In a wild season of hurricanes and typhoons on both sides of the globe, a battered company is trying to emerge from the rubble and weather the storm.

A delegation from restructured Marsh & McLennan Companies Inc (MMC), led by Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Michael Cherkasky, a household name in New York City, has just concluded a busy whirlwind trip to seal new relations and strengthen old ties.

MMC claims to be the largest professional service provider in the world, with a history dating back to 1871. It reported US$12 billion in revenues in 2004, although towards the end of the year its shares fell sharply on the New York Stock Exchange amid scandalous allegations of collusion and bid rigging.

Since then, little has been heard of the company's China operations - although it has established offices in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. It was apparently lying low, because search engine Baidu.com failed to reveal a single news item relating to MMC's China business teams over the past year.

Things were different on the evening of September 26, however, when Cherkasky was shaking hands with more than 100 government officials and business leaders in the China World Hotel's banquet hall in Beijing. It was "a sort of road show" for MMC's top China business team, executives, and the company's plans for clients in this part of the world.

This was not a purely social visit, however. Cherkasky was beaming because he had good news to cheer up his staff in New York with, including an agreement with the Chinese sports authorities to provide risk management consulting services for the Beijing 2008 Olympics.

Cherkasky says that offering risk management consulting to major sporting events is one of MMC's areas of expertise. The company has provided services for many Olympics events.

The Beijing Olympics are different, however, because almost every major marketing campaign in China wants to jump on board. If the Olympics are MMC's area of expertise, 2008 will be an important year for its marketing efforts in China.

It is also an indication, says a Chinese observer connected to the government, that after more than half a year of cleaning house, the company is finally ready to make a comeback. It does not want to be left behind when other companies are reaching out to high growth markets like China.

Cherkasky is not shy about his desire to do more business in China, although he is cagey about the details of the Olympic consulting deal.

"We want to see our China operation more than double its size in five years," he declares.

Worldwide, he says, MMC wants to be wherever the economy is growing and entrepreneurship is flourishing. More international companies are coming to China and, as seen in Lenovo's acquisition of IBM's PC business, more Chinese companies are reaching out to the world. Going to new places means exposure to more risks, so MMC is equipped to meet the rising demand for risk management services, Cherkasky says.

Several individuals on Cherkasky's China trip were among the "service stars" that MMC wanted to present to its Chinese clients. It also wanted to show off products, such as insurance coverage for Chinese companies when they issue shares in overseas stock markets.

Cherkasky says that MMC will gradually make sure its system consistently provides more integrated high-end solutions. He seemed to deliberately avoid saying "insurance" in connection to the professional quality of its risk management policies.

The MMC group now consists of 10 main subsidiaries with specialties ranging from risk management, insurance services, investment, human resources management and branding.

MMC sources say that it has more than 200 staff members in China, mainly in offices in Beijing and Shanghai. MMC subsidiaries do not usually share offices when they come to China, so total employment figures are difficult to measure.

It is still unknown when these separate operations will be put together in joint offices and become truly integrated.

MMC subsidiary Marsh's China business falls into two categories. Insurance consulting and risk management services to foreign and Chinese companies are based in Beijing, and market research is based in Shanghai.

MMC operations on the Chinese mainland can also receive more complex support from MMC Hong Kong. Before long, company sources say, MMC headquarters will also host a China desk modelled on its long-established Japanese client services, to mobilize company-wide resources for projects in China.

Cherkasky became president and CEO of MMC in October 2004, after New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, accused Marsh, the largest insurance broker in the US, of colluding with AIG and other insurers to fix prices.

Cherkasky was a high profile lawyer in New York before he joined Kroll Inc, a member company of MMC, in 1994. He had worked for 16 years as a criminal trial attorney, administrator and investigator. He worked on many important cases, including the investigation of organized crime boss John Gotti and the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Centre.

Between 2001 and 2004, Cherkasky also successfully turned around the business of Kroll Inc, an MMC subsidiary specializing in corporate restructuring, forensic accounting, and electronic discovery.

MMC agreed in January 2005 to pay US$850 million to settle charges it faces from its 2004 scandal. Cherkasky said at the same time that the Marsh insurance brokerage would fully disclose all client compensation and charge only one fee or commission when arranging policies.

(China Daily 10/08/2005 page4)