82 Abstracts and Reviews

change on selected regions, and discusses the possible impact on the frequency and strength of weather systems. The paper concludes with an outlook for future observational and research efforts needed to reduce the uncertainties in the understanding of climate change and its impacts.

(Author) Keywora3: Climate Change.s, Frequency.

051061 (E40, M50) Economic theory of the insurance company and its relations to environment (Versicherungsbetriebs- lehre: Wirtschaftliche The&e des Versicherungs- untemehmens und seiner Beziehungen zur Urnwelt). Farny D., Cologne, Germany, German Journal of Insurance, Vol. 79, 1990, pp. l-30.

Mostly, the theory of business management of

insurance companies is understood as a theory of reality, often illustrated by means of models. Its subject are the economic processes within insurance companies and between the insurance company and its environment under consideration of all legal data. Parts of the economic theory of insurance and insurance companies, especially risk business, may be illustrated by means of mathematical models. The insurance company’s environment is represented by the markets, competitors, govevent and the general public being particularly characterized by the governmental supervising authorities.

For the development of a theory of business management of insurance companies there are various concepts available. The decision theory examines the company’s objectives and the respective means to realize them.

The commodity approach leads to the production theory, representing input, transformation, and output of the goods, here the joint production in investment business may also be involved. The functional concept describes the important business sectors such as finances. Further concepts are either based on the life cycle of the insurer or they are pronounced in a systems theory or are giving the information aspects of insurance business utmost priority.

(Author) Keywor&: Business Management of Insurance Companies, Mathematical Models, Decision Theory.

051062 (E4O,B36) Insurance implications of climatic change.

Dlugolecki A.F., Scotland, Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance, Vol. 17, nr. 64, 1992, pp, 393-405.

This paper considers the implications for the insurance market of climatic change. The first step is to restate recent developments in the insurance of weather damage, particularly in the United Kingdom. Then, the long-term history of weather events is reviewed to provide a perspective for current pro- jections of climatic change. These can then be translated into possible effects on the insurance market. While it may be thought that the UK is a rather restrictive case-study, this is not so: it is a well-developed market, with unexpectedly large exposures to weather losses, and with a mixture of climate types (predominantly maritime).

(Author) Keywords: Insurance Cost.

051063 @X0, E50) Company size, a strategic success factor for insurance companies? (Die Betriebsgriisse, ein strategischer Erfolgsfaktor von Versicherungs- untemehmen?) Kaluza B., Duisburg, Germany, Zeitschrif fir die gesamte Versicherungswissenschafl, 1990, pp. 251- 273.

For years one of the main problems in strategic management has been the determination of significant success factors. The size of the company has proven to be one of these significant factors.

This article presents a systematic concept which brings to light the effects which the size of the insurance company has on its own costs and revenues. This concept will empirically applied to private health insurance companies in Germany. In this way, it is possible to determine to what extent the experience curve theory is also significant for the service industry.

(Author) Keyword: Strategic Management, Size of the Company.

E41: PRODUCTS (INCL. PREMIUMS AND DEDUCTIBLES)

051064 (E41) The impact of new product introductions on the market value of finns. Chaney P.K., Devinney T.M., Winer R.S., Vanderbilt University, University of California,