The hotel sector in Spain is clearly adopting an internationalisation strategy. The main agent in the country is the Melià Group, with a typical pattern of reinvesting profits and using banking ...credit to finance its expansion, with the acquisitions of properties, mainly in Spain, during the first twenty years. Recently, the orientation is towards a service industry, providing expertise in management of hotels. The evolution is typical of a private family company, with a second generation of the founding owner getting in charge, although the company went public in the nineties. The hedging of the actual policy is not only of the financial type, but also, in expanding using management contracts, instead of acquiring property. After several years of losses, the group is again in the black, but the structure of the company can be the prelude to an acquisition, in its totality or in parts, by some other global hotel chains.
La industria hotelera española ha emprendido un camino claro de internacionalización en las últimas décadas. El principal agente del país, el grupo Melià es el prototipo del proceso seguido: desde una primera época de capitalización, reinvirtiendo beneficios y recurriendo a financiación bancaria para la adquisición de hoteles en España, hasta una orientación, en los últimos veinte años, hacia los servicios hoteleros y turísticos. La situación típica de una empresa familiar se aprecia en la cadena, en la que la segunda generación se hace cargo de la gestión, a pesar de haberse convertido en una empresa cotizada, con los consiguientes cambios en las líneas estratégicas. El incremento del apalancamiento, no sólo financiero, sino derivado de disminuir los activos hoteleros en propiedad, están manteniendo los beneficios, tras unos años de pérdidas, y pueden ser el preludio de una absorción de la empresa, en su totalidad o en partes, por otros grupos internacionales.
This study investigates differences in expert valuations of private versus public firms conducted for transactions outside the exchange. First, we provide evidence for extreme reliance of the experts ...on private firms' reported earnings, despite a possible manipulation of these earnings. In contrast, experts valuing public firms seem to rely on other, non-financial statement information sources, even if the quality of pre-acquisition earnings is higher in these firms. Second, we present evidence that the contribution of experts to investors in private firms is questionable at best. Our findings indicate that a private firm valuation performed by a potential investor based on available information provides results similar to those of the expert. Third, we show that inconclusive results regarding the existence of a discount in private firm valuations may be explained by experts' compliance with the interests of the commissioner of the valuation. This finding provides at least a partial explanation for the private company discount, one that adds to prior standard explanations (e.g., liquidity) offered in the finance literature.
This article recalls the fact that until the mid-19th century neither company legislation, nor jurists, nor economists, envisioned companies to be private or small. Nevertheless, once freedom of ...incorporation and general limited liability were enacted, a new practice was set in motion in Britain. Smaller companies were formed in growing numbers, replacing partnerships, family firms and even sole proprietorships. They operated in sectors in which corporations had not been found before. These companies did not seek access to the stock markets. The article tracks the take-up pattern and changing characteristics of the corporate form in Britain between the enactment of free incorporation and general limited liability (1844–62) and the formal legal recognition of the private company (1907). It shows the dramatic increase in annual incorporation and the parallel decrease in the average capital and average number of shareholders in newly formed companies. The article then analyses the reasons for the decision of businesspersons to incorporate their small firms. The main motivations were the possibility to create asset partitioning between personal and business assets and the ability to use the floating charge. Finally, the article examines the legal reaction to the bottom up emergence of the private company. It examines the reactions of the courts (in the famous Salomon v Salomon case) and of the legislature to this unpredicted practice. It argues that incorporators and their lawyers used the available contractual flexibility to privately design Articles of Association and to adjust them to the specific needs of private and small companies, often by introducing partnership internal governance rules into company Articles. The present study relies on newly gathered data on the take-up of the company form and a newly produced sample of company files collected at Companies House and the National Archives.
The Arctic shelf is the richest region of the world by overall volumes of oil and gas resources. However, countries of the Arctic basin have progressed unequally in developing them. In this article, ...the authors suggest that the diverging result of these countries in many ways depends on the structure of their oil and gas sectors. This article provides a comparative analysis of privately and state-owned companies’ participation in Arctic projects for those countries that are at the stage of commercial production on the Arctic shelf, namely the US, Norway and Russia. An analysis of oil companies’ performance indicators allows us to conclude that private companies are more efficient at developing the region than state-owned ones.
Interroger le cadre général dans lequel évolue actuellement le dispositif de stages professionnels à l’université tel est la visée de cet article. Le stage s’inscrit-il dans la continuité de ...l’alternance ? Parle-t-on en effet d’un dispositif ayant une valeur formative à part entière ou d’un phénomène en mesure de produire un signal en direction de la sphère productive en quête de compétences disponibles et rapidement opérationnelles ? Formuler ces questions amène l’auteur à aborder le stage du point de vue économique et juridique en faisant l’hypothèse de son glissement de plus en plus fort vers une forme de contrat de travail. Cet article mobilise les données empiriques résultant des entretiens qualitatifs semi-directifs avec un panel d’entreprises du secteur industriel chimie/pharmaceutique de la région Alsace. A la suite des entretiens, les mêmes entreprises ont répondu à un questionnaire en ligne visant à approfondir leur perception de la place des stagiaires au sein de leurs collectifs professionnels.
The goal of this article is to review and question the general framework currently used for professional internships at the University. Does the internship fit into the continuity of the sandwich training ? Indeed, are we talking about a phenomenon that has full formative value or about one capable of sending a signal to the f the labour market in the need for quickly operational skills ? These questions have lead the author to analyse internships from economic and legal point of view and to observe the evolution of internship towards a form of employment contract. First, this study uses empirical data from semi-structured qualitative interviews with a range of companies in the pharmaceutical / chemical industry in the Alsace region (France). In the second phase, the same companies responded to an online questionnaire aiming at identifying their perception of the trainees role within their corporate professional teams.
Objective: To assess the level of anxiety and burnout syndrome in health workers of Albacete.Method: Participants included 104 health professionals aged between 24 and 63 years, serving in two types ...of companies: 52 health workers in public administration and 52 who provide services in a company that provides health services privately. A descriptive crosssectional study was conducted to measure levels of anxiety (STAI) and burnout (MBI).Results: The sample of health workers had high levels burnout in this study, since women on one side had half emotional exhaustion, high depersonalization and Performing Personal low and men on the other have average emotional exhaustion, high depersonalization and personal accomplishment low. The group of women presented minimal differences in trait anxiety and state compared to men. The groups of health workers Albacete have high trait anxiety in both men and women. Workers Health Service of Castilla la Mancha (SESCAM) have a high trait anxiety levels regarding private workers, with no differences in state anxiety. Among the dimensions of Maslach, there is high emotional exhaustion, depersonalization high and low personal accomplishment. People with high anxiety, both state and trait values have higher scores Burnout.Conclusions: The high level of burnout among health workers Albacete no differences regarding the company public or private work.
Objetivo: Valorar el nivel de ansiedad y el síndrome Burnout en una trabajadores sanitarios de Albacete.Método: La muestra del estudio la componen 104 profesionales sanitarios de edades comprendidas entre 24 y 63 años, que prestan sus servicios en dos tipos de empresa: 52 trabajadores sanitarios de la administración pública y 52 que prestan sus servicios en unaempresa que presta servicios sanitarios de forma privada. Para ello se realizó un estudio descriptivo y transversal para medir los niveles de ansiedad (STAI) y de burnout (MBI).Resultados: La muestra de trabajadores sanitarios presenta altos niveles burnout en éste estudio, ya que las mujeres por un lado tenía Cansancio Emocional medio, Despersonalización alta y Realización Personal baja y los hombres por el otro tienen CansancioEmocional medio, Despersonalización alta y Realización Personal baja. El grupo de mujeres presentó mínimas diferencias en ansiedad rasgo y estado respecto al de hombres. El grupo de trabajadores sanitarios de Albacete presentan una ansiedad Rasgo altatanto en hombres como en mujeres. Los trabajadores del Servicio de Salud de Castilla la Mancha (SESCAM) presentan un nivel de ansiedad rasgo alto respecto a la de trabajadores privados, no existiendo diferencias en la ansiedad estado. Entre las dimensiones deMaslach, existe alto cansancio emocional, baja realización personal y alta despersonalización. Las personas con alta ansiedad, tanto estado como rasgo, presentan mayores valores en las puntuaciones de Burnout.Conclusiones: Existe alto nivel de Burnout entre los trabajadores sanitarios de Albacete no existiendo diferencias en cuanto a la empresa de trabajo pública o privada.
This paper examines the efficiency of the 1998 irrigation management reform in the Guanzhong Plain, Shaanxi, China, at farm and canal level. Stochastic frontier analysis is applied to estimate ...irrigation water use efficiency, based on panel data for 800 farmers, spread over 80 irrigation canals, for the period 1999–2005. Analysis of determinants of water use efficiency shows that at farm level, water price and disclosure are important factors. Compared to the base case of unreformed, management reform has a positive impact with water user association having the largest effect, followed by joint‐stock co‐operative and private company. The canal model is in line with the farm level model, although estimates are less significant.
Resumen
Este artículo examina la eficacia de la reforma de 1998 de la gestión del riego en la llanura de Guanzhong (Shaanxi, China), a escala de finca agrícola y de canal de riego. Se aplica un análisis de frontera estocástica para calcular la eficiencia del uso del agua de riego, a partir de datos de panel de 800 agricultores distribuidos en 80 canales de riego, para el período 1999–2005. Un análisis de los determinantes de la eficiencia del uso del agua muestra que, a nivel de finca, el precio del agua y la difusión son factores importantes. En comparación con el caso base de la gestión no reformada, la reforma tiene un impacto positivo, teniendo la asociación de usuarios de agua el mayor efecto, seguido de cooperativas de accionistas y finalmente empresas privadas. El modelo de canal coincide en los resultados con el modelo de fincas, aunque las estimaciones son menos significativas.
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