:: Economic Development & Consulting

We benefit from a strong technical base with a diversified staff of professionals. This combination allows us to provide a wide range of planning services for a variety of industries. Our consultants offer expertise in healthcare consulting, equipment planning, economics, organizational development, competition policy, commercial litigation, patents, franchising, strategy and public relations in order to help our clients lock into solutions that address the problem of the day as well as the big picture issues they face.

We offer assistance in the development of feasibility studies, competitive procurements, system economic analysis, and project management.

Our main focus is based on:
Amount of service provided
Quantity produced
Response time
Cycle time (start to finish)
Conformance to industry/utility performance standards
Service quality or accuracy
Flexibility and adaptability in meeting needs

In almost all cases facilities and services are implemented as a result of a competitive procurement. We assist our clients in:
Preparing feasibility studies
Developing detailed risk/reward matrices
Preparing the request for proposal
Managing an objective proposal evaluation
Preparing a project specific financial analysis model
Providing consultation during negotiation

On a wider level, our experience in this field led us to conduct market research on a significant number of industrial products and services. Our extensive network of consultants provides our clients with direct access to highly qualified professionals in major capitals and business centers throughout the world. Our clients include corporations, governments, law firms, trade associations and international agencies. We devise practical solutions to highly complex business and legal issues, creating strategies, studies, reports, expert testimony and often, policy recommendations that reflect our specialization in industrial and financial economics. In this framework, our extensive experience in assessing the competitive process allows us to provide expert guidance to firms seeking to pursue new strategies. Such advice has included confidential guidance on the likely concerns raised by potential mergers and possible ways to meet these concerns, knowing that the globalization of the world's economies and the impact of innovation on competitive policy have made antitrust laws and competition policy standards difficult to interpret and consistently apply across national boundaries. We often assess proposed practices prior to implementation and offer advice regarding whether a government is likely to challenge a proposed merger or competitive practice. We also deliver advice to companies and counsel throughout the regulatory review of a merger, or an investigation of alleged market power abuse or monopoly behavior and participate in presentations to regulatory agencies.

Moreover, our work frequently involves the analysis of detailed transaction or bidding data to obtain a clear picture of the effect, if any, of an alleged conspiracy. Analyses in such matters have been used to advise a company's owner or board of directors of the company's potential exposure.

On another hand, in the context of commercial litigation, our work and our testimony on the issue of inappropriate transfer of assets include the analysis of whether the transferor was or could reasonably have been believed to be solvent or adequately capitalized at the time of the transfer and whether adequate consideration was received. We go beyond simple accounting estimates of the solvency of a firm at a particular point in time, and instead, often investigate fundamental approaches to determining value, including the use of statistical analysis and option pricing formulas to estimate the probability that a firm would become bankrupt over some relevant time frame because a major element of bankruptcy is forecasting what a company's future cash flows are likely to be.

Our economists combine economic principles, the knowledge of financial markets for both goods and services, and a vast industry experience to estimate damages for litigation and settlement negotiations. They play a critical role in assessing damages over patents, trademark and copyright infringement.

Our highly competent staff help companies structure better contracts by analyzing economic scenarios, suggesting clauses that accommodate each party's economic goals and offering advice on ways to maximize best business practices for all parties. This extends to the areas of franchising, and the competitive effects of franchising across a variety of industries. We have particular expertise in identifying risks and structuring incentives in order to assure adequate financial reward at a minimum cost.

The economic analysis goes well beyond ordinary accounting conventions to assess costs and prices. We use rigorous economic principles to advise our clients on how to accurately design rates and prices. We help design complex pricing mechanisms for maximizing profit when demand is fragmented. Some of our clients call on our pricing experience to help them comply with price regulation. We advise clients across a variety of industries on appropriate access charges as a result of regulation as well as help them design optimal tariff structures.

In order to appreciate the impact of e-commerce, one needs to understand how new business models affect market behavior and market outcomes. The economics of transaction costs, network industries and innovation contain deep insights into the workings of the most rapidly growing sectors of the world economy. Our understanding of these forces and experience in industries help us to develop our clients' intuition about new economy trends. Such trends are linked to issues which are associated with international trade. Our areas of focus include trade policy, trade promotion, trade aspects of intellectual property rights and trade aspects of environmental protection. We benefit from strong links with a number of distinguished academic trade economists and with industry practitioners experienced in international trade matters.

We are also proud to advise that we provide counsel to public bodies, regulators and companies on how best to achieve efficiency improvements and fiscal balance through the design of institutional and regulatory frameworks.