Equal dignity rule says that agents' contracts to sell property covered by the Statute of Frauds must be in writing to be enforceable

Which of the following is true of product modification?

a. It entails the creation of marketable new products. b. It necessitates the use of crowdsourcing to develop new ideas for a product. c. It goes beyond applied research by converting applications into marketable products. d. It makes cosmetic or functional changes to existing products.

With almost 70,000 employees in 55 countries, Alcan has been one of the best performers in a slow-growth industry, aluminum. That said, aligning the organization for the best performance possible is an ongoing process, and having so many separate companies in so many diff erent areas is a constant challenge. The company was founded in 1902 as a producer of aluminum. Today, in addition to

supplying basic metals, Alcan produces food and beauty product packaging and engineered products for the automobile and aerospace industries. The size and complexity of the organization has grown as the company has developed. Alcan currently has fi ve corporate-wide staff operations (corporate development, external aff airs, fi nance, human resources, and corporate headquarters), which work with all areas of the organization. The company also has four operating divisions: Bauxite and Alumina, Primary Metal, Engineered Products, and Packaging. Each of these divisions has its own staff operations, including such functions as fi nance, human resources, procurement, and information technology. And each division is also organized into sales groups; the Packaging division, for example, is grouped into Food Packaging—Europe, Food Packaging—Americas, Food Packaging—Asia, Global Pharmaceutical Packaging, Global Beauty Packaging, and Global Tobacco Packaging. The company has made great strides to control its costs, divesting areas that it could not run profi tably and moving into areas where it felt they had a competitive advantage. But beyond cost cutting, Alcan has found it diffi cult to raise net income as a percentage of sales. Organizing the company to take advantage of growth opportunities and move it away from being a basic metals supplier is the key to the company's future. Would it be beneficial for Alcan to create a modular organization? a. No, benchmarking is too costly for global organizations. b. Yes, it could benefit from outsourcing. c. No, the company relies too heavily on sequential processes. d. Yes, it would give it more control over organizational processes. e. No, a modular organization would not allow the company to closely monitor its environment.