Progress Report Archive

Archived Critical research on current and emerging risk management issues

Renewable Energy: the Right Risk Partner Makes the Difference December 2012
	Renewable sources play an increasingly important role in producing sustainable energy and contribute a rapidly growing share of the world’s energy needs. Whether at the financing, construction, handover or operational stage, the failure to appropriately identify, manage, control and transfer risk is one of the factors most likely to jeopardize a renewable energy business. As part of a proactive risk management strategy, owners, operators and developers of renewable resources should look for an insurer that provides seamless coverage and for risk management assistance throughout the project lifecycle. Download the paper to learn more.
Compassionate Use: Balancing Compassion and Risk in Clinical Trials December 2012
	Pharmaceutical companies conducting clinical trials of investigational drugs and devices are increasingly faced with requests to provide the treatment being studied to patients under the compassionate use exception to federal regulations. When drug companies don’t address whether they will provide compassionate use of a test drug to test subjects prior to the start of a trial, they run the risk of creating a potential lose/lose situation for everyone. This paper discusses how pharmaceutical companies can mitigate these risks.
ACE Environmental Advisory - Legionella: Minimizing the Risk During Construction November 2012
	Contractors today must deal with a wide range of pollution risks on projects of almost all sizes. Besides well known issues such as mold, lead paint, asbestos, and silica, contractors should be aware of the dangers posed by legionella pneumophilia, the bacteria that cause the potentially fatal Legionnaires’ disease. A proactive risk management strategy can help to mitigate the exposures posed by legionella.
ACE Environmental Advisory - Legionella and Mold: Construction and Renovation Risks at Healthcare Facilities October 2012
	Construction and renovation projects pose special challenges for hospitals and other healthcare facilities. The responsibility for providing high quality, safe care must remain the top priority even during hospital renovation projects. Building projects at healthcare facilities need to be planned and managed to minimize the potential risks from a range of pollutants, including mold and legionella.
Structuring Multinational Insurance Programs: Cross-border Challenges to Business Travel & Personal Accident Insurance August 2012
	This report discusses the challenges faced by multinational accident and health programs, explores best practices on how to structure multinational business travel and group personal accident insurance programs, and offers a checklist of factors to consider when insuring employees under these programs.
Structuring Multinational Insurance Programmes: Cross-Border Challenges to Side A Directors & Officers Liability Insurance April 2012
	This report addresses the complex challenges of identifying and underwriting a multinational D&O program and the difficult question of structuring locally compliant Side A insurance in conjunction with it.
Global Catastrophe Survival Guide: New Challenges to Casualty Risk Management February 2012
	Risk managers must come to terms with the changing nature of the catastrophe risks they face as their businesses expand around the globe. This paper discusses new challenges to casualty risk management and highlights the importance of developing effective catastrophe management plans.
Uninsured Motorist and Underinsured Motorist Coverage February 2012
	Large national and multinational organizations often seek to reject UM/UIM/PIP coverage or purchase the minimum amount allowable by state. However, each state has differing rules and requirements to document these coverage elections. Risk managers currently spend a significant amount of time and resources documenting and executing their UM/UIM/PIP coverage elections. In order to streamline this process, ACE has developed an online web-based portal that allows a risk manager to answer a series of questions that will facilitate documenting their coverage elections.
Structuring Multinational Insurance Programs: The Emerging Regulatory Challenge to Non-admitted Insurance February 2012
	This report discusses three recent regulatory enforcement actions in Brazil, India and the United States, each of which challenges some of the assumptions behind the most common forms of non-admitted insurance.
Pollution: The Unrecognized Risk of Business Operations February 2012
	As society grows ever more environmentally aware, a far broader spectrum of enterprises face new, and often unrecognized, pollution risks from their day-to-day operations. This paper discusses the pollution risks faced by businesses, and the range of activities of businesses today that are subject to continually evolving environmental laws and regulations at the federal, state and local level.
Insights into Cross-Border Insurance Regulation in Canada November 2011
	The international risk management community is eager to understand how to buy insurance seamlessly, cost-effectively and in a compliant manner for multinational enterprises with risks in Canada. Authored by Suresh Krishnan and Fernand Vartanian, this paper offers insight into cross-border insurance regulation.
Social Media: The Business Benefits May Be Enormous, But Can the Risks - Reputational, Legal, Operational - Be Mitigated? April 2011
	In less than a decade, social media, in many ways, seems to have “taken over the world.” This report discusses the risks and benefits of companies engaging in social media as well as solutions for addressing these risks.
Structuring Multinational Insurance Programs: Current Challenges in Argentina, Brazil and Mexico July 2011
	This report discusses how to effectively provide seamless, cost-effective and compliant insurance across national borders to multinational enterprises in Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and other Latin American countries.
Structuring Multinational Insurance Programs: Solvency II and its Potential Impact on Captive Insurance Companies – Considering the Alternatives June 2011
	The sixth in the ACE Progress Report series to focus on various aspects of multinational insurance programs, this report identifies the potential impact of the European Union’s Solvency II regulatory requirements on captive insurance companies, and offers an alternative insurance structure for risk managers of multinational companies to consider.
Structuring Multinational Insurance Programmes: Current Challenges in Australia, New Zealand and the Asia-Pacific Region May 2011
	This report outlines the regulatory and execution challenges involved in purchasing globally coordinated insurance programs, analyzes laws related to “insurable interest” in several Asia-Pacific countries, and includes a checklist of questions that participants in a multinational insurance program should consider when underwriting such a program.
What Does CSA Mean for Commercial Trucking Companies? May 2011
	This article will attempt to clarify important aspects of Compliance, Safety, Accountability Act (CSA), and suggest how to understand their overall impact.
M&A Risk Management: Avoiding Pitfalls, Finding Solutions April 2011
	This white paper is a roadmap to guide private equity firms and corporate M&A dealmakers through the M&A risk identification process and present insurance solutions to mitigate the exposures.
Structuring Multinational Insurance Programs: Addressing the Taxation and Transfer Pricing Challenge February 2011
	Sophisticated buyers of multinational insurance programs expect consistent coverage, superior service and execution certainty; however, taxation and transfer pricing should also be a central component of the design and implementation of a compliant multinational insurance program. This report explores factors that risk managers and their financial colleagues should consider -- with respect to transfer pricing -- when designing and implementing a multinational insurance program.
Structuring Multinational Insurance Programmes in Europe: Intragroup Risk Financing – Considering the Issues October 2012
	What do I need to consider when my insurer in Europe pays out on a claim relating to a loss in another country where it is an unlicensed carrier? Because every insurance policy is first and foremost a ‘promise to pay’ in the event that the unexpected happens, this is, perhaps, the single most important question for European risk managers to consider before structuring a multinational insurance programme.

Contractors and Consultants Face Increasingly Strict Environmental Laws
October 2010
Contractors and consultants are more vulnerable now than ever to environmental liabilities, from job site pollution incidents, to hidden dangers of site selection, which can cost hundreds of thousands in fines and legal fees. In addition, contactors and consultants face a growing array of environmental risks and liabilities due to increasingly strict environmental regulations. Listen to a podcast discussing the white paper.

The Future of Multinational Insurance Programs: What Captive Managers Need to Know About Designing & Implementing Global Insurance Programs
August 2010
Discover how now more than ever, captives are an effective risk management option for large and small organizations that seek insurance coverage across national borders.

Global Environmental: Debunking the Myth, Not Just Third-Party Insurance
April 2010
Discover how changing US and European environmental regulations and heightened enforcement have increased the need for first-party premises pollution coverage.

Beyond Non-Admitted: A Closer Look at Trends Affecting Today's Multinational Insurance Programs
April 2010
This white paper examines the motivations behind purchasing and selling multinational programs, and identifies many of the trends, issues, and inconsistencies in today’s international insurance regulatory environment that affect many of the assumptions behind multinational programs.

Financial Crisis: Bankruptcy Implications for D&O Insurance
April 2010
With the number and scope of corporate bankruptcies on the upswing, this paper examines the threats bankruptcy poses to corporate directors and officers, discusses key D&O coverage concerns and reviews best practices with regard to quality insurance protection.

Foreign Travel: Risk and Response
April 2010
The risks of foreign travel have evolved significantly -- natural disasters, medical emergencies, war, terrorist attacks, kidnapping -- to name just a few. As corporations, non-profit organizations and educational institutions extend their reach into less traditional destinations, only a few carriers are equipped to help manage these risks. This article discusses emerging hazards and new travel products and services. View an article based on this white paper.

Green Building: An Introduction to Sustainability and Understanding of Best Practices
April 2010
What do risk managers need to know about new government initiatives for "green" construction and the use of sustainable materials? This paper explores "green" strategies and the practical resources available to help organizations achieve these goals.

International Developments in Executive Liability
Winter 2010
This white paper discusses the international implications of a burgeoning array of laws passed by diverse countries which affect corporate disclosure, fiduciary duty, accounting, and transparency requirements. Listen to a podcast discussing the white paper.

Managing the Complex Challenges of a Global Insurance Program: Foreign Clinical Trials Case Study
Fall 2009
This white paper discusses how operating within the global market offers an unprecedented growth opportunity for U.S.-based companies and multinational corporations, while also creating the potential for nontraditional exposures and governance issues.

Climate Change is Heating Up D&O Liability
Spring 2009
This article examines existing laws and regulations that have been applied in recent corporate climate change litigation and resulting settlements that have set high standards for management disclosure, analysis, and assessment of the financial impact of climate risk.

U.S. Infrastructure: Emerging Trends, Risk Management and Insurance Issues
President Obama’s $787 billion economic stimulus program will spawn a vast number of infrastructure and energy-related projects. With billions of dollars of projects up for the bidding and time being of the essence, risk managers must be concerned about how well and how fast their insurance carrier can respond to a large volume of complex exposures involving multiple lines of insurance. This paper explores these risk implications and the ability to manage them.

The Return of Directors & Officers Litigation: Trends Driving Increasing Costs and Frequency of Litigation Against Corporate Directors and Officers
July 2008
This white paper provides an informative overview of the trends and factors behind the escalation of case filings against directors and officers and the rising severity of settlements and judgments. Listen to a podcast discussing the white paper.

Going Global: Emerging International Issues for Environmental Programs
Fall 2008
This white paper provides an informative overview of the types of environmental insurance products that address pollution risks, some of the legislative and compliance developments around the world, the challenges of placing environmental coverage outside the United States and risk management solutions available in the marketplace. Listen to a podcast discussing the white paper.

Managing the Emerging Risks of Nanotechnology
John Liner Review, Summer 2008
This white paper provides an informative overview of the wide array of industries that are beginning to reap the potential of the staggeringly small world of nanotechnology. 

Green and Environmental Technology
Combined, these three abstracts address the emerging health, safety, and environmental issues related to the proliferation of technology, the impact of continued building, and downsizing in the workplace.