The Legal Risk Management department is divided into two major work cells: the Legal Audit Group and the Litigation Risk Management Group.

Legal Audit Group

This group carries on verification of all aspects of a company’s operations. From contractual agreements to employee practices it ensures that a company acts in conformity with the various legal obligations imposed upon it.

Two objectives are kept in mind throughout the audit: assessing the liability posed by legal risks and ensuring optimal use of mechanisms in various laws that provide additional protections such as liens on a debtor’s property or non-competition clauses in key personnel agreements. The attention to detail involved in carrying out the legal audit means that elements sometimes given little attention, such as terms of payment and procedures for debt recovery, can be addressed and solutions proposed to reduce not only legal risks but also the financial risks usually associated with them.

The following are some of the issues examined in the course of the audit.

• Corporate Issues: comprising examinations of company charters, by-laws, registries for administrators and stockholders, stocks and bonds, minutes and regulatory body obligations like business registrations, permits and licenses

• Contractual Issues: comprising examinations of all Distributor, Employment, Partnership, Facility and Equipment Leasing, Purchasing, Licensing, Warranty and Sales and Order agreements

• Labor Issues: comprising examinations of all documents relating to employment offers, applications, agreements, training, terminations, disciplinary measures

• Tax Issues: comprising all documents relating to loan and debt, asset structures

• Governance Issues: comprising all internal manuals and procedures that dictate the functioning of the company on a day-to-day basis

• Publicity Issues: comprising all marketing, sales aids, press releases, product literature, promotions and promotional activities, web site content, copyrights, trademarks

Upon completion of the audit, a report identifying the legal risk status of the company is formulated along with recommendations and proposed solutions to reduce or contain the identified factors of incidental risk.

Litigation Risk Management Group

This group concerns itself with controlling the existent and potential effects of specific litigation. It examines claims or suits a company is or will be a party to and determines the benefit from either pursuing or settling the matter. Making use of risk analysis techniques that take into account elements such as case merits, related and incidental costs, overall gains and losses, after-effects, this group helps a company achieve goals and objectives with a view to restricting excessive costs usually incurred in the litigation process.