services either by providing the services directly, purchasing the services through contracts and fees, or by outside billings, in which the services are supplied by other providers who then bill Medicaid directly. Frequently, some combination of these three modes of provision is used for each ancillary service. The purpose of this study is to explore ancillary costs in a sample of nursing homes and to determine, to the extent possible, the most cost-efficient means of providing selected ancillary services (physical therapy, radiology and medical staff services). Prior to examining the impact of the mode of provision on cost levels, other facility and patient characteristics that might justifiably affect costs are identified and adjusted for. The results demonstrate that outside billing or purchasing services can be much less expensive than providing the services directly. It is suggested that all ancillary services (outside billings as well as services provided directly through contracts and fees) be included when facility-to-facility cost comparisons are made. This approach should serve as an incentive for nursing homes to seek the most cost-efficient means of providing ancillary services.