So a few things. This really should be tied into the Corpshare system. Corpshares should be used as Corpie bonuses. Yes, they can be manipulated... but Chy is the blood of corpies so game on. I'm sorry Mr. Newsie McNewserton if you can't afford the latest fast car or the tenth joy because you didn't make bonus, that's the way it is.
Some thoughts about what an implementation would look like.
All of it should center around a McGuffin that gets assigned a positive or negative value against a Corpshare. The McGuffin would run perhaps a couple weeks each time one was created. One person/department would be the parent of the McGuffin. As the McGuffin existed, the following would impact it's value. The McGuffin has to be turned in at the end of the period to someone.
Players only have vague ideas of the value of the McGuffin. NPCs in the Corp might say: "project X is really hot right now, keep working on it." or "seems that we've got a leak XYZ corp is developing a competing product now."
The rumor system will also play into this to where NPCs might say, "I've heard Joe Hustle is working on a new script. Bet he keeps that under lock and key. Oh, and I heard he's going to talk to Immie Influencer tomorrow some time to have them check it out." Give a general status of who has the McGuffin and what it's doing as well as any pending quests with it.
Positive:
The McGuffin is put in a place where it can be worked on. For VS that's a Lab, NLM a studio, etc. When it's in places that make thematic sense, then it gains value as long as it's out in the open and not in someone's inventory.
The McGuffin has "Quests" on it. Bring it to the hall for approval, take it to Shady McInfluencer to get a quick take, go talk to ACME crates on the manifest. Whatever. Just every now and again, it needs to travel and be handled by someone else. There should be a reasonable time frame of about a day to do this. Even better if some of these are taking the product to other players/NPC in rival Corps. VS product to get an Ad campaign shot. Neo Manifest getting signed off by NLM, etc.
The McGuffin is in the inventory of a player who is assigned to work on it while they are awake and active. HR for employee list. Bio/Chem for sciencey things. Producer for scripts. Flash drive for Gridworks, etc.
McGuffin is turned in.
Negative:
The McGuffin is out of it's place where it is being worked on. IE stuffed in a closet, or locked in an apartment.
Quests are missed in the time frame.
The McGuffin is in a players inventory who is not assigned to "work on it". Or in the inventory of an asleep player.
There are also Chy "Quests" which can be used to drain value and convert to Chy. Giving the script to a Bootleg radio producer. Chemicals to a Drug Runner, whatever. Just somewhere that people can take it and get a pretty big payday. Should be a massively negative impact to the McGuffin. This can be someone in the corp "Caining" or a rival corp managing to make a score.
The McGuffin can not be turned in at the deadline.
Final Thoughts
Love the idea. Semi automated ways for people to much about topside that tie into FINANCIAL ramifications are very on theme. This was just my thoughts on how to implement a system like that, but there are a lot of ways that you could. Just make sure that it's open to lots of people interacting and uses some of the systems that you've put in place like Corpshare, Bonuses, Rumors, and Chatter.
Love the idea. Would be geeked out to see it in some form.