Just Other Articles
#1 in Business Subscribe Email Print

You are here: Home > Finance > Finance > Are There Holes in Your SOX? (Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance for Public and Private Companies)

Tags

  • communication
  • combinations
  • implementing
  • combination products
  • large public

  • Links

  • Suzuki Increases Presence In The Middle East
  • Online Bingo
  • What to Do When Everyones Tossing Their Cookies
  • Just Other Articles - Are There Holes in Your SOX? (Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance for Public and Private Companies)

    Summary:
    The illicit transgressions by Enron and those alike in the late 1990s, lead to regulations created to standardize the trustworthiness of financial institutions and public companies. Companies facing SOX compliance will need to consider the following: what are the best practice processes, how do these processes differ from existing practices, how should new processes be implemented, and how
    According to USFDA, a combination product is one composed of any combination of a drug and device; biological product and device; drug and biological product
    can short term processes be balanced with longer "term strategic goals?"

    - - - - - - - - -

    A World Before SOX:
    The enterprise world had a rude awakening after a series of well-publicized corporate financial scandals. Many stories of misappropriated corporate dollars surfaced in the late 1990s involving the likes of Enron, Tyco and WorldCom. Legislation soon responded to the multitude of gross tr
    ; or drug, device, and biological product and fixed dose combination would include two or more combinations of drug.

    Examples of combination products may in
    nsgressions committed by the upper echelon management of the enterprise world.

    Offenses committed by these industry heads ranged from extravagant multi-million dollar trips to exotic locals, large private gifts to spouses and shuffling company funds to bankroll other investments. The corporate world needed to be held accountable for its misdeeds. SOX (Sarbanes-Oxley Act) or the Public Company Accounting Refo
    lude drug-coated devices, drugs packaged with delivery devices in medical kits, and drugs and devices packaged separately but intended to be used together.

    m and Investor Protection Act of 2002 came into fruition to improve corporate governance and help police possible future misdeeds.

    The 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act requires publicly traded entities to define, evaluate and document processes which lead to senior management accountability. SOX requires that audits or substantial v
    here is enormous increase in the number of combination products entering the market in the recent years. Combination products have proven advantages but fixe
    rification controls must be in place to ensure senior management is held culpable for their financial actions.

    Why Should Privately Held Businesses Care About SOX?
    While SOX applies directly to publicly traded companies, those privately held businesses who wish to do business with businesses traded on places like the NASDQ must also become Sarbanes-Oxley compliant.

    Many large public corporations
    d dose combinations are still in the process of convincing regulatory authority on their advantages over the single ingredient formulations.

    Combination pro
    will simply refuse to do business with privately held companies who are not SOX compliant. Private firms who want to do business with large public entities are now also thrown into a SOX compliant landscape .

    SOX affects a broad range of industries who "touch" information of those traded firms, they include and are not limited to:

    • Attorneys
    • Accountants and Auditing Firms who review comp
    ucts have become life saving products for the pharmaceutical companies who doesn’t have many innovative molecules in their product pipeline and have been inc
    any financial statements
  • Brokers or dealers and their employees
  • Security companies handling electronic transactions
  • International businesses who operate in the United States


  • Acceptance of SOX by private companies is not an issue, as "73% of private company CEOs said SOX has done at least a decent job of improving financial governance and transparency for public
    easingly used in the product life cycle management. Even the companies having product patents are trying to extend their product life cycle through the combi
    ompanies."(1)

    Who's Responsible for SOX Communication Compliance?
    SOX requires incoming and outgoing correspondence be monitored. Depending on the business's structure, communication exchanges can be monitored by the Chief Compliance Officers (CCOs) Chief Information Officers (CIOs) and Chief Risk Officers (CROs). These executives are responsible for the security, accuracy and the reliability of t
    nation products and maximize the revenues. But the companies involved in this practice are overlooking that they are burdening the patients both economically
    e organization's reporting and messaging systems.

    Well-groom organizations have policies set in place by their high level primary officers outlining what sorts of information may or many not be communicated outside a department and outside the organization. While these rules exist, firms often don't take the necessary steps to make sure employees within the organization understand these rules, and their impor
    and physically. They need to rightly judge the benefits of the combination products and they have to even look at the risks involved when combining the produ
    ance.

    What are the Key Elements of SOX Which Relate to Electronic Data Storage and E-mail Security?

    • SOX Section 404: Financial spreadsheets and reports must be safeguarded from being falsified or accidentally or deliberately redistributed.
    • SOX Section 409: Real time disclosure of material that impacts the company's finances must be reported within 48 hours
    • SOX Section 802: G
    ts. Some of the combination products were well accepted by physicians while others suffered. Companies involved in development of combination products are fi
    arantees that documents and records are not altered
  • SOX Section 1102: Corrupting, altering, mutilating, destroying or concealing records are violations. Those found guilty of obstructing an investigation or official proceeding will face 20 years in prison and fines.


  • The Sarbanes-Oxley Act focuses on corporate governance, accountability and the reporting practices of publicly held compa
    ding difficulty in defining their combination products and facing various challenges from selecting a combination to marketing it.

    Following aspects would a
    nies. Yet the act also impacts private firms that one day might become public and those who do business with publicly traded companies.

    What are the Holes in Your SOX Compliance?
    While sharing information online is a convenient luxury of e-commerce, it also creates a great vulnerability as information, data and correspondence are traded from business to business. Data and email exchange can pose b
    dd to the challenges in developing combination products:

    Which markets to tap where the combination products can do fairly well?
    Which combination prod
    th SOX compliance and privacy concerns.

    This errant misuse of company information isn't exclusive to U.S. companies. Staff at 18% of large UK firms gained unauthorized access to information during 2005, the report says. Nine per cent of those large firms saw staff misuse restricted information.(2)

    How Can Your Firm Sew Up its SOX Holes?
    Executive management seeking to be SOX compliant must have t
    cts are meaningful and rational?
    Which therapeutic categories to select?
    Which Combinations can address unmet needs of the patients?
    Do combin
    e fortitude and commitment to strategic planning and execution to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act's directives. The firm's CEO, CFO, CCO/CRO and CIO must cooperate and have demanding attention to detail when establishing policies to be SOX compliant. The need for creating and implementing strong electronic data and email retention policies and compliance in line with SOX has never been greater than in today's fluxing
    tions increase the patient compliance?
    What would be the developing cost?
    How to tackle the risks encountered during combination product developmen
    lectronic business world.

    Email is not necessarily secure against interception. Whether or not email is encrypted in transmission depends on your software. It is therefore our policy not to send emails to you that contain identifiable information about you, your household, or business.

    Andy Purdy, acting director of the National Cyber Security Division of the Department of Homeland Security in a 2006 intervie
    t?

    As combination products don't fit into the traditional categories of drugs, medical devices, or biological products, the USFDA is in the process of devel
    with CNET identifies the importance in protecting a company's important digital assets:

    "Small businesses and large enterprises and the government are all important when trying to reduce the cyber-risk. We're trying to raise awareness with partners of the responsibility and techniques consumers can use to help secure their systems..."(3)


    Before Sarbanes-Oxley, corporations saw
    ping new procedures for reviewing their safety, efficacy and quality.

    Professional from academic institutions, pharmaceutical industries, health care indust
    a gross abuse of executive power at the cost of earnest growth in business. Today, stiff criminal and civil penalties for violations of securities law will be instituted against companies who do not meet SOX standards.

    How can private firms flourish in today's email reliant arena, while being SOX compliant. Introducing strong compliance policies in line with SOX which include firewalls, up-to-date virus prot
    y and representatives from various regulatory agencies are working out to design the regulatory requirements for manufacture and sale of combination products
    ction, encryption and email anti-theft measures can help a business work cooperatively with publicly traded companies.

    Benefits of Email Anti-Theft Sofware
    Implementing email anti-theft allows a company to grow in credibility, reputation and trust; all factors which lead to increased clientele and revenue.

    With security meas
    .

    As there is an increasing trend of the combination products companies manufacturing such products should be able to tackle the problems involved in the de
    res to keep company correspondence as well as protect outbound email, SMB firms can be both prudent with their technology budgets and well-armed with the tools and resources necessary to be industry compliant. Clients will feel more secure about sharing their personal information with compliant SBM offices, paving the way to better and safer communication.

    - - - - - - - - - - -

    End Notes:


    1.) Rob Preston
    elopment. They need to be wiser in analyzing the market trends and the regulatory requirements.

    Companies that provide selfless information through particip
    "Time to Regulate the Regulations" Information Week, 27 February, 2006, 78.

    2.) BBC News, "Firms lax on ID theft safeguards" 16 March 2006, BBC Online; URL: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4809262.stm

    3.)Joris Evers, "Newsmaker: Locking down America's Net defenses" 16 February 2006, CNet New.com - http://news.com.com/Locking+down+Americas+Net+defenses+-+page+2/2008-7348_3-6040223-2.html?tag=st.num

    tion in industry events and feedback to regulatory authorities would be able to face the challenges and will be successful in developing combination products

    HTTP = HTML link (for blogs, profiles,phorums):
    <a href="http://www.justotherarticles.org.ua/article/89633/justotherarticles-Are-There-Holes-in-Your-SOX-SarbanesOxley-Compliance-for-Public-and-Private-Companies.html">Are There Holes in Your SOX? (Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance for Public and Private Companies)</a>

    BB link (for phorums):
    [url=http://www.justotherarticles.org.ua/article/89633/justotherarticles-Are-There-Holes-in-Your-SOX-SarbanesOxley-Compliance-for-Public-and-Private-Companies.html]Are There Holes in Your SOX? (Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance for Public and Private Companies)[/url]

    Related Articles:

    Advertise Your Website Using Niche Advertising

    The Importance of Writing Good Web Site Sales Copy

    Website Promotion - The Power of Writing Articles

    Bookmark it: del.icio.us digg.com reddit.com netvouz.com google.com yahoo.com technorati.com furl.net bloglines.com socialdust.com ma.gnolia.com newsvine.com slashdot.org simpy.com shadows.com blinklist.com