It is developed in joint partnership with the government (which supports an immense national educational enterprise from pre-school to adult learning), individuals (who invest in marketable skills), and companies (who invest in firm-specific skills for their employees in order to generate economic rents).

FORBES: What Will It Take For HR To Gain The Respect That It Wants?

The Directory can be helpful to investors by providing them with industry-wide and firm specific data.

FORBES: Investigating Brokerages (May 1, 2002 )

To what extent are the firm's problems Apple-specific?

ECONOMIST: Computer industry

While there are no major fresh developments on the European Union debt crisis front, there continues to be negotiations among EU leaders, with the underlying theme that there is still not firm agreement on specific near-term actions to be taken.

FORBES: A.M. Kitco Metals Roundup: Comex Gold Sharply Higher amid Lower Stock Markets; U.S. Jobs Data Awaited

Ward Walkers is a privately-owned firm established in Dundee in 2004 with the specific aim of delivering high-quality work shoes to the nursing profession.

BBC: Dundee shoe firm Ward Walkers secures NHS contract

The firm is a top holding in the first lithium-specific ETF.

FORBES: Chile Gets A Charge From Lithium

In December, Fidelity, the world's biggest mutual-fund firm, unveiled a new financial planner, to be available on the Internet, that would recommend specific mutual funds to 401(k) participants.

ECONOMIST: Money managers