C o l o r a d o S t a t e U n i v e r s i t y - P u e b l o
Division of Continuing Education Page 12
Independent Study and External Degree Completion Program
Lesson 3
Section 3: Once again there are questions listed for each of the chapters in this section.
Respond to them fully after stating the questions.
Section 3: Chapter 7: Question 1
The five steps for classical decision making are found on page 169, and the definition is on
page 171. In a risk environment or an uncertain environment, it may be very difficult to follow
these steps. How can a risk environment or an uncertain environment affect this process?
What is the difference between a risk environment and an uncertain environment?
Section 3: Chapter 7: Question 2
In the text, there is a discussion of framing errors, confirmation errors, escalating
commitment, availability bias, representativeness bias, anchoring bias, and adjustment bias.
Briefly define each of these errors and biases and provide an example of each one (not the one
in the text). These are particularly important since they are found in all levels of an
organization.
Section 3: Chapter 7: Question 3
Managers are often confronted with structured problems which require programmed
decisions, and unstructured problems which require non-programmed decisions. Serious
problems may require a crisis decision which is the most serious type of non-programmed
decision.
Provide an example of a programmed and non-programmed decision which you have
encountered in your own experience. How do you determine whether a decision is really a
programmed decision, or whether it actually requires a unique solution? When should senior
management become involved?
(Many programmed decisions are just that today. In retail they may be built into the computer
system, and made at the cash register – such as returns, returns with or without receipts, or
information available regarding a customer’s past transactions!)
Section 3: Chapter 8: Question 1
Organizations should have a mission statement, a strategic plan, organizational plans,
tactical plans, goals and objectives. Which of these should primarily be developed by directors
and senior management, middle management, and supervisors and other first level
management personnel? How can these plans be best aligned in order to clearly involve all
levels of management in these goals?
C o l o r a d o S t a t e U n i v e r s i t y - P u e b l o
Division of Continuing Education Page 13
Independent Study and External Degree Completion Program
Section 3: Chapter 8: Question 2
Benchmarking is often used as a way to improve an organization. What is organizational
benchmarking and how is it developed?
Section 3: Chapter 8: Question 3
Planners often use forecasting, contingency planning, and scenario planning. Define and
provide an example of each. The example should d.
Econ Questions1. Which do you think is the greater risk for theEvonCanales257
Econ Questions:
1. Which do you think is the greater risk for the U.S. economy in 2022: inflation or deflation? Base your answer on what we’ve discussed in class and your readings, but you may also want to consider this:
2. Many developing nations are not seeing the resurgence in demand that the developed world has in the 2nd half of this year. How feasible would it be for developing nations to maintain current interest rate levels when the rest of the world is raising interest rates to prevent continued increases in the inflation rate?
3. Looking at the chart below, speculate on why Japan’s inflation rate breaks the mold. (I say speculate because no one knows for sure….)
4. Central bank independence is taken for granted in developed nations like those in Western Europe and the U.S., but independent central banks are something of a rarity in developing and emerging market economies. What roles does an independent central bank play in a country’s economic and financial development, and how does the absence of an independent central bank jeopardize economic growth?
5. The Economist writes: “Cash is a safe asset, but a wasting one. The real returns on risky assets have been much greater. True, cash affords options—to buy cheaply when others are selling. But episodes of distressed selling have been fleeting, largely thanks to central banks, which have been liberal in supplying cash in emergencies.” Why are investors willing to incur the opportunity cost of holding cash in the face of current outsized returns in the equity and bond markets?
6. What does the risk structure of interest rates measure? Is the current structure of U.S. rates consistent with your impressions of the health of the US economy and the corporate and housing sectors? Give specific examples.
7. The global investment bank ING has released its forecast of when the major central banks will change their interest rates in 2022. Answer the following questions based on their forecast:
a. Would you expect the dollar to be strengthening against the British pound in the first quarter of 2022?
b. Would you expect the euro to strengthen or weaken against the Swedish krone in 2022? When?
c. Which two currencies are most likely to move in lockstep in 2022?
d. Which country is likely to have the strongest currency at the end of 2023?
8. The U.S. financial system boasts very liquid and efficient markets where financial assets are bought and sold. The U.S. also has a very large number of banks. Other developed nations, like France, Japan or Germany, have few banks even fewer financial markets. What are the pros and cons of the two different approaches?
06/25/2021 1
Group Project: SWOT Analysis Presentation
Before you begin this assignment, be sure you have read the Case Study.
Purpose of this Assignment
This assignment gives you the opportunity to demonstrate your ability to participate in a team project
and to communicate effectively with an important ...
Financial Statement Analysis
Ratio Analysis Example
Prufrock Corporation
Balance Sheet as of December 31,2008
($ in millions)
Assets
Liabilities and Owners' Equity
Current assets
Current liabilities
Cash
$98
Accounts payable
$344
Accounts receivable
$188
Notes payable
$196
Inventory
$422
Total
$540
Total
$708
Long-term debt
$457
Fixed assets
Owners' equity
Net plant and equipment
$2,880
Common stock and paid-in surplus
$550
Total assets
$3,588
Retained earnings
$2,041
Total
$2,591
Total liabilities and owners' equity
$3,588
Prufrock Corporation
2008 Income Statement
($ in millions)
Sales
2311
Cost of goods sold
1344
Depreciation
276
Earnings before interest and taxes
691
Interest paid
141
Taxable income
550
Taxes (34%)
187
Net income
363
Dividends
121
Addition to retained earnings
242
*Create common size balance sheet and common size income statement.
*Calculate ratios for Prufrock Corporation
Short-term solvency or liquidity ratios
Liquidity ratio measures the firm’s ability to pay its bills over the short run without undue stress.
Current ratio=
*Do we have enough short-term liquid assets to cover our short-term debts?
Quick ratio (acid test ratio) =
*Do we have enough really liquid short-term assets to cover our short-term debts?
Long-term solvency, or financial leverage, ratios
Leverage ratio measures the form’s long-run ability to meet its obligations.
Total debt ratio=
What percentage of total assets is financed with either short- or long-term debt?
Debt-equity ratio=
Times interest earned=
* It measures how well a company has its interest obligations covered. Are we generating enough income to make out interest payments?
Asset management or turnover ratios
Turnover ratios measure asset use efficiency.
Inventory turnover=
*On average, how many times per year do we go through our inventory? (Excess inventory is expensive!)
Day’s sales Outstanding=
Fixed Assets Turnover Ratio=
Total Assets Turnover Ratio=
Profitability ratios
Operating margin=
Profit margin=
Return on assets (ROA) =
*What is profit per dollar of asset?
Return on equity (ROE) =
*What is the rate of return for stockholders?
Return on equity (ROE) = Profit margin * Total asset turnover * Equity multiplier
Market value ratios
(We assume that Prufrock has 33 million shares outstanding and stock sold for $88 per share at the end of the year.)
EPS=
Price-earnings ratio=
Market-to-book ratio=
4-1
Running head: FULL TITLE OF YOUR PAPER IN CAPS ON ONE LINE1
ABBREVIATED TITLE OF YOUR PAPER 2
Team Paper: Sources of and solutions to conflict in a virtual environment
PJM6210 Communication Skills for Project Managers
Month, day, year
Sources of Conflict in a Virtual Environment
Interpersonal Conflict 🡪 Jones
In the second paragraph, begin addressing your first topic or question. This should directly align to what you stated you were going to talk about in the first se ..
Project Plans Each student will submit two project plan.docxwkyra78
Project Plans
Each student will submit two project plans: a draft project plan and a final project plan.
The first plan is due in Module 2 and the final project plan is due in Module 3. The
purpose of the project plans are to demonstrate mastery of project planning using an
applied context. The draft project plan includes all of the project plan elements covered in
Module 1 and 2. The final project plan includes all of the project plan elements covered
in all three modules.
Draft Project Plan 1
The initial project plan will include the following:
Problem, need, or vision statement
Project Definition or Statement of Work, which includes the following:
o Project objectives or performance criteria
o Assumptions, constraints, and limitations
o Project work requirements: Summary of deliverables
Major responsibilities
Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) down to the work package level
Preliminary Schedule (with event milestones and exit criteria for each milestone)
Final Project Plan 2
The final project plan will include all the elements of the project plan 1 updated, plus the
following elements:
Required resources (people-organization, equipment, materials, and facilities)
Linear Responsibility Matrix: Project organization chart
End-item specifications (such as reference documents, engineering specifications,
regulatory codes, etc.)
Control system (documentation, procedures, and evaluation)
Communication plan (flow of project information to stakeholders)
Quality management plan (methods to be utilized to manage quality and project
processes)
Detailed project schedule (CPM diagram with the critical path identified)
Risk response plan
Change management plan or amendments procedure
Procedures and Criteria
1. Pick a potential project of interest.
2. The project must meet the following criteria:
A job or problem with multiple and sequential tasks
Performed only once (not repetitive in nature)
Has defined start and end points in time (start time and a deadline)
A budget or a limited source of funds
A defined scope of work
Specific performance requirements
More than one person is involved in the project
3. Develop the draft project plan 1 with all of the required elements in Module 2.
4. Update the project plan as you gain more information during the course modules
5. Develop the final project plan during Module 3 and submit via Blackboard
Examples of Possible Projects
Group project for another class
Home improvement project
Auto restoration project
Wedding
Graduation party
Senior project (with a group)
Business start-up
Theatre production
Product development project
Musical recital
Chamber mixer
Holiday parade
Charity fundraiser
Group Vacation
Project Plans Grading Criteria
Each plan will be graded using the following criteria:
Table 1.
Points Plan Content
Plan Organization,
Consistency, and F ...
5show calculation.1. Which one of the following is not diMargaritoWhitt221
5
show calculation.
1. Which one of the following is not directly related to the features of common stocks?
a. Common stock represents the ownership b. Ownership implies control.
c. Stockholders elect directors. d. Directors elect management
e. Management’s goal is to minimize the cost.
2. Which one is the cost of preferred stock, calculated from the data below?
Data: A 10%, $1,000 par value, annually dividend, perpetual preferred stock sells for $1,111.
3. You were recently hired by Hubbard Darren Inc. to estimate its cost of common equity. You obtained the following data: D1 = $1.00; P0 = $42.50; g = 5.00% (constant). What is the cost of equity raised by selling new common stock? (hint: use rs = (D1/P0) X100+(g) or P rs = (D1/P0) X100+(P1-P0)/P0 X100)
4. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, the expected market return is 9.5%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the required rate of return, rs?
5. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the company's current stock price? (Hint: use rs=10.325%)
6. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the Dividend yield?
7. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, the expected market return is 9.5%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the stock’s expected value, P1 one year from now? (Hint: use rs=10.325%)
8. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, the expected market return is 9.5%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the capital gain yield?
9. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to have a negative and constant growth rate, -4% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, the expected market return is 9.5%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the company's current stock price? (Hint: ...
Econ Questions1. Which do you think is the greater risk for theEvonCanales257
Econ Questions:
1. Which do you think is the greater risk for the U.S. economy in 2022: inflation or deflation? Base your answer on what we’ve discussed in class and your readings, but you may also want to consider this:
2. Many developing nations are not seeing the resurgence in demand that the developed world has in the 2nd half of this year. How feasible would it be for developing nations to maintain current interest rate levels when the rest of the world is raising interest rates to prevent continued increases in the inflation rate?
3. Looking at the chart below, speculate on why Japan’s inflation rate breaks the mold. (I say speculate because no one knows for sure….)
4. Central bank independence is taken for granted in developed nations like those in Western Europe and the U.S., but independent central banks are something of a rarity in developing and emerging market economies. What roles does an independent central bank play in a country’s economic and financial development, and how does the absence of an independent central bank jeopardize economic growth?
5. The Economist writes: “Cash is a safe asset, but a wasting one. The real returns on risky assets have been much greater. True, cash affords options—to buy cheaply when others are selling. But episodes of distressed selling have been fleeting, largely thanks to central banks, which have been liberal in supplying cash in emergencies.” Why are investors willing to incur the opportunity cost of holding cash in the face of current outsized returns in the equity and bond markets?
6. What does the risk structure of interest rates measure? Is the current structure of U.S. rates consistent with your impressions of the health of the US economy and the corporate and housing sectors? Give specific examples.
7. The global investment bank ING has released its forecast of when the major central banks will change their interest rates in 2022. Answer the following questions based on their forecast:
a. Would you expect the dollar to be strengthening against the British pound in the first quarter of 2022?
b. Would you expect the euro to strengthen or weaken against the Swedish krone in 2022? When?
c. Which two currencies are most likely to move in lockstep in 2022?
d. Which country is likely to have the strongest currency at the end of 2023?
8. The U.S. financial system boasts very liquid and efficient markets where financial assets are bought and sold. The U.S. also has a very large number of banks. Other developed nations, like France, Japan or Germany, have few banks even fewer financial markets. What are the pros and cons of the two different approaches?
06/25/2021 1
Group Project: SWOT Analysis Presentation
Before you begin this assignment, be sure you have read the Case Study.
Purpose of this Assignment
This assignment gives you the opportunity to demonstrate your ability to participate in a team project
and to communicate effectively with an important ...
Financial Statement Analysis
Ratio Analysis Example
Prufrock Corporation
Balance Sheet as of December 31,2008
($ in millions)
Assets
Liabilities and Owners' Equity
Current assets
Current liabilities
Cash
$98
Accounts payable
$344
Accounts receivable
$188
Notes payable
$196
Inventory
$422
Total
$540
Total
$708
Long-term debt
$457
Fixed assets
Owners' equity
Net plant and equipment
$2,880
Common stock and paid-in surplus
$550
Total assets
$3,588
Retained earnings
$2,041
Total
$2,591
Total liabilities and owners' equity
$3,588
Prufrock Corporation
2008 Income Statement
($ in millions)
Sales
2311
Cost of goods sold
1344
Depreciation
276
Earnings before interest and taxes
691
Interest paid
141
Taxable income
550
Taxes (34%)
187
Net income
363
Dividends
121
Addition to retained earnings
242
*Create common size balance sheet and common size income statement.
*Calculate ratios for Prufrock Corporation
Short-term solvency or liquidity ratios
Liquidity ratio measures the firm’s ability to pay its bills over the short run without undue stress.
Current ratio=
*Do we have enough short-term liquid assets to cover our short-term debts?
Quick ratio (acid test ratio) =
*Do we have enough really liquid short-term assets to cover our short-term debts?
Long-term solvency, or financial leverage, ratios
Leverage ratio measures the form’s long-run ability to meet its obligations.
Total debt ratio=
What percentage of total assets is financed with either short- or long-term debt?
Debt-equity ratio=
Times interest earned=
* It measures how well a company has its interest obligations covered. Are we generating enough income to make out interest payments?
Asset management or turnover ratios
Turnover ratios measure asset use efficiency.
Inventory turnover=
*On average, how many times per year do we go through our inventory? (Excess inventory is expensive!)
Day’s sales Outstanding=
Fixed Assets Turnover Ratio=
Total Assets Turnover Ratio=
Profitability ratios
Operating margin=
Profit margin=
Return on assets (ROA) =
*What is profit per dollar of asset?
Return on equity (ROE) =
*What is the rate of return for stockholders?
Return on equity (ROE) = Profit margin * Total asset turnover * Equity multiplier
Market value ratios
(We assume that Prufrock has 33 million shares outstanding and stock sold for $88 per share at the end of the year.)
EPS=
Price-earnings ratio=
Market-to-book ratio=
4-1
Running head: FULL TITLE OF YOUR PAPER IN CAPS ON ONE LINE1
ABBREVIATED TITLE OF YOUR PAPER 2
Team Paper: Sources of and solutions to conflict in a virtual environment
PJM6210 Communication Skills for Project Managers
Month, day, year
Sources of Conflict in a Virtual Environment
Interpersonal Conflict 🡪 Jones
In the second paragraph, begin addressing your first topic or question. This should directly align to what you stated you were going to talk about in the first se ..
Project Plans Each student will submit two project plan.docxwkyra78
Project Plans
Each student will submit two project plans: a draft project plan and a final project plan.
The first plan is due in Module 2 and the final project plan is due in Module 3. The
purpose of the project plans are to demonstrate mastery of project planning using an
applied context. The draft project plan includes all of the project plan elements covered in
Module 1 and 2. The final project plan includes all of the project plan elements covered
in all three modules.
Draft Project Plan 1
The initial project plan will include the following:
Problem, need, or vision statement
Project Definition or Statement of Work, which includes the following:
o Project objectives or performance criteria
o Assumptions, constraints, and limitations
o Project work requirements: Summary of deliverables
Major responsibilities
Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) down to the work package level
Preliminary Schedule (with event milestones and exit criteria for each milestone)
Final Project Plan 2
The final project plan will include all the elements of the project plan 1 updated, plus the
following elements:
Required resources (people-organization, equipment, materials, and facilities)
Linear Responsibility Matrix: Project organization chart
End-item specifications (such as reference documents, engineering specifications,
regulatory codes, etc.)
Control system (documentation, procedures, and evaluation)
Communication plan (flow of project information to stakeholders)
Quality management plan (methods to be utilized to manage quality and project
processes)
Detailed project schedule (CPM diagram with the critical path identified)
Risk response plan
Change management plan or amendments procedure
Procedures and Criteria
1. Pick a potential project of interest.
2. The project must meet the following criteria:
A job or problem with multiple and sequential tasks
Performed only once (not repetitive in nature)
Has defined start and end points in time (start time and a deadline)
A budget or a limited source of funds
A defined scope of work
Specific performance requirements
More than one person is involved in the project
3. Develop the draft project plan 1 with all of the required elements in Module 2.
4. Update the project plan as you gain more information during the course modules
5. Develop the final project plan during Module 3 and submit via Blackboard
Examples of Possible Projects
Group project for another class
Home improvement project
Auto restoration project
Wedding
Graduation party
Senior project (with a group)
Business start-up
Theatre production
Product development project
Musical recital
Chamber mixer
Holiday parade
Charity fundraiser
Group Vacation
Project Plans Grading Criteria
Each plan will be graded using the following criteria:
Table 1.
Points Plan Content
Plan Organization,
Consistency, and F ...
5show calculation.1. Which one of the following is not diMargaritoWhitt221
5
show calculation.
1. Which one of the following is not directly related to the features of common stocks?
a. Common stock represents the ownership b. Ownership implies control.
c. Stockholders elect directors. d. Directors elect management
e. Management’s goal is to minimize the cost.
2. Which one is the cost of preferred stock, calculated from the data below?
Data: A 10%, $1,000 par value, annually dividend, perpetual preferred stock sells for $1,111.
3. You were recently hired by Hubbard Darren Inc. to estimate its cost of common equity. You obtained the following data: D1 = $1.00; P0 = $42.50; g = 5.00% (constant). What is the cost of equity raised by selling new common stock? (hint: use rs = (D1/P0) X100+(g) or P rs = (D1/P0) X100+(P1-P0)/P0 X100)
4. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, the expected market return is 9.5%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the required rate of return, rs?
5. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the company's current stock price? (Hint: use rs=10.325%)
6. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the Dividend yield?
7. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, the expected market return is 9.5%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the stock’s expected value, P1 one year from now? (Hint: use rs=10.325%)
8. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to grow at a constant rate of 2.00% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, the expected market return is 9.5%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the capital gain yield?
9. The Edward Company is expected to pay a dividend of D1 = $1.00 per share at the end of the year, and that dividend is expected to have a negative and constant growth rate, -4% per year in the future. The company's beta is 1.15, the market risk premium is 5.50%, the expected market return is 9.5%, and the risk-free rate is 4.00%. What is the company's current stock price? (Hint: ...
Discussion- 11. How does efficient frontier analysis (EFA) dif.docxmadlynplamondon
Discussion- 1
1. How does efficient frontier analysis (EFA) differ from other forms of complex risk assessment techniques?
The issue of the selection of the risk management methods to support investment decision-making is one of the key issues discussed in the management of portfolios. The factor contributing to the development and dissemination of the risk management methods is the fact that the development of this theory, the risk of portfolios of financial institutions began to measure widely using the Markowitz portfolio selection model. Currently, this problem has been solved, since his designation used linear programming. It cannot be missed with these two facts. The indication of such a relationship, as well as its characteristics are the main purpose of the publication, in which there was not only used the study literature. The efficient frontier can be defined as the image of a set of portfolios that provide the maximum return for each level of risk or minimal risk for any level of return. In addition, this measure brings important details in the development area of portfolios’ management of financial instruments, on the grounds that it considers the possibility of the investor’s bankruptcy and may be regarded as a dynamic measurement of the risk (Bali T.G).
2. What limitations might an analyst encounter with EFA?
The financial equivalent of racing cars if They're one of the most touted, yet most misunderstood and misused, tools in the field of financial planning. Understanding the nature of an efficient frontier model and the assumptions on which it relies. As with a sophisticated racing car, a powerful tool in the wrong hands can be a very dangerous thing. For example, it's logical to believe that stocks will outperform bonds in the future. Efficient frontier models rely on historical data and relationships to generate the "perfect" portfolio. In my experience, many investors who use efficient frontier models are unaware of their pitfalls. These models are being marketed as solutions to the problem of portfolio construction, but they come without instructions.
3. How can efficient frontier analysis results be communicated and utilized with nonmathematical decision maker?
Communication is not a crank to be turned mindlessly, but a decision problem of its own. As we will see, there are many alternatives to consider. The analyst’s choices constitute the design of a communication plan. In ideal cases, the client is infinitely patient, unshakably invested in the problem, fully committed to finding the highest quality solutions, flexible about the process, and unwavering in confidence in the analyst’s work. In such cases, tight outlines or rambling jumbles may lead to the same outcome. Good quantitative analysis alone does not usually produce good decisions, because rarely does the analyst control all the resources required to decide and act. Decision makers and other players who influence the decision must assimilate the results of th ...
A1 Experiential Learning Project Apply the Design Thinking App.docxdaniahendric
A1: Experiential Learning Project:
Apply the Design Thinking Approach to the creation of a new service and prepare a presentation of the entire process.
The presentation should include all the following major steps of Design Thinking Approach:
a) Understand. Referring to available sources (own experience, outside experts …) research the status quo on
the concept you would like to develop
b) Observe: conduct an ethnographic research by firsthand observation of potential users
c) Ideate: create as many ideas as possible (use techniques as brainstorming). Select the most promising idea
d) Prototype: translate the idea into a simple representation of the app
e) Test: the model with target users. Interact with them. Observe their reactions and behavior and collect
feed-backs to refine the concept
f) The work should also include the marketing plan of the new service.
Outcome requirements:
The slide/visual presentation (format can be selected by the team) will contain the steps in the agenda
mentioned above and it will present the service concept. A visual representation of the service is mandatory.
The Experiential Learning Project will be scored across four (4) attributes based on:
a) Applying the Design Thinking Model. For this first score, the instructor will assess the extent to which
students are able to apply the model into a simulated-real life situation
b) Transforming observations and data into usable information. For this second score, the instructor will
evaluate the extent to which students were able to organize information collected on field analysis in a
presentable fashion (i.e., table, figures, videos …)
c) Creativity: For the third score, the instructor will assess the extent to which students are able to apply
creativity in a new service development and into the presentation itself
d) Original Results: For the fourth score, the instructor will assess the extent to which students are able to
apply the innovation drivers to their project
**********EXAMPLE************
This class was maybe the most troublesome of some other class I have taken at TUI. Be that as it may, I can say I have left with a superior comprehension of Principles of Accounting. The inside and out readings of how to comprehend organizations money related wellbeing was exceptionally enlightening, yet for the present minute isn't important to what I do.
An idea that was precious to me was opportunity costs. They comprise of decisions that make substitute occasions inside people. For myself being a dad of three, officer, and understudy, I in some cases feel that I am out of luck, yet l still figure out how to get past this voyage called life. Deciding to plan something that is going for require penances is a lot of merited, and can have an advantageous effect whenever finished.
The SLP for Module 3 was intriguing on the grounds that as customers, we investigate the "four P's" constantly while shopping. Being from a little Pacific island, regardless we use ...
Discussion Questions Chapter 15Terms in Review1Define or exp.docxedgar6wallace88877
Discussion Questions Chapter 15
Terms in Review
1
Define or explain:
1. Coding rules.
2. Spreadsheet data entry.
3. Bar codes.
4. Precoded instruments.
5. Content analysis.
6. Missing data.
7. Optical mark recognition.
2
How should the researcher handle “don’t know” responses?
Making Research Decisions
3
A problem facing shoe store managers is that many shoes eventually must be sold at markdown prices. This prompts us to conduct a mail survey of shoe store managers in which we ask, What methods have you found most successful for reducing the problem of high markdowns? We are interested in extracting as much information as possible from these answers to better understand the full range of strategies that store managers use. Establish what you think are category sets to code 500 responses similar to the 14 given here. Try to develop an integrated set of categories that reflects your theory of markdown management. After developing the set, use it to code the 14 responses.
1. Have not found the answer. As long as we buy style shoes, we will have markdowns. We use PMs on slow merchandise, but it does not eliminate markdowns. (PM stands for “push-money”—special item bonuses for selling a particular style of shoe.)
2. Using PMs before too old. Also reducing price during season. Holding meetings with salespeople indicating which shoes to push.
3. By putting PMs on any slow-selling items and promoting same. More careful check of shoes purchased.
4. Keep a close watch on your stock, and mark down when you have to—that is, rather than wait, take a small markdown on a shoe that is not moving at the time.
5. Using the PM method.
6. Less advance buying—more dependence on in-stock shoes.
7. Sales—catch bad guys before it’s too late and close out.
8. Buy as much good merchandise as you can at special prices to help make up some markdowns.
9. Reducing opening buys and depending on fill-in service. PMs for salespeople.
10. Buy more frequently, better buying, PMs on slow-moving merchandise.
11. Careful buying at lowest prices. Cash on the buying line. Buying closeouts, FDs, overstock, “cancellations.” (FD stands for “factory-discontinued” style.)
12. By buying less “chanceable” shoes. Buy only what you need, watch sizes, don’t go overboard on new fads.
13. Buying more staple merchandise. Buying more from fewer lines. Sticking with better nationally advertised merchandise.
14. No successful method with the current style situation. Manufacturers are experimenting, the retailer takes the markdowns—cuts gross profit by about 3 percent—keep your stock at lowest level without losing sales.
4
Select a small sample of class members, work associates, or friends and ask them to answer the following in a paragraph or two: What are your career aspirations for the next five years? Use one of the four basic units of content analysis to analyze their responses. Describe your findings as frequencies for the unit of analysis selected.
Bringing Research to L.
FIN 320 Final Project Guidelines and Rubric Final Pro.docxmydrynan
FIN 320 Final Project Guidelines and Rubric
Final Project Part I
Part I Overview
Business professionals typically need to demonstrate a core set of financial knowledge to earn the job and to succeed on a job. For this part of the assessment,
you will be given a scenario in which you are asked to illustrate your financial management knowledge.
This part of the final project addresses the following course outcomes:
Analyze the roles and responsibilities of financial managers in confirming compliance with federal and shareholder requirements
Differentiate between various financial markets and institutions by comparing and contrasting options when selecting appropriate private and corporate
investments
Part I Prompt
You have completed an internship in the finance division of a fast-growing information technology corporation. Your boss, the financial manager, is considering
hiring you for a full-time job. He first wants to evaluate your financial knowledge and has provided you with a short examination. When composing your answers
to this employment examination, ensure that they are cohesive and read like a short essay.
Your submission must address the following critical elements:
I. Analyze Roles and Responsibilities for Compliance
A. Examine the types of decisions financial managers make. How are these decisions related to the primary objective of financial managers?
B. Analyze the various ethical issues a financial manager could potentially face and how these could be handled.
C. Compare and contrast the different federal safeguards that are in place to reduce financial reporting abuse. Why are these considered
appropriate safeguards?
II. Investment Options
A. If a private company is “going public,” what does this mean, and how would the company do this? What are the advantages of doing this? Do
you see any disadvantages? If so, what are they?
B. How do the largest U.S. stock markets differ? Out of those choices, which would be the smartest private investment option, in your opinion?
Why?
C. Compare and contrast the various investment products that are available and the types of institutions that sell them.
Final Project Part I Rubric
Guidelines for Submission: Ensure that your employment examination is submitted as one comprehensive and cohesive short essay (2-3 pages). It should use
double spacing, 12-point Times New Roman font, and one-inch margins. Citations should be formatted according to APA style.
Instructor Feedback: This activity uses an integrated rubric in Blackboard. Students can view instructor feedback in the Grade Center. For more information,
review these instructions.
Critical Elements Exemplary (100%) Proficient (85%) Needs Improvement (55%) Not Evident (0%) Value
Roles and
Responsibilities:
Examine
Meets “Proficient” criteria and
includes examples in analysis
Comprehensively examines the
types of decisions financial
managers make, including ...
PERSONAL CHAPTER TAKEAWAYS Action Plan – Tunnel Vision .docxherbertwilson5999
PERSONAL CHAPTER TAKEAWAYS
Action Plan – Tunnel Vision
Take a few minutes and complete this Action Plan about Tunnel Vision.
Tunnel Vision
Self-Handicap
What is the
Situation
Trigger Impact on Others What to Do/When
Changing your
mindsets
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Get beyond linear
thinking
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Learn to juggle
projects
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Think long-term. ___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
View situations
from different
perspectives
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Practice conceptual
thinking
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Engage in “what-if”
thinking
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Create a map of the
variables for a
project
and their
interactions
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Analyze group
influences on
your thinking
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Choose a problem
to work on
when you have free
moments
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Better Prioritizing
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Deal with
procrastination
___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
___Look & Listen___________
Ignoring people
after you get your
way
___Expedient .
The Validity of Company Valuation Using Dis.docxchristalgrieg
The Validity of Company Valuation
Using Discounted Cash Flow Methods
Florian Steiger
1
Seminar Paper
Fall 2008
Abstract
This paper closely examines theoretical and practical aspects of the widely used discounted
cash flows (DCF) valuation method. It assesses its potentials as well as several weaknesses. A
special emphasize is being put on the valuation of companies using the DCF method. The
paper finds that the discounted cash flow method is a powerful tool to analyze even complex
situations. However, the DCF method is subject to massive assumption bias and even slight
changes in the underlying assumptions of an analysis can drastically alter the valuation
results. A practical example of these implications is given using a scenario analysis.
____________
1
Author: Florian Steiger, European Business School, e-mail: [email protected]
Table of Contents
List of abbreviations ........................................................................................................... i
List of figures and tables ................................................................................................... ii
1 Introduction .................................................................................................................. 1
1.1 Problem Definition and Objective ...................................................................... 1
1.2 Course of the Investigation ................................................................................. 2
2 Company valuation ....................................................................................................... 2
2.1 General Goal and Use of Company Valuation ................................................... 2
2.2 Other Valuation Methods ................................................................................... 3
3 The Discounted Cash Flow Valuation Method ............................................................ 4
3.1 Approach of the Discounted Cash Flow Valuation ............................................ 4
3.2 Calculation of the Free Cash Flow ..................................................................... 5
3.2.1 Cash Flow to Firm and Cash Flow to Equity.................................................. 5
3.2.2 Building Future Scenarios .............................................................................. 6
3.3 The Weighted Average Cost of Capital ............................................................. 6
3.3.1 Cost of Equity ................................................................................................. 7
3.3.2 Cost of Debt .................................................................................................... 8
3.3.3 Summary ......................................................................................................... 9
3.4 Calculation of the Terminal Value ................................................... ...
Calculus Quiz 2 (Derivatives)Covers Units 9-13. This is a 10 quest.docxclairbycraft
Calculus Quiz 2 (Derivatives)
Covers Units 9-13. This is a 10 question, 10 point quiz consisting of multiple choice and calculated numeric answers.
You should complete the homework over these units before beginning the quiz.
You should complete the by
Thursday, November 12.
YOU MAY ATTEMPT THE QUIZ up to 3 timesIF YOU WISH to improve your score.
.
Calculus IDirections (10 pts. each) Answer each of the followin.docxclairbycraft
Calculus I
Directions: (10 pts. each) Answer each of the following questions below. In order to receive ANY credit for a question, you must SHOW YOUR WORK using proper notation and clear and concise logic. You're graded on both the accuracy of your answers AND your explanations that sufficiently support your answers. Unless otherwise stated, you're to give the EXAXCT VALUES of answers instead of decimal approximations. In order to receive ANY credit for any applied/word problem (i.e. Problems #29 - ), you MUST declare a variable (unless the variable(s) have already been declared in the problem) and set up and solve an appropriate mathematical expression that can be used to answer the question. Proper units must also be included in answers to applied problems. NO CREDIT WILL BE GIVEN FOR EITHER GUESSING OR CHECKING POSSIBLE ANSWERS WITHOUT SOLVING THE PROBLEM. YOU CANNOT USE CALCULUS TO SOLVE THESE PROBLEMS.
Finally, write ONLY FINAL ANSWERS ON THESE PAGES; you must show your work both according to homework guidelines and on YOUR OWN PAPER.
SHORT ANSWER. Write the word or phrase that best completes each statement or answers the question.
Multiply or divide as indicated. Write your answer in factored form.
1) x22 - 9x + 14 · xx22 -- 1618x x ++ 4877 1)
2)
x
-
12
x
+
32
Simplify the complex rational expression.
4
x
2
-
4
x
-
32
-
1
x
-
8
2)
1 + 1 x + 4
Find the difference quotient for the function and simplify it.
3) g(x) = 6x2 + 14x - 1 3)
Find the domain and range of the function. Write your answers using interval notation.
4)
g(z)
=
16
-
z
2
4)
Find a formula for the function graphed.
5) 5)
Determine if the function is even, odd, or neither. You must use algebra to justify your answer; otherwise, no full credit will be given. NO CREDIT is given for an answer without a mathematical explanation.
6) f(x) = x -+7 9 6)
State the domain of the composition.
7)
(
g
H
h)(x) with g(x)
=
x
+
5
and h(x)
=
8
x
+
7
7)
Compute
f(x
+
h)
-
f(x)
h
(h
J
0) for the given function
.
8) f(x) = 4x - 8 8)
9)
f(x)
=
5
x
2
+
6
x
9)
10)
f(x)
=
1
9
x
10)
Solve the equation by multiplying both sides by the LCD.
11) 32x - x 3+ 1 = 1 11)
12)
Solve the equation.
x
+
6
+
2
-
x
=
4
12)
13)
(
4
x
-
2
)
/
3
2
+
6
=
15
13)
14)
3
x
+
4
=
x
-
1
14)
Find the real solutions of the equation by factoring.
15) x3 + 8x2 - x - 8 = 0 15)
Solve the equation by making an appropriate substitution.
16) (x2 - 2x)2 - 11(x2 - 2x) + 24 = 0 16)
Solve the logarithmic equation.
17) log2(x + 7) + log2(x - 7) = 2 17)
Solve the exponential equation. Express the solution set in terms of natural logarithms.
18) 4x + 4 = 52x + 5 18)
Solve the inequality and express the solution in interval notation.
19) 7Ax - 1A L 2 19)
Solve the inequality. Write your answer using interval notation.
20) x 18- 5 > x 15+ 1 20)
Write the equation as f(x) = a(x - h)2 + k. Identify the vertex, range, and axis of symmetry of the function.
21) f(x) = x2 + 5x + 2 21)
23) log
F.
Cadence Publishes Comprehensive Book onMixed-Signal Method.docxclairbycraft
Cadence Publishes Comprehensive Book on
Mixed-Signal Methodology; The "Mixed-Signal
Methodology Guide" Provides Expert Direction
on How to Address Design, Verification and
Implementation Challenges of Modern Mixed-
Signal Designs
Publication info: M2 Presswire ; Coventry [Coventry]14 Aug 2012.
ProQuest document link
ABSTRACT
SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Cadence Design Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CDNS), a leader in global electronic design innovation,
today announced availability of the critically acclaimed and much anticipated comprehensive design methodology
book for chip designers and CAD engineers that focuses on current and future advanced mixed-signal design
challenges and solutions. The "Mixed-Signal Methodology Guide" provides an overview of the design, verification
and implementation methodologies required for advanced mixed-signal designs. The book brings together top
mixed-signal design experts from across the industry -- including authors from Boeing, Cadence(R), ClioSoft and
Qualcomm -- to address the complex problems facing the mixed-signal design community.
"Modern mixed-signal design require new methodologies to improve productivity, reduce design time and achieve
silicon success," said Hao Fang, engineering director at LSI. "The Mixed-Signal Methodology Guide is a thorough
reference book on advanced verification and implementation methodologies. It will be particularly useful to mixed-
signal verification engineers for its coverage of analog behavioral modeling, and assertion and metric driven
verification methodology as applied to analog and mixed-signal design."
FULL TEXT
M2 PRESSWIRE-August 14, 2012-Cadence Publishes Comprehensive Book on Mixed-Signal Methodology; The
"Mixed-Signal Methodology Guide" Provides Expert Direction on How to Address Design, Verification and
Implementation Challenges of Modern Mixed-Signal Designs
(C)2012 M2 COMMUNICATIONS http://www.m2.com
August 13, 2012
SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Cadence Design Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CDNS), a leader in global electronic design innovation,
today announced availability of the critically acclaimed and much anticipated comprehensive design methodology
book for chip designers and CAD engineers that focuses on current and future advanced mixed-signal design
challenges and solutions. The "Mixed-Signal Methodology Guide" provides an overview of the design, verification
and implementation methodologies required for advanced mixed-signal designs. The book brings together top
mixed-signal design experts from across the industry -- including authors from Boeing, Cadence(R), ClioSoft and
Qualcomm -- to address the complex problems facing the mixed-signal design community.
The growing complexity of today's mixed-signal designs requires major changes in design methodology to both
increase productivity and deliver high quality products on time. This wide-ranging compendium examines in depth
such topics as AMS behavioral modeling, mixed-signal me.
Calculate the energy in the form of heat (in kJ) required to change .docxclairbycraft
Calculate the energy in the form of heat (in kJ) required to change 75.0 g of liquid water at 27.0 °C to ice at –20.0 °C. Assume that no energy in the form of heat is transferred to the environment. (Heat of fusion = 333 J/g; heat of vaporization = 2256 J/g; specific heat capacities: ice = 2.06 J/g×K, liquid water = 4.184 J/g×K)
.
CAHIIM Competencies Assessed Subdomain VI.D. Human Resources Ma.docxclairbycraft
CAHIIM Competencies Assessed:
Subdomain VI.D. Human Resources Management
Create and implement staff orientation and training programs (Blooms 6)
Instructions:
You are an HIM Supervisor at a hospital and you have been asked to create a new staff training on data compliance rules. Assume that the new staff has a wide variety of background, with some new staff knowing nothing about data compliance at all. The training should be basic and introductory.
Create an outline for your training.
Requirements:
Include an introduction and summary within your outline
Length of outline should be 3-4 pages
It should be an annotated outline. This means that it should include citations within the outline and a reference page.
Your training should include the topics of HIPAA and The Joint Commission and other data compliance topics that affect hospital staff
.
C8-1 CASE STUDY 8 CARLSON COMPANIES STORAGE SOLUT.docxclairbycraft
C8-1
CASE STUDY 8
CARLSON COMPANIES STORAGE SOLUTIONS
Carlson Companies (www.carlson.com) is one of the largest privately held
companies in the United States, with more than 171,000 employees in more
than 150 countries. Carlson enterprises include a presence in marketing,
business and leisure travel, and hospitality industries. Its Carlson Hotels
Worldwide division owns and operates approximately 1,075 hotels located in
more than 70 countries. Radisson, Park Plaza, and Country Inn & Suites by
Carlson are some of its hotel brands. The hotel loyalty program is named
Club Carlson. The Carlson Restaurants Worldwide includes T.G.I. Friday’s
and the Pick Up Stix chains. The company registered approximately $38
billion in sales in 2011.
Carlson’s Information Technology (IT) division, Carlson Shared Services,
acts as a service provider to its internal clients and consequently must
support a spectrum of user applications and services. The IT division uses a
centralized data processing model to meet business operational
requirements. The central computing environment has traditionally included
an IBM mainframe and over 50 networked Hewlett-Packard and Sun servers
[KRAN04, CLAR02, HIGG02]. The mainframe supports a wide range of
applications, including Oracle financial database, e-mail, Microsoft Exchange,
Web, PeopleSoft, and a data warehouse application.
C8-2
In 2002, the IT division established six goals for assuring that IT
services continued to meet the needs of a growing company with heavy
reliance on data and applications:
1. Implement an enterprise data warehouse.
2. Build a global network.
3. Move to enterprise-wide architecture.
4. Establish six-sigma quality for Carlson clients.
5. Facilitate outsourcing and exchange.
6. Leverage existing technology and resources.
The key to meeting these goals was to implement a storage area
network (SAN) with a consolidated, centralized database to support
mainframe and server applications. Carlson needed a SAN and data center
approach that provided a reliable, highly scalable facility to accommodate
the increasing demands of its users.
Storage Requirements
Prior to implementing the SAN and data center approach, the central DP
shop included separate disc storage for each server, plus that of the
mainframe. This dispersed data storage scheme had the advantage of
responsiveness; that is, the access time from a server to its data was
minimal. However, the data management cost was high. There had to be
backup procedures for the storage on each server, as well as management
controls to reconcile data distributed throughout the system. The mainframe
included an efficient disaster recovery plan to preserve data in the event of
major system crashes or other incidents and to get data back online with
little or no disruption to the users. No comparable plan existed for the many
servers.
C8-3
As Ca.
Caffeine intake in children in the United States and 10-ytre.docxclairbycraft
Caffeine intake in children in the United States and 10-y
trends: 2001–20101–4
Namanjeet Ahluwalia, Kirsten Herrick, Alanna Moshfegh, and Michael Rybak
ABSTRACT
Background: Because of the increasing concern of the potential
adverse effects of caffeine intake in children, recent estimates of
caffeine consumption in a representative sample of children are
needed.
Objectives: We provide estimates of caffeine intake in children in
absolute amounts (mg) and in relation to body weight (mg/kg) to
examine the association of caffeine consumption with sociodemo-
graphic factors and describe trends in caffeine intake in children in
the United States.
Design: We analyzed caffeine intake in 3280 children aged 2–19 y
who participated in a 24-h dietary recall as part of the NHANES,
which is a nationally representative survey of the US population
with a cross-sectional design, in 2009–2010. Trends over time be-
tween 2001 and 2010 were examined in 2–19-y-old children (n =
18,530). Analyses were conducted for all children and repeated for
caffeine consumers.
Results: In 2009–2010, 71% of US children consumed caffeine on
a given day. Median caffeine intakes for 2–5-, 6–11-, and 12–19-y
olds were 1.3, 4.5, and 13.6 mg, respectively, and 4.7, 9.1, and 40.6
mg, respectively, in caffeine consumers. Non-Hispanic black chil-
dren had lower caffeine intake than that of non-Hispanic white
counterparts. Caffeine intake correlated positively with age; this
association was independent of body weight. On a given day,
10% of 12–19-y-olds exceeded the suggested maximum caffeine
intake of 2.5 mg/kg by Health Canada. A significant linear trend
of decline in caffeine intake (in mg or mg/kg) was noted overall for
children aged 2–19 y during 2001–2010. Specifically, caffeine in-
take declined by 3.0 and 4.6 mg in 2–5- and 6–11-y-old caffeine
consumers, respectively; no change was noted in 12–19-y-olds.
Conclusion: A majority of US children including preschoolers con-
sumed caffeine. Caffeine intake was highest in 12–19-y-olds and
remained stable over the 10-y study period in this age group. Am J
Clin Nutr 2014;100:1124–32.
INTRODUCTION
Caffeine is a commonly consumed stimulant present naturally
in or added to foods and beverages. Caffeine consumption in
children has received considerable interest because of the con-
cern of adverse health effects. Caffeine intake of 100–400 mg has
been associated with nervousness, jitteriness, and fidgetiness
(1, 2). Because of the continued brain development involving
myelination and pruning processes, children may be particularly
sensitive to caffeine (3, 4). There has been some evidence that
has linked caffeine intake in children to sleep dysfunction, el-
evated blood pressure, impairments in mineral absorption and
bone health, and increased alcohol use or dependence (1, 5–7).
In addition, the routine use of caffeinated sugar-sweetened
beverages may contribute to weight gain and dental cavities (8).
Caffeine toxicity in children has also.
Cabbage patch hip dance move, The running man hip hop dance move, th.docxclairbycraft
Cabbage patch hip dance move, The running man hip hop dance move, the humpty dance hip hop move and the butterfly hip hop dance move. Describe each using the attachment in the assignment which provides certain words and descriptions. each style of dance ( cabbage patch, running man, the humpty dance, butterfly) has to have description or analysis using B.A.S.T.E See the attachment
use the attachment to describe each hip hop dance move
.
CA4Leading TeamsAre we a teamHi, my name is Jenny .docxclairbycraft
CA4:
Leading Teams
Are we a team?
Hi, my name is Jenny McConnell. I am the newly appointed CIO of a medium-sized technology company. Our company recruits top graduates from schools of business and engineering. Talent, intellect, creativity – it’s all there. If you lined up this crowd for a group photo, credentials in hand, the “wow” factor would be there.
Our company is spread over a dozen states, mostly in the Northwest. The talent pool is amazing across the board, both in IT and in the rest of the company. But when the CEO hired me, he said that we are performing nowhere near our potential. On the surface, the company is doing fine. But we should be a
Fortune 500
organization. With this much talent, we should be growing at a much faster rate. The CEO also said that I was inheriting “a super team with disappointing performance.” His task for me was to pull the IT stars into a cohesive team that would meet company needs for new IT systems and services much faster and more effectively.
Without making our superstars feel that they were being critiqued and second-guessed, or indicating “there’s a real problem here,” I wanted to gather as much information and feedback as possible from the 14 team members (regional CIOs and department heads) who report to me. I held one-on-one meetings in order to give a voice to each person, allowing each individual to provide an honest assessment of the team as well as areas for improvement and a vision for the future of team efforts.
I was surprised by the consistency of remarks and opinions. For example, a picture emerged of the previous CIO, who was obviously awed by the talent level of the team members. Comments such as “Bob pretty much let us do what we wanted” and “Bob would start the meeting and then just fade into the background, as if he found us intimidating” were typical. The more disturbing comment, “Bob always agree with
me
,” was expressed by most of the team members at some point in our conversation. It was as if the regional heads believed that the CIO wanted them to succeed by doing as they thought best for themselves.
I queried members about the level of cooperation during meetings and uncovered areas of concern, including the complaint that others at the table were constantly checking their iPads and smartphones during meetings. One department head told me, “You could turn off the sound while watching one of our meetings, and just by the body language and level of attention, tell who is aligned with whom and who wishes the speaker would just shup up. It would be comical if it weren’t so distressing.”
Such remarks were indicative of a lack of trust and respect and a breakdown of genuine communication. One team member told me, “I recently encountered a problem that a department head from another region had successfully solved, but the information was never shared, so here I am reinventing the wheel and wasting valuable time.” It was apparent that these so-called high performers were .
C7-1 CASE STUDY 7 DATA CENTER CONSOLIDATION AT GUARDI.docxclairbycraft
C7-1
CASE STUDY 7
DATA CENTER CONSOLIDATION AT GUARDIAN
LIFE
As one of the largest mutual life insurance firms in the United States,
Guardian Life (www.guardianlife.com) has more than 5000 employees and
over 3000 financial representatives in 80 agencies. Guardian and its
subsidiaries provide almost three million people with life and disability
income insurance, retirement services, and investment products such as
mutual funds, securities, variable life insurance, and variable annuities. The
company also supplies employee benefits programs to six million
participants, including life, health, and dental insurance, as well as qualified
pension plans. In addition to regional home offices in New York City;
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania; Spokane, Washington; and Appleton, Wisconsin,
the company has 55 remote sales offices and 80 remote agency offices.
Like other insurance companies, Guardian Life is an information
intensive organization where data processing and communications network
infrastructure have consistently been important contributors to its success.
Guardian Life’s IT organization has earned numerous accolades including
multiple CIO100 awards from CIO magazine [PRNE11]. According to Dennis
Callahan, Executive Vice President and Chief Information Officer for,
Guardian Life, "A strong partnership between IT and the businesses enables
http://www.guardianlife.com/
C7-2
Guardian to deliver cost-effective technology services that facilitate world-
class customer service, product innovation, and operational efficiency.”
Ensuring alignment between business and IT is important to Guardian Life
and provides a consistent theme for many of the insurance companies IT
projects including its data center consolidation initiatives [CIOZ12].
Data center consolidation has been an ongoing concern at Guardian for
more than a decade. Guardian’s IT governance structure is team-oriented
and the company’s data center consolidation initiatives are overseen by it
Infrastructure team. The Infrastructure team is primarily co-located in New
York, and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania but it has key support teams in Spokane,
Washington, Appleton, Wisconsin, and Pittsfield, Massachusetts.
Guardian Life began taking a serious look at data center consolidation in
2000, but in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack,
Guardian also became more concerned with business continuity issues.
Guardian had four significant data centers, at its four home offices, but the
primary data center was in New York City. After 9/11, Guardian wanted
make infrastructure changes to ensure business continuity across its existing
data centers and made plans to add two more data centers to the mix.
Guardian performed an assessment of its data centers to provide a basis
for planning on the location of data processing resources. One surprising
outcome of this assessment had to do with utilization. The.
C9-1 CASE STUDY 9 ST. LUKES HEALTH CARE SYSTEM Hospitals have been .docxclairbycraft
C9-1 CASE STUDY 9 ST. LUKE'S HEALTH CARE SYSTEM Hospitals have been some of the earliest adopters of wireless local area networks (WLANs). The clinician user population is typically mobile and spread out across a number of buildings, with a need to enter and access data in real time. St. Luke's Episcopal Health System in Houston, Texas (www.stlukestexas.com) is a good example of a hospital that has made effective use wireless technologies to streamline clinical work processes. Their wireless network is distributed throughout several hospital buildings and is used in many different applications. The majority of the St. Luke’s staff uses wireless devices to access data in real-time, 24 hours a day. Examples include the following: • Diagnosing patients and charting their progress: Doctors and nurses use wireless laptops and tablet PCs to track and chart patient care data. • Prescriptions: Medications are dispensed from a cart that is wheeled from room to room. Clinician uses a wireless scanner to scan the patient's ID bracelet. If a prescription order has been changed or cancelled, the clinician will know immediately because the mobile device displays current patient data. C9-2 • Critical care units: These areas use the WLAN because running hard wires would mean moving ceiling panels. The dust and microbes that such work stirs up would pose a threat to patients. • Case management: The case managers in the Utilization Management Department use the WLAN to document patient reviews, insurance calls/authorization information, and denial information. The wireless session enables real time access to information that ensures the correct level of care for a patient and/or timely discharge. • Blood management: Blood management is a complex process that involves monitoring both patients and blood products during all stages of a treatment process. To ensure that blood products and patients are matched correctly, St. Luke’s uses a wireless bar code scanning process that involves scanning both patient and blood product bar codes during the infusion process. This enables clinicians to confirm patient and blood product identification before proceeding with treatment. • Nutrition and diet: Dietary service representatives collect patient menus at each nursing unit and enter them as they go. This allows more menus to be submitted before the cutoff time, giving more patients more choice. The dietitian can also see current patient information, such as supplement or tube feeding data, and view what the patient actually received for a certain meal. • Mobile x-ray and neurologic units: St. Luke’s has implemented the wireless network infrastructure necessary to enable doctors and clinicians to use mobile x-ray and neurologic scanning units. This makes it possible to take x-rays or to perform neurological studies in patient rooms. This minimizes the need to schedule patients for neurology or radiology lab visits. The mobile units also enable equipment to be brought to t.
C9-1 CASE STUDY 9 ST. LUKES HEALTH CARE SYSTEM .docxclairbycraft
C9-1
CASE STUDY 9
ST. LUKE'S HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
Hospitals have been some of the earliest adopters of wireless local area
networks (WLANs). The clinician user population is typically mobile and
spread out across a number of buildings, with a need to enter and access
data in real time. St. Luke's Episcopal Health System in Houston, Texas
(www.stlukestexas.com) is a good example of a hospital that has made
effective use wireless technologies to streamline clinical work processes.
Their wireless network is distributed throughout several hospital buildings
and is used in many different applications. The majority of the St. Luke’s
staff uses wireless devices to access data in real-time, 24 hours a day.
Examples include the following:
• Diagnosing patients and charting their progress: Doctors and
nurses use wireless laptops and tablet PCs to track and chart patient
care data.
• Prescriptions: Medications are dispensed from a cart that is wheeled
from room to room. Clinician uses a wireless scanner to scan the
patient's ID bracelet. If a prescription order has been changed or
cancelled, the clinician will know immediately because the mobile device
displays current patient data.
http://www.stlukestexas.com/
C9-2
• Critical care units: These areas use the WLAN because running hard
wires would mean moving ceiling panels. The dust and microbes that
such work stirs up would pose a threat to patients.
• Case management: The case managers in the Utilization Management
Department use the WLAN to document patient reviews, insurance
calls/authorization information, and denial information. The wireless
session enables real time access to information that ensures the correct
level of care for a patient and/or timely discharge.
• Blood management: Blood management is a complex process that
involves monitoring both patients and blood products during all stages of
a treatment process. To ensure that blood products and patients are
matched correctly, St. Luke’s uses a wireless bar code scanning process
that involves scanning both patient and blood product bar codes during
the infusion process. This enables clinicians to confirm patient and blood
product identification before proceeding with treatment.
• Nutrition and diet: Dietary service representatives collect patient
menus at each nursing unit and enter them as they go. This allows more
menus to be submitted before the cutoff time, giving more patients
more choice. The dietitian can also see current patient information, such
as supplement or tube feeding data, and view what the patient actually
received for a certain meal.
• Mobile x-ray and neurologic units: St. Luke’s has implemented the
wireless network infrastructure necessary to enable doctors and
clinicians to use mobile x-ray and neurologic scanning units. This makes
it possible to take x-rays or to perform neurological studies in patient
rooms. This min.
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This class was maybe the most troublesome of some other class I have taken at TUI. Be that as it may, I can say I have left with a superior comprehension of Principles of Accounting. The inside and out readings of how to comprehend organizations money related wellbeing was exceptionally enlightening, yet for the present minute isn't important to what I do.
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Define or explain:
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4. Precoded instruments.
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How should the researcher handle “don’t know” responses?
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Final Project Part I
Part I Overview
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Take a few minutes and complete this Action Plan about Tunnel Vision.
Tunnel Vision
Self-Handicap
What is the
Situation
Trigger Impact on Others What to Do/When
Changing your
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___Expedient
___Avoiding
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___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
___Face it _________________
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Get beyond linear
thinking
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___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
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___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
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___Look & Listen___________
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___Deliberate Action________
___Self-efficacy_____________
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___Expedient
___Avoiding
___Apprehension
___Self-Deception
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___Self-efficacy_____________
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Practice conceptual
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Florian Steiger
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Seminar Paper
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Abstract
This paper closely examines theoretical and practical aspects of the widely used discounted
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results. A practical example of these implications is given using a scenario analysis.
____________
1
Author: Florian Steiger, European Business School, e-mail: [email protected]
Table of Contents
List of abbreviations ........................................................................................................... i
List of figures and tables ................................................................................................... ii
1 Introduction .................................................................................................................. 1
1.1 Problem Definition and Objective ...................................................................... 1
1.2 Course of the Investigation ................................................................................. 2
2 Company valuation ....................................................................................................... 2
2.1 General Goal and Use of Company Valuation ................................................... 2
2.2 Other Valuation Methods ................................................................................... 3
3 The Discounted Cash Flow Valuation Method ............................................................ 4
3.1 Approach of the Discounted Cash Flow Valuation ............................................ 4
3.2 Calculation of the Free Cash Flow ..................................................................... 5
3.2.1 Cash Flow to Firm and Cash Flow to Equity.................................................. 5
3.2.2 Building Future Scenarios .............................................................................. 6
3.3 The Weighted Average Cost of Capital ............................................................. 6
3.3.1 Cost of Equity ................................................................................................. 7
3.3.2 Cost of Debt .................................................................................................... 8
3.3.3 Summary ......................................................................................................... 9
3.4 Calculation of the Terminal Value ................................................... ...
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x
-
12
x
+
32
Simplify the complex rational expression.
4
x
2
-
4
x
-
32
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1
x
-
8
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g(z)
=
16
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z
2
4)
Find a formula for the function graphed.
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(
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5
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f(x)
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2
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x
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f(x)
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Solve the inequality. Write your answer using interval notation.
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M2 PRESSWIRE-August 14, 2012-Cadence Publishes Comprehensive Book on Mixed-Signal Methodology; The
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(C)2012 M2 COMMUNICATIONS http://www.m2.com
August 13, 2012
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C8-1
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Carlson Companies (www.carlson.com) is one of the largest privately held
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than 150 countries. Carlson enterprises include a presence in marketing,
business and leisure travel, and hospitality industries. Its Carlson Hotels
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and the Pick Up Stix chains. The company registered approximately $38
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[KRAN04, CLAR02, HIGG02]. The mainframe supports a wide range of
applications, including Oracle financial database, e-mail, Microsoft Exchange,
Web, PeopleSoft, and a data warehouse application.
C8-2
In 2002, the IT division established six goals for assuring that IT
services continued to meet the needs of a growing company with heavy
reliance on data and applications:
1. Implement an enterprise data warehouse.
2. Build a global network.
3. Move to enterprise-wide architecture.
4. Establish six-sigma quality for Carlson clients.
5. Facilitate outsourcing and exchange.
6. Leverage existing technology and resources.
The key to meeting these goals was to implement a storage area
network (SAN) with a consolidated, centralized database to support
mainframe and server applications. Carlson needed a SAN and data center
approach that provided a reliable, highly scalable facility to accommodate
the increasing demands of its users.
Storage Requirements
Prior to implementing the SAN and data center approach, the central DP
shop included separate disc storage for each server, plus that of the
mainframe. This dispersed data storage scheme had the advantage of
responsiveness; that is, the access time from a server to its data was
minimal. However, the data management cost was high. There had to be
backup procedures for the storage on each server, as well as management
controls to reconcile data distributed throughout the system. The mainframe
included an efficient disaster recovery plan to preserve data in the event of
major system crashes or other incidents and to get data back online with
little or no disruption to the users. No comparable plan existed for the many
servers.
C8-3
As Ca.
Caffeine intake in children in the United States and 10-ytre.docxclairbycraft
Caffeine intake in children in the United States and 10-y
trends: 2001–20101–4
Namanjeet Ahluwalia, Kirsten Herrick, Alanna Moshfegh, and Michael Rybak
ABSTRACT
Background: Because of the increasing concern of the potential
adverse effects of caffeine intake in children, recent estimates of
caffeine consumption in a representative sample of children are
needed.
Objectives: We provide estimates of caffeine intake in children in
absolute amounts (mg) and in relation to body weight (mg/kg) to
examine the association of caffeine consumption with sociodemo-
graphic factors and describe trends in caffeine intake in children in
the United States.
Design: We analyzed caffeine intake in 3280 children aged 2–19 y
who participated in a 24-h dietary recall as part of the NHANES,
which is a nationally representative survey of the US population
with a cross-sectional design, in 2009–2010. Trends over time be-
tween 2001 and 2010 were examined in 2–19-y-old children (n =
18,530). Analyses were conducted for all children and repeated for
caffeine consumers.
Results: In 2009–2010, 71% of US children consumed caffeine on
a given day. Median caffeine intakes for 2–5-, 6–11-, and 12–19-y
olds were 1.3, 4.5, and 13.6 mg, respectively, and 4.7, 9.1, and 40.6
mg, respectively, in caffeine consumers. Non-Hispanic black chil-
dren had lower caffeine intake than that of non-Hispanic white
counterparts. Caffeine intake correlated positively with age; this
association was independent of body weight. On a given day,
10% of 12–19-y-olds exceeded the suggested maximum caffeine
intake of 2.5 mg/kg by Health Canada. A significant linear trend
of decline in caffeine intake (in mg or mg/kg) was noted overall for
children aged 2–19 y during 2001–2010. Specifically, caffeine in-
take declined by 3.0 and 4.6 mg in 2–5- and 6–11-y-old caffeine
consumers, respectively; no change was noted in 12–19-y-olds.
Conclusion: A majority of US children including preschoolers con-
sumed caffeine. Caffeine intake was highest in 12–19-y-olds and
remained stable over the 10-y study period in this age group. Am J
Clin Nutr 2014;100:1124–32.
INTRODUCTION
Caffeine is a commonly consumed stimulant present naturally
in or added to foods and beverages. Caffeine consumption in
children has received considerable interest because of the con-
cern of adverse health effects. Caffeine intake of 100–400 mg has
been associated with nervousness, jitteriness, and fidgetiness
(1, 2). Because of the continued brain development involving
myelination and pruning processes, children may be particularly
sensitive to caffeine (3, 4). There has been some evidence that
has linked caffeine intake in children to sleep dysfunction, el-
evated blood pressure, impairments in mineral absorption and
bone health, and increased alcohol use or dependence (1, 5–7).
In addition, the routine use of caffeinated sugar-sweetened
beverages may contribute to weight gain and dental cavities (8).
Caffeine toxicity in children has also.
Cabbage patch hip dance move, The running man hip hop dance move, th.docxclairbycraft
Cabbage patch hip dance move, The running man hip hop dance move, the humpty dance hip hop move and the butterfly hip hop dance move. Describe each using the attachment in the assignment which provides certain words and descriptions. each style of dance ( cabbage patch, running man, the humpty dance, butterfly) has to have description or analysis using B.A.S.T.E See the attachment
use the attachment to describe each hip hop dance move
.
CA4Leading TeamsAre we a teamHi, my name is Jenny .docxclairbycraft
CA4:
Leading Teams
Are we a team?
Hi, my name is Jenny McConnell. I am the newly appointed CIO of a medium-sized technology company. Our company recruits top graduates from schools of business and engineering. Talent, intellect, creativity – it’s all there. If you lined up this crowd for a group photo, credentials in hand, the “wow” factor would be there.
Our company is spread over a dozen states, mostly in the Northwest. The talent pool is amazing across the board, both in IT and in the rest of the company. But when the CEO hired me, he said that we are performing nowhere near our potential. On the surface, the company is doing fine. But we should be a
Fortune 500
organization. With this much talent, we should be growing at a much faster rate. The CEO also said that I was inheriting “a super team with disappointing performance.” His task for me was to pull the IT stars into a cohesive team that would meet company needs for new IT systems and services much faster and more effectively.
Without making our superstars feel that they were being critiqued and second-guessed, or indicating “there’s a real problem here,” I wanted to gather as much information and feedback as possible from the 14 team members (regional CIOs and department heads) who report to me. I held one-on-one meetings in order to give a voice to each person, allowing each individual to provide an honest assessment of the team as well as areas for improvement and a vision for the future of team efforts.
I was surprised by the consistency of remarks and opinions. For example, a picture emerged of the previous CIO, who was obviously awed by the talent level of the team members. Comments such as “Bob pretty much let us do what we wanted” and “Bob would start the meeting and then just fade into the background, as if he found us intimidating” were typical. The more disturbing comment, “Bob always agree with
me
,” was expressed by most of the team members at some point in our conversation. It was as if the regional heads believed that the CIO wanted them to succeed by doing as they thought best for themselves.
I queried members about the level of cooperation during meetings and uncovered areas of concern, including the complaint that others at the table were constantly checking their iPads and smartphones during meetings. One department head told me, “You could turn off the sound while watching one of our meetings, and just by the body language and level of attention, tell who is aligned with whom and who wishes the speaker would just shup up. It would be comical if it weren’t so distressing.”
Such remarks were indicative of a lack of trust and respect and a breakdown of genuine communication. One team member told me, “I recently encountered a problem that a department head from another region had successfully solved, but the information was never shared, so here I am reinventing the wheel and wasting valuable time.” It was apparent that these so-called high performers were .
C7-1 CASE STUDY 7 DATA CENTER CONSOLIDATION AT GUARDI.docxclairbycraft
C7-1
CASE STUDY 7
DATA CENTER CONSOLIDATION AT GUARDIAN
LIFE
As one of the largest mutual life insurance firms in the United States,
Guardian Life (www.guardianlife.com) has more than 5000 employees and
over 3000 financial representatives in 80 agencies. Guardian and its
subsidiaries provide almost three million people with life and disability
income insurance, retirement services, and investment products such as
mutual funds, securities, variable life insurance, and variable annuities. The
company also supplies employee benefits programs to six million
participants, including life, health, and dental insurance, as well as qualified
pension plans. In addition to regional home offices in New York City;
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania; Spokane, Washington; and Appleton, Wisconsin,
the company has 55 remote sales offices and 80 remote agency offices.
Like other insurance companies, Guardian Life is an information
intensive organization where data processing and communications network
infrastructure have consistently been important contributors to its success.
Guardian Life’s IT organization has earned numerous accolades including
multiple CIO100 awards from CIO magazine [PRNE11]. According to Dennis
Callahan, Executive Vice President and Chief Information Officer for,
Guardian Life, "A strong partnership between IT and the businesses enables
http://www.guardianlife.com/
C7-2
Guardian to deliver cost-effective technology services that facilitate world-
class customer service, product innovation, and operational efficiency.”
Ensuring alignment between business and IT is important to Guardian Life
and provides a consistent theme for many of the insurance companies IT
projects including its data center consolidation initiatives [CIOZ12].
Data center consolidation has been an ongoing concern at Guardian for
more than a decade. Guardian’s IT governance structure is team-oriented
and the company’s data center consolidation initiatives are overseen by it
Infrastructure team. The Infrastructure team is primarily co-located in New
York, and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania but it has key support teams in Spokane,
Washington, Appleton, Wisconsin, and Pittsfield, Massachusetts.
Guardian Life began taking a serious look at data center consolidation in
2000, but in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack,
Guardian also became more concerned with business continuity issues.
Guardian had four significant data centers, at its four home offices, but the
primary data center was in New York City. After 9/11, Guardian wanted
make infrastructure changes to ensure business continuity across its existing
data centers and made plans to add two more data centers to the mix.
Guardian performed an assessment of its data centers to provide a basis
for planning on the location of data processing resources. One surprising
outcome of this assessment had to do with utilization. The.
C9-1 CASE STUDY 9 ST. LUKES HEALTH CARE SYSTEM Hospitals have been .docxclairbycraft
C9-1 CASE STUDY 9 ST. LUKE'S HEALTH CARE SYSTEM Hospitals have been some of the earliest adopters of wireless local area networks (WLANs). The clinician user population is typically mobile and spread out across a number of buildings, with a need to enter and access data in real time. St. Luke's Episcopal Health System in Houston, Texas (www.stlukestexas.com) is a good example of a hospital that has made effective use wireless technologies to streamline clinical work processes. Their wireless network is distributed throughout several hospital buildings and is used in many different applications. The majority of the St. Luke’s staff uses wireless devices to access data in real-time, 24 hours a day. Examples include the following: • Diagnosing patients and charting their progress: Doctors and nurses use wireless laptops and tablet PCs to track and chart patient care data. • Prescriptions: Medications are dispensed from a cart that is wheeled from room to room. Clinician uses a wireless scanner to scan the patient's ID bracelet. If a prescription order has been changed or cancelled, the clinician will know immediately because the mobile device displays current patient data. C9-2 • Critical care units: These areas use the WLAN because running hard wires would mean moving ceiling panels. The dust and microbes that such work stirs up would pose a threat to patients. • Case management: The case managers in the Utilization Management Department use the WLAN to document patient reviews, insurance calls/authorization information, and denial information. The wireless session enables real time access to information that ensures the correct level of care for a patient and/or timely discharge. • Blood management: Blood management is a complex process that involves monitoring both patients and blood products during all stages of a treatment process. To ensure that blood products and patients are matched correctly, St. Luke’s uses a wireless bar code scanning process that involves scanning both patient and blood product bar codes during the infusion process. This enables clinicians to confirm patient and blood product identification before proceeding with treatment. • Nutrition and diet: Dietary service representatives collect patient menus at each nursing unit and enter them as they go. This allows more menus to be submitted before the cutoff time, giving more patients more choice. The dietitian can also see current patient information, such as supplement or tube feeding data, and view what the patient actually received for a certain meal. • Mobile x-ray and neurologic units: St. Luke’s has implemented the wireless network infrastructure necessary to enable doctors and clinicians to use mobile x-ray and neurologic scanning units. This makes it possible to take x-rays or to perform neurological studies in patient rooms. This minimizes the need to schedule patients for neurology or radiology lab visits. The mobile units also enable equipment to be brought to t.
C9-1 CASE STUDY 9 ST. LUKES HEALTH CARE SYSTEM .docxclairbycraft
C9-1
CASE STUDY 9
ST. LUKE'S HEALTH CARE SYSTEM
Hospitals have been some of the earliest adopters of wireless local area
networks (WLANs). The clinician user population is typically mobile and
spread out across a number of buildings, with a need to enter and access
data in real time. St. Luke's Episcopal Health System in Houston, Texas
(www.stlukestexas.com) is a good example of a hospital that has made
effective use wireless technologies to streamline clinical work processes.
Their wireless network is distributed throughout several hospital buildings
and is used in many different applications. The majority of the St. Luke’s
staff uses wireless devices to access data in real-time, 24 hours a day.
Examples include the following:
• Diagnosing patients and charting their progress: Doctors and
nurses use wireless laptops and tablet PCs to track and chart patient
care data.
• Prescriptions: Medications are dispensed from a cart that is wheeled
from room to room. Clinician uses a wireless scanner to scan the
patient's ID bracelet. If a prescription order has been changed or
cancelled, the clinician will know immediately because the mobile device
displays current patient data.
http://www.stlukestexas.com/
C9-2
• Critical care units: These areas use the WLAN because running hard
wires would mean moving ceiling panels. The dust and microbes that
such work stirs up would pose a threat to patients.
• Case management: The case managers in the Utilization Management
Department use the WLAN to document patient reviews, insurance
calls/authorization information, and denial information. The wireless
session enables real time access to information that ensures the correct
level of care for a patient and/or timely discharge.
• Blood management: Blood management is a complex process that
involves monitoring both patients and blood products during all stages of
a treatment process. To ensure that blood products and patients are
matched correctly, St. Luke’s uses a wireless bar code scanning process
that involves scanning both patient and blood product bar codes during
the infusion process. This enables clinicians to confirm patient and blood
product identification before proceeding with treatment.
• Nutrition and diet: Dietary service representatives collect patient
menus at each nursing unit and enter them as they go. This allows more
menus to be submitted before the cutoff time, giving more patients
more choice. The dietitian can also see current patient information, such
as supplement or tube feeding data, and view what the patient actually
received for a certain meal.
• Mobile x-ray and neurologic units: St. Luke’s has implemented the
wireless network infrastructure necessary to enable doctors and
clinicians to use mobile x-ray and neurologic scanning units. This makes
it possible to take x-rays or to perform neurological studies in patient
rooms. This min.
C361 TASK 2 2
C361 TASK 2 2
C361 Task 2
WGU
Evidence-Based Practice and Applied Nursing Research
C361
Eve Butler
July 28, 2019
Running head: C361 TASK 2 2
C361 Task 2
A.1 Healthcare problem
Worldwide estimates have shown that greater than 1.4 million patients have acquired nosocomial infections. Adherence to hand hygiene policies are shown to be the most effective way to help prevent these healthcare-associated infections; sadly research shows that healthcare workers have suboptimal compliance with their facilities hand hygiene policies due to lack of education and compliance monitoring. Patients in our healthcare settings are under the assumption that we are doing our best to promote their healing when in fact 7% of them will be subjected to a nosocomial infection with that rate climbing to 10% in developing countries (Finco et al., 2018).
A.2 Significance of the problem
The cost of care that is associated with nosocomial infections is estimated to be over ten billion dollars putting a burden on both patients and health organizations alike. It is estimated that 38% of all infections are caused by cross-contamination due to noncompliance with hand hygiene policies. These infections lead to approximately 99,000 deaths a year in the United States alone (Sickbert-Bennett et al., 2016).
A.3 Current healthcare practices related to the problem
Most healthcare facilities have an educational program that simply teaches how to achieve proper hand hygiene and use the WHO five moments of hand hygiene as their standard. However, this does not educate the healthcare workers on why it is important, nor does it address the far-reaching consequences for noncompliance. Along with the lack of foundational education, most facilities do not monitor for compliance.
A.4 How the problem affects the organization and patients’ cultural background
Inadequate hand hygiene leading to nosocomial infections can affect the organization's cultural background by leading to dissatisfaction in the workplace as staff becomes frustrated by their feelings of inadequacy and helplessness in dealing with patients getting sicker instead of better. The staff may also be feeling stress in the burden of caring for sicker patients. The patient's cultural background may be affected as they may be feeling despair or depression at their inability to get better, and some may feel it is punishment according to their cultural or religious beliefs.
B. Two research evidence sources and two non-research evidence sources considered
In searching for my research evidence sources, I start with the Western Governors University Library online. Once in the library, a boolean phrase was used, which allowed me to search for research articles that contain more than one topic in the same paper. Phrases I used in this search were “nosocomial infections,” “hand hygiene compliance,” and “ hand hygiene education.” With these phrases, thousands of articles were available to peruse.
One of the res.
C6-1 CASE STUDY 6 CHEVRON’S INFRASTRUCTURE EVOLUT.docxclairbycraft
C6-1
CASE STUDY 6
CHEVRON’S INFRASTRUCTURE
EVOLUTION
Chevron Corporation (www.chevron.com) is one of the world’s leading
energy companies. Chevron’s headquarters are in San Ramon, California.
The company has more than 62,000 employees and produces more than
700,000 barrels of oil per day. It has 19,500 retail sites in 84 countries. In
2012, Chevron was number three on the Fortune 500 list and had more than
$244 billion in revenue in 2011 [STAT12].
IT infrastructure is very important to Chevron and to better support all
facets of its global operations, the company is always focused on improving
its infrastructure [GALL12]. Chevron faces new challenges from increased
global demand for its traditional hydrocarbon products and the need to
develop IT support for new value chains for liquid natural gas (LNG) and the
extraction of gas and oil from shale. Huge investments are being made
around the world, particularly in Australia and Angola on massive projects of
unprecedented scale. Modeling and analytics are more important than ever
to help Chevron exploit deep water drilling and hydrocarbon extraction in
areas with challenging geographies. For example, advanced seismic imaging
tools are used by Chevron to reveal possible oil or natural gas reservoirs
beneath the earth’s surface. Chevron’s proprietary seismic imaging
http://www.chevron.com/
C6-2
technology contributed to it achieving a 69% discovery rate in
2011[CHEV12].
Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA)
Systems
Chevron refineries are continually collecting data from sensors spread
throughout the facilities to maintain safe operations and to alert operators to
potential safety issues before they ever become safety issues. Data from the
sensors is also used to optimize the way the refineries work and to identify
opportunities of greater efficiency. IT controls 60,000 valves at Chevron’s
Pascagoula, Mississippi refinery; the efficiency and safety of its end-to-end
operations are dependent on advanced sensors, supervisory control and data
acquisition (SCADA) systems, and other digital industrial control systems
[GALL12].
SCADA systems are typically centralized systems that monitor and
control entire sites and/or complexes of systems that are spread out over
large areas such as an entire manufacturing, fabrication, power generation,
or refining facility. The key components of SCADA systems include:
Programmable logic units (PLCs) that and remote terminal units (RTUs)
connected to sensors that convert sensor signals to digital data and
send it to the supervisory system
A supervisory computer system that acquires data about the process
and sends control commands to the process
A human-machine interface (HMI) that presents process to the human
operators that monitor and control the process.
Process meters and process analysis instruments
Communication infrastructure connecting.
C125C126 FORMAL LAB REPORTFORMAL LAB REPORT, GeneralA f.docxclairbycraft
C125/C126 FORMAL LAB REPORT
FORMAL LAB REPORT, General
A formal lab report is required in conjunction with some of the experiments in each chemistry course. It is your chance to demonstrate to your professor or TA how well you understand the experiment and the chemical principles involved. A formal report is different than a term paper. It should be written in a scientific style, which is not the same style used for English or philosophy papers.
The keys to effective technical writing are organization, brevity, clarity, and an appreciation of the needs of the reader. You must write clearly and be thorough, but concise. Do not ramble. The best way to avoid rambling is to first prepare an outline of the report and stick to it. Always use complete sentences. Bulleted lists are okay in a lab notebook but are unacceptable in a formal report. Formal reports must be typed. Use 1.5 line spacing, 1-inch margins, 12 pt font and 8.5x11 inch paper. Only use third person, past tense. Also, proofread well.
The general structure of a formal lab report follows that of a scientific paper. It is:
Title and Author (s)
Introduction
Experimental Information
Data and Calculation
Results and Discussion
Conclusion
References
Results and discussion sections are combined into one single section. Different instructors may have specific formats that they want you to follow. You should always defer to the instructions given to you by your course. Presented here are general guidelines for writing formal lab reports and scientific papers.
Before writing your first report, visit the library and examine several journal articles. Pay close attention to the style of the prose and the contents of each particular section. Several common journals to investigate are:
The Journal of the American Chemical Society
The Journal of Physical Chemistry
Analytical Chemistry
Biochemistry
Initialed and dated laboratory notebook pages of the experiment must be submitted. While report sheets may be a joint effort, formal reports must be individually written. A schedule of reports and dates on which they are due is given in the course laboratory schedule. We highly recommend that reports be completed prior to the day of submission to allow time to proofread, and thus avoiding loss of points due to last minute problems. Lost data or the inability to print reports is not acceptable excuses for incomplete or missing reports. You will be informed when notebook pages will be collected before the report is due.
FORMAL LAB REPORT - Title and Author(s)
State the title of the experiment, your name, the date and your laboratory section number, if applicable. Also state the name of your lab partner(s). This information should be at the top of the first page.
FORMAL LAB REPORT – Introduction
The Introduction states the purpose of the study and introduces the reader with new ideas and topics. It also provides any background necessary to acquaint the read.
C10-1 CASE STUDY 10 CHOICE HOTELS INTERNATIONAL .docxclairbycraft
C10-1
CASE STUDY 10
CHOICE HOTELS INTERNATIONAL
Within the hospitality industry, there has traditionally been a division
between networks that serve guest functions and those that serve
operations and administration, both with respect to data transmission and
voice transmission. In recent years, most hotel and motel chains have
moved in the direction of consolidating multiple functions on networks that
used to be dedicated to one use. Tighter integration of voice and data and of
guest and operations/administration networking is a fast-growing trend.
Choice Hotels International (www.choice.com) is a good example of this
trend.
Choice Hotels International (NYSE: CHH) is one of the largest and most
successful lodging companies in the world. It franchises more than 6,100
hotels, representing more than 490,000 rooms, in the United States and
more than 30 countries and territories. The company's best known brands
include Comfort Inn, Comfort Suites, Quality, Sleep Inn, Clarion, Cambria
Suites, MainStay Suites, Suburban Extended Stay Hotel, Econo Lodge and
Rodeway Inn.
In-House Networking Functions
Choice supports two distinct networking functions. A central Web site
enables customers to reserve rooms at any Choice franchise
http://www.choice.com/
C10-2
accommodation. The central reservation system, known as Profit Manager,
automatically finds the most appropriate hotel based on location, price
range, or standard. Individual hotels also take bookings, so there needs to
be a way for hotels and the central system to remain synchronized.
Choice networks also support its franchisees. Choice is in fact a
relatively small company in terms of personnel (about 2000 employees) and
does not own or operate any hotels. All of the establishments under its brand
names are independently owned and pay Choice licensing fees and a royalty
on all sales. In return, they receive a variety of services, including
marketing, quality control, and inventory management. Many of these
services are offered via network, such as allowing managers to order
supplies online and check booking status. This support network is similar to a
corporate intranet but has a higher reliability requirement. The 6100 hotel
managers are, in effect, Choice's customers, not employees. Thus, the
standards for reliability and performance of the network are high.
In the late 1990s, Choice began to focus on providing a state-of-the-art
global reservation system. At this point, the synchronization of local and
online reservations was done manually. Each hotel provided Choice with a
fixed block of inventory to sell over the central reservation system, with an
average of 30% of capacity. Once that 30% was sold, Profit Manager listed
the hotel as fully booked, even though there might be plenty of rooms
available from the other 70%. The reverse problem also occurred: If the
local reservation system had so.
C11-1 CASE STUDY 11 CLOUD COMPUTING (IN)SECURITY .docxclairbycraft
C11-1
CASE STUDY 11
CLOUD COMPUTING (IN)SECURITY
Cloud computing is reshaping enterprise network architectures and
infrastructures. It refers to applications delivered as services over the
Internet as well as the hardware and systems software in data centers that
provide those services. The services themselves have long been referred to
as Software as a Service (SaaS) which had its roots in Software-Oriented
Architecture (SOA) concepts that began shaping enterprise network
roadmaps in the early 2000s. IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service) and PaaS
(Platform as a Service) are other types of cloud computing services that are
available to business customers.
Cloud computing fosters the notion of computing as a utility that can be
consumed by businesses on demand in a manner that is similar to other
services (e.g. electricity, municipal water) from traditional utilities. It has the
potential to reshape much of the IT industry by giving businesses the option
of running business software applications fully on-premises, fully in “the
cloud” or some combination of these two extremes. These are choices that
businesses have not had until recently and many companies are still coming
to grips with this new computing landscape.
Security is important to any computing infrastructure. Companies go to
great lengths to secure on-premises computing systems, so it is not
surprising that security looms as a major consideration when augmenting or
replacing on-premises systems with cloud services. Allaying security
C11-2
concerns is frequently a prerequisite for further discussions about migrating
part or all of an organization’s computing architecture to the cloud.
Availability is another major concern: “How will we operate if we can’t access
the Internet? What if our customers can’t access the cloud to place orders?”
are common questions [AMBR10].
Generally speaking, such questions only arise when businesses
contemplating moving core transaction processing, such as ERP systems,
and other mission critical applications to the cloud. Companies have
traditionally demonstrated less concern about migrating high maintenance
applications such as e-mail and payroll to cloud service providers even
though such applications hold sensitive information.
Security Issues and Concerns
Auditability is a concern for many organizations, especially those who must
comply with Sarbanes-Oxley and/or Health and Human Services Health
Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) regulations [IBM11].
The auditability of their data must be ensured whether it is stored on-
premises or moved to the cloud.
Before moving critical infrastructure to the cloud, businesses should do
diligence on security threats both from outside and inside the cloud
[BADG11]. Many of the security issues associated with protecting clouds
from outside threats are similar to those that have traditionally faced
.
C1-1 CASE STUDY 1 UNIFIED COMMUNICATIONS AT BOEING .docxclairbycraft
C1-1
CASE STUDY 1
UNIFIED COMMUNICATIONS AT BOEING
The Boeing Company (http://www.boeing.com/), headquartered in Chicago,
Illinois, is the world’s largest manufacturer of military aircraft and
commercial jetliners. Boeing has more than 159,000 employees working in
70 different countries who require effective communication to develop and
build some of the world’s most complex products using components from
more than 22,000 global suppliers.
The company’s workforce is one of the most highly educated in the
world. Most employees hold a college degree and many hold advanced
degrees. Collectively Boeing employees have very broad and deep
knowledge that can be harnessed to solve problems and design next
generation products.
Like many major corporations, Boeing has experienced an uptick in the
number of employees who work remotely or travel the majority of each work
week. Boeing’s engineers number in the thousands and are purposely
scattered worldwide to support the company’s global operations.
Boeing organizes its employees into work and project teams. Given the
company’s size and geographic footprint, many of Boeing work’s teams
include globally dispersed members. Engineers on the same team may be
separated by multiple time zones and thousands of miles. Time zone
differences and distance frequently present teams with communication
challenges when they are faced with time sensitive issues that must be
resolved quickly.
http://www.boeing.com/
C1-2
Additional communication issues are associated with the sheer breadth
and depth of Boeing’s knowledge base. When faced with questions about a
particular part included in one of Boeing’s new airliners, an engineer can be
challenged to identify the right person in the company to contact for
answers.
Collaboration Technologies
Boeing knows that continual innovation is important to its long term success.
It also recognizes that effective communication among its employees,
customers, and suppliers is an important enabler of continual innovation.
Boeing has traditionally relied on a variety of systems to facilitate
collaboration among its employees and business partners. As illustrated in
Figure C1-1a, Web conferencing, audio conferencing, desktop sharing, and
mobile voice and data services have been used by Boeing employees to
facilitate communication among geographically dispersed team members.
Historically, these capabilities have been provided by different third-party
providers who were selected on the basis of their ability to provide high-
quality communication services at competitive rates.
By the mid-2000s, Boeing had begun its migration toward unified
messaging and unified communications. At that time, instant messaging (IM)
was one of the more popular messaging services used Boeing employees. At
Boeing, IM has traditionally been supplemented by Web and audio
conferencing services as well as by de.
C09 07222011 101525 Page 88IT leader who had just been.docxclairbycraft
C09 07/22/2011 10:15:25 Page 88
IT leader who had just been hired and would be focused on developing a long-term IT
strategy for the company.
This chapter shows how to develop a strategy for your IT organization and avoid
getting overwhelmed with day-to-day issues. Many CIOs get caught up in tactical
issues and never take the time to establish a future strategy for the organization. The
process is not new or difficult, but many CIOs fail to devote the time to this area and
end up like Fred.
OVERVIEW
Developing an IT strategy is critical for IT leaders. Unless your organization has
developed an understanding of your future goals and objectives, you will not be
successful in leading it forward. In the same manner that you must first decide where
you want to live and build your dream house before engaging the architect and building
contractors, you need to develop a future strategy in order to successfully build your
IT organization.
This chapter is written for someone who has never developed an IT strategy in the
past or needs to revise an existing strategy to align with the company’s future direction.
We first review the methodology you can use to develop your strategy and then go
through the actual steps necessary to complete the strategy. It is important to note that
this is a collaborative process between the IT organization and its business partners. You
must actively engage them during the process and solicit their input during the
development of the strategy. The IT strategy should be considered a component of
an effective business strategy. Finally, we recommend that your strategy is a living
document that is updated on a regular basis to support the evolving nature of your
business. If you decide to enter a new market, offer new products or services, or change
your business model, the IT strategy must be revised to support the business.
IT STRATEGY METHODOLOGY
The methodology for creating your IT strategy consists of three steps, and development
of your improvement road map encompasses three critical elements, as shown in
Figure 9.1.
The first step is to understand the current state of the IT organization. Key questions
for determining current state include:
& Has the organization been successful in meeting the needs of the business?
& Are the relations between the IT organization and its business partners collaborative?
& Does the business feel that investments in the IT organization are providing the
desired benefits?
It is important to take an objective view of how the organization is operating today
and not assume that things are going great.
88 & Process
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C053GXML 10192012 214425 Page 131cC H A P T E R.docxclairbycraft
C053GXML 10/19/2012 21:44:25 Page 131
c
C H A P T E R
5
Privacy and Cyberspace
Of all the ethical issues associated with the use of cybertechnology, perhaps none has
received more media attention than concern about the loss of personal privacy. In this
chapter, we examine issues involving privacy and cybertechnology by asking the
following questions:
� How are privacy concerns generated by the use of cybertechnology different from
privacy issues raised by earlier technologies?
� What, exactly, is personal privacy, and why is it valued?
� How do computerized techniques used to gather and collect information, such as
Internet “cookies” and radio frequency identification (RFID) technology, raise
concerns for personal privacy?
� How do the transfer and exchange of personal information across and between
databases, carried out in computerized merging and matching operations,
threaten personal privacy?
� How do tools used to “mine” personal data exacerbate existing privacy concerns
involving cybertechnology?
� Can personal information we disclose to friends in social networking services
(SNS), such as Facebook and Twitter, be used in ways that threaten our privacy?
� How do the use of Internet search engines and the availability of online public
records contribute to the problem of protecting “privacy in public”?
� Do privacy-enhancing tools provide Internet users with adequate protection for
their online personal information?
� Are current privacy laws and data protection schemes adequate?
Concerns about privacy can affect many aspects of an individual’s life—from
commerce to healthcare to work to recreation. For example, we speak of consumer
privacy, medical and healthcare privacy, employee and workplace privacy, and so forth.
Unfortunately, we cannot examine all of these categories of privacy in a single chapter. So
we will have to postpone our analysis of certain kinds of privacy issues until later chapters
in the book. For example, we will examine some ways that medical/genetic privacy issues
are aggravated by cybertechnology in our discussion of bioinformatics in Chapter 12, and
131
C053GXML 10/19/2012 21:44:25 Page 132
we will examine some particular employee/workplace privacy issues affected by the use
of cybertechnology in our discussion of workplace surveillance and employee mon-
itoring in Chapter 10. Some cyber-related privacy concerns that conflict with cyberse-
curity issues and national security interests will be examined in Chapter 6, where
privacy-related concerns affecting “cloud computing” are also considered. In our
discussion of emerging and converging technologies in Chapter 12, we examine
some issues that affect a relatively new category of privacy called “location privacy,”
which arise because of the use of embedded chips, RFID technology, and global
positioning systems (GPS).
Although some cyber-related privacy concerns are specific to one or more spheres or
sectors—i.e., employment, healthcare, and so f.
We all have good and bad thoughts from time to time and situation to situation. We are bombarded daily with spiraling thoughts(both negative and positive) creating all-consuming feel , making us difficult to manage with associated suffering. Good thoughts are like our Mob Signal (Positive thought) amidst noise(negative thought) in the atmosphere. Negative thoughts like noise outweigh positive thoughts. These thoughts often create unwanted confusion, trouble, stress and frustration in our mind as well as chaos in our physical world. Negative thoughts are also known as “distorted thinking”.
The Roman Empire A Historical Colossus.pdfkaushalkr1407
The Roman Empire, a vast and enduring power, stands as one of history's most remarkable civilizations, leaving an indelible imprint on the world. It emerged from the Roman Republic, transitioning into an imperial powerhouse under the leadership of Augustus Caesar in 27 BCE. This transformation marked the beginning of an era defined by unprecedented territorial expansion, architectural marvels, and profound cultural influence.
The empire's roots lie in the city of Rome, founded, according to legend, by Romulus in 753 BCE. Over centuries, Rome evolved from a small settlement to a formidable republic, characterized by a complex political system with elected officials and checks on power. However, internal strife, class conflicts, and military ambitions paved the way for the end of the Republic. Julius Caesar’s dictatorship and subsequent assassination in 44 BCE created a power vacuum, leading to a civil war. Octavian, later Augustus, emerged victorious, heralding the Roman Empire’s birth.
Under Augustus, the empire experienced the Pax Romana, a 200-year period of relative peace and stability. Augustus reformed the military, established efficient administrative systems, and initiated grand construction projects. The empire's borders expanded, encompassing territories from Britain to Egypt and from Spain to the Euphrates. Roman legions, renowned for their discipline and engineering prowess, secured and maintained these vast territories, building roads, fortifications, and cities that facilitated control and integration.
The Roman Empire’s society was hierarchical, with a rigid class system. At the top were the patricians, wealthy elites who held significant political power. Below them were the plebeians, free citizens with limited political influence, and the vast numbers of slaves who formed the backbone of the economy. The family unit was central, governed by the paterfamilias, the male head who held absolute authority.
Culturally, the Romans were eclectic, absorbing and adapting elements from the civilizations they encountered, particularly the Greeks. Roman art, literature, and philosophy reflected this synthesis, creating a rich cultural tapestry. Latin, the Roman language, became the lingua franca of the Western world, influencing numerous modern languages.
Roman architecture and engineering achievements were monumental. They perfected the arch, vault, and dome, constructing enduring structures like the Colosseum, Pantheon, and aqueducts. These engineering marvels not only showcased Roman ingenuity but also served practical purposes, from public entertainment to water supply.
This is a presentation by Dada Robert in a Your Skill Boost masterclass organised by the Excellence Foundation for South Sudan (EFSS) on Saturday, the 25th and Sunday, the 26th of May 2024.
He discussed the concept of quality improvement, emphasizing its applicability to various aspects of life, including personal, project, and program improvements. He defined quality as doing the right thing at the right time in the right way to achieve the best possible results and discussed the concept of the "gap" between what we know and what we do, and how this gap represents the areas we need to improve. He explained the scientific approach to quality improvement, which involves systematic performance analysis, testing and learning, and implementing change ideas. He also highlighted the importance of client focus and a team approach to quality improvement.
The Indian economy is classified into different sectors to simplify the analysis and understanding of economic activities. For Class 10, it's essential to grasp the sectors of the Indian economy, understand their characteristics, and recognize their importance. This guide will provide detailed notes on the Sectors of the Indian Economy Class 10, using specific long-tail keywords to enhance comprehension.
For more information, visit-www.vavaclasses.com
The Art Pastor's Guide to Sabbath | Steve ThomasonSteve Thomason
What is the purpose of the Sabbath Law in the Torah. It is interesting to compare how the context of the law shifts from Exodus to Deuteronomy. Who gets to rest, and why?
How to Split Bills in the Odoo 17 POS ModuleCeline George
Bills have a main role in point of sale procedure. It will help to track sales, handling payments and giving receipts to customers. Bill splitting also has an important role in POS. For example, If some friends come together for dinner and if they want to divide the bill then it is possible by POS bill splitting. This slide will show how to split bills in odoo 17 POS.
Instructions for Submissions thorugh G- Classroom.pptxJheel Barad
This presentation provides a briefing on how to upload submissions and documents in Google Classroom. It was prepared as part of an orientation for new Sainik School in-service teacher trainees. As a training officer, my goal is to ensure that you are comfortable and proficient with this essential tool for managing assignments and fostering student engagement.
2024.06.01 Introducing a competency framework for languag learning materials ...Sandy Millin
http://sandymillin.wordpress.com/iateflwebinar2024
Published classroom materials form the basis of syllabuses, drive teacher professional development, and have a potentially huge influence on learners, teachers and education systems. All teachers also create their own materials, whether a few sentences on a blackboard, a highly-structured fully-realised online course, or anything in between. Despite this, the knowledge and skills needed to create effective language learning materials are rarely part of teacher training, and are mostly learnt by trial and error.
Knowledge and skills frameworks, generally called competency frameworks, for ELT teachers, trainers and managers have existed for a few years now. However, until I created one for my MA dissertation, there wasn’t one drawing together what we need to know and do to be able to effectively produce language learning materials.
This webinar will introduce you to my framework, highlighting the key competencies I identified from my research. It will also show how anybody involved in language teaching (any language, not just English!), teacher training, managing schools or developing language learning materials can benefit from using the framework.
Welcome to TechSoup New Member Orientation and Q&A (May 2024).pdfTechSoup
In this webinar you will learn how your organization can access TechSoup's wide variety of product discount and donation programs. From hardware to software, we'll give you a tour of the tools available to help your nonprofit with productivity, collaboration, financial management, donor tracking, security, and more.
Welcome to TechSoup New Member Orientation and Q&A (May 2024).pdf
C o l o r a d o S t a t e U n i v e r s i t y - P u e b l o .docx
1. C o l o r a d o S t a t e U n i v e r s i t y - P u e b l o
Division of Continuing Education Page 12
Independent Study and External Degree Completion Program
Lesson 3
Section 3: Once again there are questions listed for each of the
chapters in this section.
Respond to them fully after stating the questions.
Section 3: Chapter 7: Question 1
The five steps for classical decision making are found on
page 169, and the definition is on
page 171. In a risk environment or an uncertain environment, it
may be very difficult to follow
these steps. How can a risk environment or an uncertain
environment affect this process?
What is the difference between a risk environment and an
uncertain environment?
Section 3: Chapter 7: Question 2
In the text, there is a discussion of framing errors,
confirmation errors, escalating
commitment, availability bias, representativeness bias,
anchoring bias, and adjustment bias.
Briefly define each of these errors and biases and provide an
example of each one (not the one
2. in the text). These are particularly important since they are
found in all levels of an
organization.
Section 3: Chapter 7: Question 3
Managers are often confronted with structured problems
which require programmed
decisions, and unstructured problems which require non-
programmed decisions. Serious
problems may require a crisis decision which is the most serious
type of non-programmed
decision.
Provide an example of a programmed and non-programmed
decision which you have
encountered in your own experience. How do you determine
whether a decision is really a
programmed decision, or whether it actually requires a unique
solution? When should senior
management become involved?
(Many programmed decisions are just that today. In retail they
may be built into the computer
system, and made at the cash register – such as returns, returns
with or without receipts, or
information available regarding a customer’s past transactions!)
Section 3: Chapter 8: Question 1
Organizations should have a mission statement, a strategic
plan, organizational plans,
tactical plans, goals and objectives. Which of these should
primarily be developed by directors
and senior management, middle management, and supervisors
and other first level
management personnel? How can these plans be best aligned in
3. order to clearly involve all
levels of management in these goals?
C o l o r a d o S t a t e U n i v e r s i t y - P u e b l o
Division of Continuing Education Page 13
Independent Study and External Degree Completion Program
Section 3: Chapter 8: Question 2
Benchmarking is often used as a way to improve an
organization. What is organizational
benchmarking and how is it developed?
Section 3: Chapter 8: Question 3
Planners often use forecasting, contingency planning, and
scenario planning. Define and
provide an example of each. The example should differ from
the one found in the text. It may
be either from additional reading or the student’s own
experience.
Section 3: Chapter 9: Question 1
See if you can solve Puzzle Number One and Puzzle Number
2 on page 207. How did you do
it? Did you use math, special reasoning – or ask a friend?
(Five extra credit points)
Actual Question – Different companies have different basic
strategies. Michael Porter’s
model includes competitive, differentiation, cost leadership and
focus differentiation
4. strategies. Briefly define each one and provide an example
which is not found in the text.
Why did you choose this example?
Section 3: Chapter 9: Question 2
Almost every class in management uses a SWOT analysis to
identify analyze organizational
strengths and weaknesses. Choose an organization and develop
a brief SWOT analysis for that
organization. It can be an organization that you work with
either for pay or on a volunteer
basis or a company in which you are interested.
Section 3: Chapter 9: Question 3
Marketers often refer to products based on their position and
potential. They call these
products Stars, Question Marks, Cash Cows and Dogs. Define
each and identify a product
which meets the description in the text. Why did you choose
this product?
Once again select one of these questions and develop it into a
two to three page single
spaced essay.
5. The Validity of Company Valuation
Using Discounted Cash Flow Methods
Florian Steiger
1
Seminar Paper
Fall 2008
Abstract
This paper closely examines theoretical and practical aspects of
the widely used discounted
cash flows (DCF) valuation method. It assesses its potentials as
well as several weaknesses. A
special emphasize is being put on the valuation of companies
using the DCF method. The
paper finds that the discounted cash flow method is a powerful
tool to analyze even complex
situations. However, the DCF method is subject to massive
assumption bias and even slight
changes in the underlying assumptions of an analysis can
drastically alter the valuation
6. results. A practical example of these implications is given using
a scenario analysis.
____________
1
Author: Florian Steiger, European Business School, e-mail:
[email protected]
Table of Contents
List of abbreviations
...............................................................................................
............ i
List of figures and tables
...............................................................................................
.... ii
1 Introduction
...............................................................................................
................... 1
1.1 Problem Definition and Objective
...................................................................... 1
1.2 Course of the Investigation
................................................................................. 2
2 Company valuation
................................................................................ ...............
........ 2
7. 2.1 General Goal and Use of Company Valuation
................................................... 2
2.2 Other Valuation Methods
................................................................................... 3
3 The Discounted Cash Flow Valuation Method
............................................................ 4
3.1 Approach of the Discounted Cash Flow Valuation
............................................ 4
3.2 Calculation of the Free Cash Flow
..................................................................... 5
3.2.1 Cash Flow to Firm and Cash Flow to
Equity.................................................. 5
3.2.2 Building Future Scenarios
.............................................................................. 6
3.3 The Weighted Average Cost of Capital
............................................................. 6
3.3.1 Cost of Equity
...............................................................................................
.. 7
3.3.2 Cost of Debt
...............................................................................................
..... 8
3.3.3 Summary
...............................................................................................
.......... 9
8. 3.4 Calculation of the Terminal Value
................................................................... 10
3.5 Determination of Company Value
................................................................... 11
4 Validity of the Discounted Cash Flow Valuation Approach
...................................... 11
4.1 Case Study: BASF
............................................................................................
11
4.2 Sensitivity Analysis
.......................................................................................... 12
5 Conclusion
...............................................................................................
................... 14
Reference List
...............................................................................................
.................. 16
Appendix
...............................................................................................
.......................... 18
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation i
9. List of abbreviations
APV Adjusted Present Value
bp Base Point (equal to 0.01%)
Capex Capital Expenditure
CAGR Compounded Annual Growth Rate
CAPM Capital Asset Pricing Model
COD Cost of Debt
COE Cost of Equity
D&A Depreciation and Amortization
DCF Discounted Cash Flow
EBIT Earnings Before Interests and Taxes
EBITDA Earnings Before Interests, Taxes, Depreciation and
Amortization
EURm Millions of Euro
EV Enterprise Value
Eq. V. Equity Value
FCF Free Cash Flow
FCFE Free Cash Flow to Equity
10. FCFF Free Cash Flow to Firm
IPO Initial Public Offering
LBO Leveraged Buyout
LIBOR London Interbank Offer Rate
M&A Mergers and Acquisitions
NI Net Income
NOPAT Net Operating Profit After Taxes
NPV Net Present Value
P / E Price Earnings Ratio
r Discount Rate
ROA Return on Assets
ROE Return on Equity
SIC Standard Industry Classification
t or T Tax Rate
T-Bill US Treasury Bill
T-Bond US Treasury Bond
TV Terminal Value
11. Discounted Cash Flow Valuation ii
List of figures and tables
Table 1. Long term credit rating scales: Source: adapted from
HSBC handbook, 2008
Table 2. Trading comparables analysis
Table 3. Transaction multiple analysis
Table 4. Case Study: Calculation of the enterprise value
Table 5. Case Study: Sensitivity Analysis WACC, perpetual
growth rate
Table 6. Case Study: Sensitivity analysis perpetual growth rate,
sales CAGR
Table 7. Case Study: Income statement estimates
Table 8. Case Study: Liabilities structure
Table 9. Case Study: WACC calculation
Table 10. Case Study: Terminal Value calculation
Table 11. Case Study: DCF valuation
Figure 1. LIBOR credit spread (in bp): Source: Bloomberg
Professional Database, 2008
12. Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 1
1 Introduction
The goal of this paper is to introduce the reader to the method
of company valuation
using discounted cash flows, often referred to as “DCF”. The
DCF method is a standard
procedure in modern finance and it is therefore very important
to thoroughly understand
how the method works and what its limitations and their
implications are. Although this
paper is on a basic level, it requires some knowledge of
accounting and corporate
finance, as well as a good understanding of general economic
coherencies, since not
every topic can be explained in detail due to size limitations.
1.1 Problem Definition and Objective
Since the beginning of the year 2008, Goldman Sachs has
advised clients on merger and
acquisition (M&A) deals with aggregated enterprise values (EV)
13. of more than EURm
475,000 according to recent league tables (Thomson One
Banker, 2008). There are
“probably almost as many motives for M&As as there are bidder
and targets”
(Mukherjee, Kiymaz, & Bake, 2004, p. 8), but the transaction
volumes indicate the
importance that M&A activities have for the worldwide
economy and underline the
necessity for efficient methods to adequately value companies.
The DCF method is based upon forward looking data and
therefore requires a relatively
large amount of predictions for the future business situation of
the company and the
economy in general. Minor changes in the underlying
assumptions will result in large
differences in the company’s value. It is therefore very
important to know which
assumptions are used and how they influence the outcome of the
analysis. For this
reason, this paper will introduce the key input factors that are
needed for the DCF
analysis and examine the consequences that changes in the
assumptions have on the
14. company value.
The DCF analysis is a very powerful tool that is not only used
to value companies but
also to price initial public offerings (IPOs) and other financial
assets. It is such a
powerful tool in finance, that it is so widely used by
professionals in investment banks,
consultancies and managers around the world for a range of
tasks that it is even referred
to as “the heart of most corporate capital-budgeting systems”
(Luehrman, 1998, p. 51).
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 2
1.2 Course of the Investigation
This paper begins with a brief introduction to valuation
techniques in general and shows
how valuation techniques can be used to assess a company’s
value. Afterwards the basic
idea behind the DCF valuation technique will be introduced and
the key input factors
15. will be explained and discussed, since it is most important to
gain a deep understanding
on how the input is computed to state the company value. In the
next step a sensitivity
analysis will be conducted using BASF as an example to explain
how varying input will
lead to different results. In the end, a conclusion will be drawn
on the benefits and
shortfalls of the DCF valuation technique.
2 Company valuation
2.1 General Goal and Use of Company Valuation
The goal of company valuation is to give owners, potential
buyers and other interested
stakeholders an approximate value of what a company is worth.
There are different
approaches to determine this value but some general guidelines
apply to all of them.
In general there are two kind of possible takeover approaches.
An interested buyer could
either buy the assets of a company, known as asset deal, or the
buyer could take over a
majority of the company’s equity, known as share deal.
2
Since taking over the assets
16. will not transfer ownership of the legal entity known as “the
company”, share deals are
much more common in large transactions. Due to the financing
of a company by debt
and equity, valuation techniques that focus on share deals either
value the equity,
resulting in the equity value (Eq. V.) or the total liabilities,
stating the enterprise value
(EV) or firm value (FV). It is possible to derive the EV from the
Eq. V. and vice versa
(Bodie, Kane, & Marcus, 2008, pp. 630-631) by using the
following formula:
�� − ��� ���� − ��������� ����������� =
��. �.
Net debt and the corporate adjustments are derived with the
following definitions:
��� ���� = ���� ���� ���� + ����� ����
���� + ����������� ������
+ ����� �������� �������� ���������� −
���� ��� �������� ������
____________
2
Actually there are more possibilities to gain ownership of a
17. company, like a debt-to-equity swap,
where debt holders offer the equity holders to swap their debt
into equity of the company and therewith
gain equity ownership. This usually happens with companies
that are in financial distress like insolvency
or bankruptcy.
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 3
��������� �����������
= �������� ��������� + �� �� �������
�������
+ ���������� ����� ����������� ±
���������� ���������
2.2 Other Valuation Methods
There are many other valuation techniques besides the DCF
approach which are
commonly used. In fact, most of the time various techniques are
used and the results are
then compared to each other to increase the confidence that the
result is reasonable.
A widely used method is the so-called trading comparables
analysis. In this method a
18. peer group of listed companies is built, usually using firms with
similar standard
industry classification (SIC) and other similarities to the target
company like geographic
focus, financing structure, and client segments. If the company
is listed, the equity value
is simply the market capitalization
3
. The EV can be calculated based on this Eq. V. as
described above. Then some multiples are calculated to state
relationship between EV
and Eq. V. to a company’s fundamental data. Usually the
multiples are the following:
��
�����
��
�����
��
����
��. �.
19. ��� ������
4
The median and arithmetic average of these multiples is then
calculated for the peer
group.
5
These figures are a good approximation for a target’s EV and
Eq. V., but they
tend to be lower than actual transaction values, since trading
comparables do not include
majority premiums that have to be paid when acquiring a
majority stake in a company.
A similar approach to the trading comparables method is the
transaction comparables
valuation approach. It uses the same multiples, but the peer
group consists of previous
transactions and therefore includes all premiums that arise
during transactions. This
method is very reliable but since it is very difficult to find
previous transactions that are
similar, it is difficult to build peer groups that are statistically
significant
6
. These two
methods, in combination with the DCF are the most widely used
20. in modern finance.
____________
3
������ ��� = ����� ����� ∗ ������ ��
������ �����������
4
The
�� .�.
��� ������
is the same as the trailing (historical)
�
�
ratio
5
Please see table 2 in the appendix for an exemplary trading
comparables analysis of the European car
rental market
6
Please see table 3 in the appendix for an example
21. Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 4
3 The Discounted Cash Flow Valuation Method
3.1 Approach of the Discounted Cash Flow Valuation
The DCF method values the company on basis of the net present
value (NPV) of its
future free cash flows which are discounted by an appropriate
discount rate. The
formula for determining the NPV of numerous future cash flows
is shown below. It can
be found in various sources, e.g. in “Financial Management –
Theory and Practice”
(Brigham & Gapenski, 1997, p. 254).
��� =
����
(1 + �)�
�
�=0
The free cash flow is the amount of “cash not required for
operations or reinvestment”
(Brealey, Myers, & Allen, 2006, p. 998). Another possibility to
22. analyze a company’s
value using discounted cash flows is the adjusted present value
(APV). The APV is the
net present value of the company’s free cash flows assuming
pure equity financing and
adding the present value of any financing side effect, like tax
shield (Brealey, Myers, &
Allen, 2006, p. 993) In general you can say, that the APV is
based on the “principle of
value additivity” (Luehrmann, 1997, S. 135). However, APV
and NPV lead to the same
result.
Since the DCF method is a valuation technique that is based on
predictions, a scenario
analysis is usually conducted to examine the effects of changes
in the underlying
assumptions. Such a scenario analysis is usually based on three
scenarios, namely the
“base case” or “management scenario” that uses the
management’s estimations for the
relevant metrics, a “bull case” which uses very optimistic
assumptions and a “bear case”
that calculates the company’s value if it performs badly.
23. The process of valuing a company with the DCF method
contains different stages. In
the first stage scenarios are developed to predict future free
cash flows (FCF) for the
next five to ten years. Afterwards, an appropriate discount rate,
the weighted average
cost of capital (WACC) has to be determined to discount all
future FCFs to calculate
their NPVs. In the next step the terminal value (TV) has to be
identified. The TV is the
net present value of all future cash flows that accrue after the
time period that is covered
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 5
by the scenario analysis. In the last step the net present values
of the cash flows are
summed up with the terminal value.
7
������� ����� =
����
(1 + �)�
�
24. �=0
+ �������� �����
3.2 Calculation of the Free Cash Flow
3.2.1 Cash Flow to Firm and Cash Flow to Equity
There are two ways of using cash flows for the DCF valuation.
You can either use the
free cash flow to the firm (FCFF) which is the cash flow that is
available to debt- and
equity holders, or you can use the free cash flow to equity
(FCFE) which is the cash
flow that is available to the company’s equity holders only.
When using the FCFF, all inputs have to be based on accounting
figures that are
calculated before any interest payments are paid out to the debt
holders. The FCFE in
contrast uses figures from which interest payments have already
been deducted. Using
the FCFF as base for the analysis will result in the enterprise
value of the company,
using the FCFE will give the equity value. Since an acquirer
usually takes over all
25. liabilities, debt and equity, the FCFF is more relevant than the
equity approach.
The FCFF is calculated by deducting taxes from the company’s
earnings before interest
and taxes (EBIT), resulting in the net operating profit after tax
(NOPAT). All
calculatory costs (e.g. D&A) are then added back, since they do
not express any cash
flows. The capital expenditure (Capex) is deducted. It is a cash
outflow that is not
reflected in the income statement, because Capex is activated on
the asset side of the
balance sheet. The increase in net working capital (NWC) is
also deducted, because it is
does not represent any actual cash flows. The formula for
calculating the FCFF is
shown below. (Damodaran, 1996, p. 237)
���� = ����� + �&� − ����� − �������� ��
���
There are more methods that can be used to calculate the FCFF,
but they will all result
in the same value.
____________
26. 7
�������� ����� =
����
(1+�)�
∞
�=�+1
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 6
3.2.2 Building Future Scenarios
Deriving the NPV of the free cash flows that accrue in the
scenario period is very
complex, because all these cash flows are based on assumptions.
The method therefore
requires a detailed picture of the company’s future situation,
e.g. EBIT and Capex.
Predictions are usually made for the next five to fifteen years.
The NPV of the cash
flows accruing after this scenario period is included in the
terminal value, which is
derived using much less assumptions. These predictions are
usually based on historical
data, but may also reflect changes in the company’s business
27. plan, industry or in the
global economy.
To provide a detailed view on how the company’s value might
be affected by a change
in the underlying assumption, a scenario analysis is usually
conducted. In the bear case
scenario, low assumptions for rates of growth and margins are
used to build a very
pessimistic scenario. In the bull case the opposite is the case,
all assumptions are very
optimistic. These two cases mark the boundaries of where in
between the fair value of
the company should be with a high certainty. Of course,
additional scenario and risk
testing methods like value at risk using a Monte Carlo
Simulation can be used to further
evaluate any risks.
The most important scenario in the valuation of a company is
the base case. In this case
the management’s predictions and opinions regarding the future
development of the
company, its relevant markets and competitors are used to build
the scenario that is
28. most likely to happen. However, attention has to be paid to the
reliability of any
management provided figures, since managers often have a
personal incentive to
increase the takeover price and therefore might provide biased
estimates.
Another item that is usually included are potential synergies
between the target and the
acquirer. If the potential acquirer is a strategic acquirer who
runs a similar business,
many synergies can be realized. This will allow the strategic
bidder to offer a higher
price than a financial bidder, like a private equity funds for
example.
3.3 The Weighted Average Cost of Capital
Determining the discount rate requires extensive analysis of the
company’s financing
structure and the current market conditions. The rate that is
used to discount the FCFs is
called the weighted average cost of capital (WACC). The
WACC is one of the most
important input factors in the DCF model. Small changes in the
WACC will cause large
29. Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 7
changes in the firm value. The WACC is calculated by
weighting the sources of capital
according to the company’s financial structure and then
multiplying them with their
costs. Therefore the formula for the WACC calculation is:
8
���� =
������
���� + ������
∗ ���� �� ������ +
����
���� + ������
∗ ���� �� ����
3.3.1 Cost of Equity
The cost of equity (COE) is calculated with the help of the
capital asset pricing model
(CAPM). The CAPM reveals the return that investors require for
bearing the risk of
holding a company’s share. This required return is the return on
equity (ROE) that
30. investors demand to bear the risk of holding the company’s
share, and is therefore
equivalent to the company’s cost of equity. According to the
CAPM, the required ROE,
or in this case the COE is derived with the following formula
(Ross, Westerfield, &
Jordan, 2008, p. 426):
��� = �� + � �� − ��
Although the risk-free interest rate is the yield on T-Bills or T-
Bonds, professionals use
the London Interbank Offer Rates (LIBOR) as an approximation
for the short-term risk-
free interest rates, since “. . . treasury rates are too low to be
used as risk-free rates . . . “
(Hull, 2008, p. 74) It is therefore common to use the LIBOR as
the risk-free rate for
valuation purposes.
The input factor β is the risk, that holding the stock will add to
the investor’s portfolio
9
(Rhaiem, Ben, & Mabrouk, 2007, p. 80). It is derived using
linear regression analysis,
where the excess return of the stock is the dependent variable
31. and the excess market
return is the independent variable. The beta is the slope of the
regression line. (Brealey,
Myers, & Allen, 2006, p. 220) Beta is an empirical determined
input factor that is also
based on the company’s historical level of leverage, because
higher leverage ratios
increase the shareholder’s risk. Since the company’s level of
leverage often changes
during a transaction, the beta has to be adjusted for this change
by unlevering and
relevering to the new capital structure. If the company is not
listed there is no data
____________
8
In case of any preferred share outstanding, the formula has to be
rearranged to include this source of
financing as well. The adjusted formula will be as following:
���� =
������
������
∗ ��� +
����
32. ������
∗ ��� +
���������
������
∗ ���� �� ��������� �������
9
� =
��� (����� ,������ )
��� (������ )
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 8
available to compute a linear regression. As a consequence, a
peer group of similar
companies is set up and the median of their unlevered betas is
then relevered to fit the
target’s financing structure. Although the CAPM approach is
very useful to estimate the
cost of equity, some scientists argue that the CAPM was
developed for liquid assets
(Michailetz, Artemenkov, & Artemenkov, 2007, p. 44), and
33. therefore its significance
for the valuation of illiquid assets, like non-listed companies
should be subject to further
research.
3.3.2 Cost of Debt
The cost of debt (COD) is the interest rate that a company has
to pay on its outstanding
debt. The most influencing factor on the COD is a company’s
credit rating. A company
with an investment grade credit rating
10
(e.g.: S&P AAA) is able to borrow at
considerably lower interest rates than a company that is rated as
non-investment grade
(e.g.: S&P BB-). The difference between the risk-free interest
rate and the interest rate
that a company has to pay to borrow money is called the
company’s credit spread. The
credit spread does not only depend on a company’s credit
worthiness, but is also
determined by market conditions. An indicator for these
conditions is the spread of the
USD 3m LIBOR vs. the 3m T-Bills
34. 11
depicted in figure 1 in the appendix (Bloomberg
Professional Database, 2008). The chart reflects a massive
widening in credit spreads
that occurred in August 2007 after numerous banks and hedge
funds announced a
massive exposure to the so-called subprime mortgage market.
The dependence of
overall market conditions should be kept in mind when
calculating the COD. Especially
when the company has a high leverage ratio, special attention
has to be paid to the credit
markets.
Interest rate costs are tax deductable in most economies, so that
the true COD is lower
than the interest rate a company pays out to its debt holders
12
. Due to the fact that
taxation laws are very different around the world, a very
thorough analysis is needed to
verify how much of the interest costs are deductable. The COD
after tax can be
calculated as following, where i is the interest rate on
35. outstanding debt and t is the
effective tax rate paid by the company:
____________
10
Please see table 1 for an overview of long term credit rating
scales of different rating agencies
11
Another widely used benchmark to assess the credit spread is
the iTraxx Europe index, a credit index
consisting of 125 investment grade companies in Europe
12
Assuming the fact that the company is paying taxes from which
the COD can be deducted
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 9
��� = � ∗ (1 − �)
If the company has different kinds of debt outstanding, the COD
is the weighted
average cost of debt of these different tranches, adjusted for
36. tax:
13
��� = 1 − � ∗ ����
�
�=1
3.3.3 Summary
By plugging in the formulas for the COE and COD, we get the
full formula for the
WACC including all factors that influence the discount rate:
���� =
�
� + �
∗ �� + � �� − �� +
�
� + �
∗ � ∗ (1 − �)
The WACC is therefore determined by the COE, which is
derived by applying the
CAPM with its underlying assumptions for beta. The COD is
derived from the interest
rate that the company has to pay to its debt holders and by the
37. tax rate that the
corporation has to pay on its profits. Changing the assumptions
for the cost of capital
will have large effects on the result of the overall valuation
process.
The WACC of a company is dependent on a variety of economic
factors. Especially the
company’s industry and the steadiness of its cash flows
influence it. Companies with
stable cash flows in mature industries with low growth rates
will typically have low
capital costs (Morningstar, 2007, pp. 1-2). For example, Bayer
will have a substantially
lower WACC than Conergy.
The WACC is used to discount the FCFs that we predicted in
our scenario analysis. The
result is the NPV of the company in the scenario period, to
which we will later add the
terminal value, which also makes uses of the WACC.
Using current figures for beta, risk-free rate, credit spread, and
interest costs will lead to
a fairly realistic approximation for the discount rate in most
cases. However, to get an
38. exact value, the company’s future WACC must be used.
Therefore, all input factors of
the WACC formula have to be predicted, resulting in leeway for
the outcome of the
DCF analysis.
____________
13
The weights are calculated by dividing the market value of a
tranche by the market value of total
debt outstanding: �� =
������ ����� �� ����� ��
������ ����� �� ����� ����
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 10
3.4 Calculation of the Terminal Value
The terminal value is the NPV of all future cash flows that
accrue after the time period
that is covered by the scenario analysis. Due to the fact that it is
very difficult to
estimate precise figures showing how a company will develop
over a long period of
39. time, the terminal value is based on average growth
expectations, which are easier to
predict.
The idea behind the terminal value is to assume constant growth
rates for the time
following the time period that was analyzed more extensively.
The constant perpetual
growth rate g, together with the WACC as the discount rate r
allows for the use of a
simple dividend discount model to determine the terminal value.
Therefore the TV can
be expresses as
14
(Beranek & Howe, 1990, p. 193), where the FCF is one period
before
the TV period:
�� =
����� ∗ (1 + �)
�
(1 + �)�
∞
�=1
40. =
����� (1 + �)
� − �
Since all these cash flows are discounted to a date in the future,
the TV has to be
discounted again to give us the NPV of all free cash flows that
occur after the scenario
predicted period.
The determination of the perpetual growth rate is one of the
most important and
complex tasks of the whole DCF analysis process, since minor
changes in this rate will
have major effects on the TV and therefore on the firm value in
total. The huge range of
values that result from a change in this growth rate will be
examined in a case study
later on in this chapter. In most cases a perpetual growth rate
should be between 0% and
5%. It has to be positive since in the long-term, the economy is
always growing.
However, according to economists, any growth rate above 5% is
not sustainable on the
41. long-term. The perpetual growth rate should be in line with the
nominal GDP growth.
(JP Morgan Chase, 2006).
Due to the fact, that the TV often accounts for more than half of
the total company
value, special attention has to be paid to its calculation and
input coefficients. As
discussed in the case study later in this paper, even very small
changes that might not
____________
14
�� =
���∗ 1+� 1
1+� 1
+
���∗ 1+� 2
1+� 2
+
���∗ 1+� 3
(1+�)3
…
���∗ 1+� �
(1+�)�
42. which can be mathematically
rearranged to equal the formula given in the text
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 11
even be significant from an economist’s perspective will result
in substantial changes in
the company value. Therefore it is very easy to move the TV
into the desired direction
without having to drastically change any underlying business
predictions, like EBIT
margin or capital expenses.
3.5 Determination of Company Value
After having determined the NPV of the cash flows accruing
within the scenario period
and the TV, the TV is discounted to its NPV. Both NPVs are
then added together to
give the enterprise value or the equity value, depending on
whether the valuation is
based on FCFFs or FCFEs:
������� ����� =
����
43. (1 + �)�
+
��
(1 + �)�+1
�
�=0
Usually the company value is calculated using different levels
of leverage to find an
optimal financing structure. The determined company value can
then be used for further
analysis, e.g. the equity value could be divided by the number
of shares outstanding to
determine a fair share price for listed companies.
4 Validity of the Discounted Cash Flow Valuation Approach
4.1 Case Study: BASF
To demonstrate the wide range of possible results of the DCF
analysis, this paper will
now analyze the BASF stock and the DCF’s sensitivity to
changes in the WACC, the
perpetual growth rate, and sales growth. For this purpose, a base
scenario based on
44. broker estimates (Credit Suisse Equity Research, 2008) will be
built to obtain a fair
reference value for one BASF stock. Afterwards a sensitivity
analysis will be conducted
to examine the effects on this reference price that modifying
factors will have.
The base case scenario uses the estimates by Credit Suisse
analysts for the cash flow
forecasts for the years 2008 to 2013. The unlevered beta was
determined to be 0.9 using
a linear regression model leading to the cost of equity of 10.3%.
BASF’s current credit
rating results in a credit spread of 500bp according to analysts
(Credit Suisse Equity
Research, 2008). This leads to a WACC of 9.0%. Furthermore
we assume the perpetual
growth rate to be equal to 1.5%. Discounting the predicted free
cash flows to the firm
for the years 2008 to 2013 using the WACC of 9.0% and then
adding the discounted
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 12
terminal value results in an enterprise value of EURm 67,850.
45. Please see tables 3 - 7 for
the exact calculations.
Period 2008E 2009E 2010E 2011E 2012E 2013E TV
FCFF 4,284 4,405 4,866 5,409 6,148 6,212 -
NPV 3,930 3,708 3,758 3,832 3,996 3,704 44,923
EV 67,850
Table 4: Case Study: Calculation of the enterprise
value
It is remarkable that the terminal value accounts for EURm
44,923 of the total EV. This
makes obvious, that the outcome of the DCF analysis is highly
sensitive to changes in
the perpetual growth rate, since it has a major effect on the TV.
Having determined the
EV, net debt and corporate adjustments are deducted from the
EV to calculate the equity
value of EURm 55,332. The equity value is then divided by the
number of shares
outstanding. The result of EUR 58.49 is the fair price for one
BASF share given the
underlying assumptions. Knowing the fact that the current share
46. price equals only EUR
39.41 (Thomson Reuters, 2008), this would make the BASF
share a great investment if
you believe that the underlying assumptions are valid. This
share price will serve as the
reference value for the sensitivity analysis, since it lies in
between of most research
analyst’s target price for BASF.
4.2 Sensitivity Analysis
To investigate the sensitivity of the DCF method, the BASF
case study developed above
will be used. The changes that occur in the share price will be
stated as percentage
offset from the base case share price of EUR 58.49.
The WACC and the perpetual growth rate are two main input
factors that have large
effect on the outcome of the analysis. Therefore the table below
shows the result of the
sensitivity analysis regarding those two factors. The base case
assumptions of 9.0% for
the WACC and 1.5% for the perpetual growth rate are
highlighted in dark blue.
47. Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 13
WACC (%)
0.00 7.0% 7.5% 8.0% 8.5% 9.0% 9.5% 10.0% 10.5% 11.0%
P
e
r
p
e
tu
a
l
g
r
o
w
th
r
a
te
(
48. %
)
0.0% 19.2% 9.0% 0.2% -7.6% -14.5% -20.7% -26.2% -31.2% -
31.2%
0.5% 27.2% 15.8% 5.9% -2.7% -10.3% -17.0% -23.0% -28.3% -
28.3%
1.0% 36.6% 23.6% 12.5% 2.9% -5.4% -12.8% -19.3% -25.1% -
25.1%
1.5% 47.6% 32.7% 20.1% 9.3% 0.0% -8.1% -15.3% -21.6% -
21.6%
2.0% 60.9% 43.5% 29.0% 16.7% 6.2% -2.8% -10.7% -17.7% -
17.7%
2.5% 77.2% 56.4% 39.4% 25.3% 13.4% 3.2% -5.6% -13.3% -
13.3%
3.0% 97.5% 72.2% 52.0% 35.5% 21.8% 10.2% 0.3% -8.2% -
8.2%
Table 5: Case Study: Sensitivity Analysis WACC, Perpetual
growth rate
The table clearly shows that even slight changes in the WACC
or in the perpetual
growth rate, which might not even be significant from an
economist’s perspective, will
largely offset the determined fair share price from the base case
49. scenario. For example
increasing the WACC by 100bp and simultaneously decreasing
the perpetual growth
rate by 50bp will shrink the calculated fair stock price by more
than 19%. Since it is
very difficult to estimate the perpetual growth rate or the cost
of capital with an
exactness of just a few base points, the determined fair share
price can only be seen as
guidance, but not as an absolutely exact value.
The sensitivity to changes in the WACC can be expressed as the
first derivative of the
company value in respect to the discount rate, similar to the
concept of bond duration.
The formula below shows the approximate change in the
company value when
modifying the WACC.
15
��
��
=
1
50. 1 + �
−� ∗ ����
(1 + �)�
�
�=0
The next step in the sensitivity analysis is to assess whether
changes in the perpetual
growth rate or in the growth rate for the predicted period (Sales
CAGR) have a higher
impact on the share price. Since both growth rates affect the
nominal value free cash
flow, the result of the analysis should be helpful to understand
the importance that the
terminal value has on the DCF analysis since all other factors
are kept fixated. If
modifying the perpetual growth rate leads to larger changes than
modifying the sales
CAGR for the scenario period, the terminal value would be of
significantly higher
importance than the scenario predictions for the first years.
____________
15
51. Due to convexity however, this approximation should only be
used in the case of small changes
in the discount rate.
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 14
Perpetual growth rate (%)
0.00 0.50% 0.75% 1.00% 1.25% 1.50% 1.75% 2.00% 2.25%
2.50%
S
a
le
s
C
A
G
R
(
%
) 6.75% -14.0% -11.8% -9.4% -6.9% -4.3% -1.4% 1.6% 4.9%
8.5%
7.00% -12.8% -10.5% -8.1% -5.6% -2.9% 0.0% 3.2% 6.5%
10.1%
52. 7.25% -11.5% -9.2% -6.8% -4.2% -1.4% 1.5% 4.7% 8.1% 11.8%
7.50% -10.3% -7.9% -5.5% -2.8% 0.0% 3.0% 6.2% 9.7% 13.4%
7.75% -9.0% -6.6% -4.1% -1.4% 1.5% 4.5% 7.8% 11.3% 15.1%
8.00% -7.7% -5.3% -2.7% 0.0% 2.9% 6.1% 9.4% 13.0% 16.9%
8.25% -6.4% -3.9% -1.3% 1.5% 4.5% 7.6% 11.0% 14.7% 18.6%
Table 6: Case Study: Sensitivity analysis perpetual growth
rate, sales CAGR
As expected, changes in the perpetual growth rate have a higher
impact than changes in
the sales CAGR have. For example an increase in the perpetual
growth rate by 25bp
result in a 3% higher share price, whereas a change by the same
amount in the sales
CAGR will only drive the fair share price up by 1.5%. Looking
at this result, the
importance of the terminal value becomes evident again. It
underlines the fact that the
TV includes all cash flows from the end of the scenario period
up to infinity compared
to just a few years in the scenario period. Therefore the TV,
together with its underlying
53. assumptions, is the most important and influential part of the
whole discounted cash
flow analysis. As mentioned before it is very easy to slightly
adjust the assumptions that
influence the TV, without having to justify these changes since
they are very small.
However, these small adjustments will significantly change the
TV and therefore the
value of the whole company.
5 Conclusion
The sensitivity analysis has shown that the DCF method is very
vulnerable to changes
in the underlying assumptions. Only marginally changes in the
perpetual growth rate
will lead to huge variances in the terminal value. Since the
terminal value accounts for a
large portion of the company’s value, this is of big significance
for the validity of the
DCF method.
It is very easy to manipulate the DCF analysis to result in the
value that you want it to
result in by adjusting the inputs. This is even possible without
making changes that
54. would be significant from an economist’s point of perspective,
e.g. a change in the
perpetual growth rate or in the WACC by just a few base points.
Analysts or business
professionals have no tools to estimate the input factors with
that kind of exactness.
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 15
However, the DCF analysis is a great tool to analyze what
assumptions and conditions
have to be fulfilled in order to reach a certain company value.
This is especially helpful
in the case of capital budgeting and in the creation of feasibility
plans.
The company valuation using discounted cash flows is a valid
method to assess the
company’s value if special precaution is put on the validity of
the underlying
assumptions. As with all other financial models, the validity of
the DCF method almost
completely depends on the quality and validity of the data that
is used as input. If used
wisely, the discounted cash flow valuation is a powerful tool to
55. evaluate the values of a
variety of assets and also to analyze the effects that different
economic scenarios have
on a company’s value.
The range of reasonable rates for discount factor and perpetual
growth rate depends on
each specific firm, its business situation and many more
variables. In general you can
say that the more risky a firm is, the higher its capital costs
(WACC) are. The perpetual
growth rate should be the same for all industries, since
according to the arbitrage theory
in the long run all companies and industries will grow by the
same rate.
I conclude that using the DCF method in combination with other
methods, like the
trading comparables or precedent transaction analysis, is an
effective approach to obtain
a realistic range of appropriate company values. This
combination technique is indeed
the method that most companies and investment banks use
today. When using several
valuation techniques, their individual shortfalls are eliminated
and the ultimate goal in
56. the field of company valuation can be reached: determining a
fair and valid company
value.
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 16
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Applied
Economics and Finance , 80.
Ross, Westerfield, & Jordan. (2008). Corporate Finance
Fundamentals. New York:
McGraw-Hill Irwin.
Thomson One Banker. (2008, August 14). M&A League Tables.
Retrieved August 14,
2008, from Thomson One Banker:
http://banker.thomsonib.com/ta
Thomson Reuters. (2008, August 26). Worldscope Database.
New York.
59. Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 18
Appendix
Table 1: Long term credit rating scales
Rating Agency Moody's
Standard & Poor's
(S&P)
Fitch
Investment
grade debt
Aaa AAA AAA
Aa1 AA+ AA+
Aa2 AA AA
Aa3 AA- AA-
A1 A+ A+
A2 A A
A3 A- A-
Baa1 BBB+ BBB+
Baa2 BBB BBB
60. Baa3 BBB- BBB-
Non-investment
grade debt
Ba1 BB+ BB+
Ba2 BB BB
Ba3 BB- BB-
B1 B+ B+
B2 B B
B3 B- B-
Caa1 CCC+ CCC+
Caa2 CCC CCC
Caa3 CCC- CCC-
Ca CC CC
C C C
Default grade
debt C D D
62. Company
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 19
Table 3: Transaction multiple analysis
Table 4: Case Study: Calculation of the enterprise value
Period 2008E 2009E 2010E 2011E 2012E 2013E TV
FCFF 4,284 4,405 4,866 5,409 6,148 6,212 -
NPV 3,930 3,708 3,758 3,832 3,996 3,704 44,923
EV 67,850
Table 5: Case Study: Sensitivity Analysis WACC,
perpetual growth rate
WACC (%)
0.00 7.0% 7.5% 8.0% 8.5% 9.0% 9.5% 10.0% 10.5% 11.0%
P
e
r
p
e
tu
63. a
l
g
r
o
w
th
r
a
te
(
%
)
0.0% 19.2% 9.0% 0.2% -7.6% -14.5% -20.7% -26.2% -31.2% -
31.2%
0.5% 27.2% 15.8% 5.9% -2.7% -10.3% -17.0% -23.0% -28.3% -
28.3%
1.0% 36.6% 23.6% 12.5% 2.9% -5.4% -12.8% -19.3% -25.1% -
25.1%
1.5% 47.6% 32.7% 20.1% 9.3% 0.0% -8.1% -15.3% -21.6% -
21.6%
2.0% 60.9% 43.5% 29.0% 16.7% 6.2% -2.8% -10.7% -17.7% -
17.7%
2.5% 77.2% 56.4% 39.4% 25.3% 13.4% 3.2% -5.6% -13.3% -
64. 13.3%
3.0% 97.5% 72.2% 52.0% 35.5% 21.8% 10.2% 0.3% -8.2% -
8.2%
Table 6: Case Study: Sensitivity analysis perpetual growth rate,
sales CAGR
Perpetual growth rate (%)
0.00 0.50% 0.75% 1.00% 1.25% 1.50% 1.75% 2.00% 2.25%
2.50%
S
a
le
s
C
A
G
R
(
%
) 6.75% -14.0% -11.8% -9.4% -6.9% -4.3% -1.4% 1.6% 4.9%
8.5%
7.00% -12.8% -10.5% -8.1% -5.6% -2.9% 0.0% 3.2% 6.5%
10.1%
7.25% -11.5% -9.2% -6.8% -4.2% -1.4% 1.5% 4.7% 8.1% 11.8%
65. 7.50% -10.3% -7.9% -5.5% -2.8% 0.0% 3.0% 6.2% 9.7% 13.4%
7.75% -9.0% -6.6% -4.1% -1.4% 1.5% 4.5% 7.8% 11.3% 15.1%
8.00% -7.7% -5.3% -2.7% 0.0% 2.9% 6.1% 9.4% 13.0% 16.9%
8.25% -6.4% -3.9% -1.3% 1.5% 4.5% 7.6% 11.0% 14.7% 18.6%
Table 7: Case Study: Income statement estimates
Target Acquirer Date EV (€m) EV / SALES EV / EBITDA EV /
EBIT EqV / Net Income
Vanguard Car Rental EMEA Europcar International 13/11/2006
670.00 1.70x 6.34x 23.92x n.m.
Keddy Car Europcar International 30/06/2006 0.00
Europcar International Eurazeo SA 03.09.2006 3083.00 2.41x
Hertz Group (Canada) FirstGroup plc 20/12/2000 18.07 1.22x
Laidlaw International FirstGroup plc 02.09.2007 2701.76 1.11x
7.43x 13.84x 22.10x
Cognisa Transportation First Transit, Inc 01.05.2007 11.87
SKE Support Services FirstGroup plc 13/09/2004 22.85 0.38x
Aircoach FirstGroup plc 11.01.2003 16.99
GB Railways Group FirstGroup plc 16/07/2003 44.51 0.34x
29.67x 55.64x 88.99x
66. Coach USA Kohlberg & Company LLC 06.06.2003 130.99
0.72x
Verona Bus Service FirstGroup plc 08.01.2001 6.51 1.00x 3.81x
7.15x
Avis Greece Piraeus Bank SA 05.02.2007 215.50 2.65x
Avis French Avis Europe plc 02.03.2003 8.50 0.43x
Budget International Avis Europe plc 23/01/2003 37.28
SAISC Avis Europe plc 31/01/2002 25.58
3 Arrows Avis Europe plc 12.10.1998 57.09
Fraikin SA CVC Capital 12.08.2006 1350.00 2.21x 18.10x
Average 1.29x 11.81x 23.73x 55.54x
Median 1.11x 6.89x 18.10x 55.54x
Discounted Cash Flow Valuation 20
Period 2008E 2009E 2010E 2011E 2012E 2013E 2014E
Sales 64,702.10 65,388.80 67,645.50 71,390.10 74,631.10
76,870.00 86,517.90
EBIT Margin 12.2% 11.2% 11.9% 13.2% 14.0% 13.0% 11.0%
78. 1
5
-M
a
i-
2
0
0
8
USD LIBOR 3m vs US Treasury 3m …
Project4Income StatementAll numbers in thousandsRevenue
12/30/1712/31/1612/26/15Total
Revenue63,525,00062,799,00063,056,000Cost of
Revenue28,785,00028,209,00028,731,000Gross
Profit34,740,00034,590,00034,325,000Cash FlowOperating
ExpensesAll numbers in thousandsResearch Development---
Period Ending12/31/1712/31/1612/31/15Selling General and
Administrative24,231,00024,805,00024,613,000Net
Income1,248,0006,527,0007,351,000Non Recurring--
1,359,000Operating Activities, Cash Flows Provided By or Used
InOthers---Depreciation1,260,0001,787,0001,970,000Total
Operating Expenses---Adjustments To Net
Income923,000680,0001,349,000Operating Income or
Loss10,509,0009,785,0008,353,000Changes In Accounts
Receivables---Income from Continuing OperationsChanges In
Liabilities---Total Other Income/Expenses
Net244,000110,00059,000Changes In Inventories---Earnings
Before Interest and
Taxes10,753,0009,895,0008,412,000Changes In Other
79. Operating Activities3,537,000-221,000-157,000Interest
Expense1,151,0001,342,000970,000Total Cash Flow From
Operating Activities6,995,0008,796,00010,528,000Income
Before Tax9,602,0008,553,0007,442,000Investing Activities,
Cash Flows Provided By or Used InIncome Tax
Expense4,694,0002,174,0001,941,000Capital Expenditures-
1,675,000-2,262,000-2,553,000Minority
Interest92,000104,000107,000Investments-609,0001,125,000-
1,752,000Net Income From Continuing
Ops4,857,0006,329,0005,452,000Other Cash flows from
Investing Activities-101,000138,000-1,881,000Non-recurring
EventsTotal Cash Flows From Investing Activities-2,385,000-
999,000-6,186,000Discontinued Operations---Financing
Activities, Cash Flows Provided By or Used InExtraordinary
Items---Dividends Paid-6,320,000-6,043,000-5,741,000Effect
Of Accounting Changes---Sale Purchase of Stock-2,087,000-
2,247,000-2,319,000Other Items---Net
Borrowings1,089,0001,666,0002,696,000Net IncomeOther Cash
Flows from Financing Activities-91,00079,000251,000Net
Income4,857,0006,329,0005,452,000Total Cash Flows From
Financing Activities-7,409,000-6,545,000-5,113,000Preferred
Stock And Other Adjustments---Effect Of Exchange Rate
Changes242,000-6,000-878,000Net Income Applicable To
Common Shares4,857,0006,329,0005,452,000Change In Cash
and Cash Equivalents-2,549,0001,246,000-1,649,000Balance
SheetAll numbers in thousandsPeriod
Ending12/26/1512/31/1612/30/17Current AssetsCash And Cash
Equivalents9,096,0009,158,00010,610,000Short Term
Investments2,913,0006,967,0008,900,000Net
Receivables6,437,0006,694,0007,024,000Inventory2,720,0002,7
23,0002,947,000Other Current
Assets1,865,000908,0001,546,000Total Current
Assets23,031,00026,450,00031,027,000Long Term
Investments2,311,0001,950,0002,042,000Property Plant and
Equipment16,317,00016,591,00017,240,000Goodwill14,177,000
14,430,00014,744,000Intangible
80. Assets13,081,00013,433,00013,838,000Accumulated
Amortization---Other Assets750,000636,000913,000Deferred
Long Term Asset Charges---Total
Assets69,667,00073,490,00079,804,000Current
LiabilitiesAccounts
Payable13,507,00014,243,00015,017,000Short/Current Long
Term Debt4,071,0006,892,0005,485,000Other Current
Liabilities---Total Current
Liabilities17,578,00021,135,00020,502,000Long Term
Debt29,213,00030,053,00033,796,000Other
Liabilities5,887,0006,669,00011,283,000Deferred Long Term
Liability Charges4,959,0004,434,0003,242,000Minority
Interest107,000104,00092,000Negative Goodwill---Total
Liabilities57,744,00062,395,00068,915,000Stockholders'
EquityMisc. Stocks Options Warrants-145,000-151,000-
156,000Redeemable Preferred Stock---Preferred Stock---
Common Stock24,00024,00024,000Retained
Earnings50,472,00052,518,00052,839,000Treasury Stock-
29,185,000-31,468,000-32,757,000Capital
Surplus4,076,0004,091,0003,996,000Other Stockholder Equity-
13,319,000-13,919,000-13,057,000Total Stockholder
Equity12,068,00011,246,00011,045,000Net Tangible Assets-
15,190,000-16,617,000-17,537,000Cash FlowAll numbers in
thousandsPeriod Ending12/30/1712/31/1612/26/15Net
Income4,857,0006,329,0005,452,000Operating Activities, Cash
Flows Provided By or Used
InDepreciation2,369,0002,368,0002,416,000Adjustments To Net
Income3,545,000950,0002,089,000Changes In Accounts
Receivables-202,000-349,000-461,000Changes In Liabilities-
137,0001,326,0001,747,000Changes In Inventories-168,000-
75,000-244,000Changes In Other Operating Activities-
321,00074,000-184,000Total Cash Flow From Operating
Activities9,994,00010,673,00010,864,000Investing Activities,
Cash Flows Provided By or Used InCapital Expenditures-
2,969,000-3,040,000-2,758,000Investments-1,910,000-
4,301,000-400,000Other Cash flows from Investing
81. Activities476,000193,000-411,000Total Cash Flows From
Investing Activities-4,403,000-7,148,000-3,569,000Financing
Activities, Cash Flows Provided By or Used InDividends Paid-
4,472,000-4,227,000-4,040,000Sale Purchase of Stock-
1,543,000-2,542,000-4,501,000Net
Borrowings2,050,0003,746,0004,632,000Other Cash Flows from
Financing Activities-221,000-188,000-203,000Total Cash Flows
From Financing Activities-4,186,000-3,211,000-4,112,000Effect
Of Exchange Rate Changes47,000-252,000-221,000Change In
Cash and Cash Equivalents1,452,00062,0002,962,000Figure 1
Liabilities and equity20162017MicroDrive’s Most Recent
Financial Statements (Thousand, Except for Per Share
Data)Accounts Payable$ 14,243,000$ 15,017,000INCOME
STATEMENTSBALANCE SHEETSShort/Current Long Term
Debt6,892,0005,485,00020162017Assets20162017Other Current
Liabilities--Net sales$ 62,799,000$ 63,525,000Cash And
Cash Equivalents$ 9,158,000$ 10,610,000Total Current
Liabilities21,135,00020,502,000COGS (excl.
depr.)28,209,00028,785,000Short Term
Investments6,967,0008,900,000Long Term
Debt30,053,00033,796,000Depreciation2,368,0002,369,000Net
Receivables6,694,0007,024,000Other
Liabilities6,669,00011,283,000Other operating expenses--
Inventory2,723,0002,947,000Deferred Long Term Liability
Charges4,434,0003,242,000EBIT$ 32,222,000$
32,371,000Other Current Assets908,0001,546,000Minority
Interest104,00092,000Interest expense1,342,0001,151,000Total
Current Assets26,450,00031,027,000Negative Goodwill--Pre-
tax earnings$ 30,880,000$ 31,220,000Long Term
Investments1,950,0002,042,000Total
Liabilities62,395,00068,915,000Taxes
(7,849,073)15,262,100Property Plant and
Equipment16,591,00017,240,000Stockholders' EquityNI before
pref. div.$ 38,729,073$
15,957,900Goodwill14,430,00014,744,000Misc. Stocks Options
Warrants(151,000)(156,000)Preferred div.--Intangible
82. Assets13,433,00013,838,000Redeemable Preferred Stock--Net
income$ 38,729,073$ 15,957,900Accumulated Amortization--
Preferred Stock--Other Assets636,000913,000Common
Stock24,00024,000Other DataDeferred Long Term Asset
Charges--Retained Earnings52,518,00052,839,000Common
dividends$0$0Total Assets73,490,00079,804,000Treasury
Stock(31,468,000)(32,757,000)Addition to
RE$52,518,000$50,472,000Capital
Surplus4,091,0003,996,000Tax rate-25%49%Other Stockholder
Equity(13,919,000)(13,057,000)Shares of common
stock4,000,0004,000,000Total Stockholder
Equity11,246,00011,045,000Earnings per share$9.68$3.99Net
Tangible Assets(16,617,000)(17,537,000)Dividends per
share$0.00$0.00Price per share$5.67$6.89Figure 2Pepsi's
Forecast: Inputs for the Selected ScenarioStatus QuoKOPepsi
ActualPepsiInputsActualActualForecast1. Operating
Ratios20172016201720182019202020212022Sales growth
rate5%-1%1%8%6%7%5%5%COGS (excl. depr.) /
Sales76%223%221%200%178%178%178%178%Depreciation /
Net PP&E9%14%14%35%35%35%35%35%Other op. exp. /
Sales10%0%0%18%18%18%19%20%Cash /
Sales1%15%17%6%6%7%7%7%Actual Historical
FinancingAcc. rec. /
Sales8%11%11%10%8%8%8%8%20162017Inventory /
Sales15%4%5%20%5%4%4%4%Long-term
debt$30,053,000$33,796,000Net PP&E /
Sales33%26%27%40%55%60%60%60%Short-term
debt$6,892,000$5,485,000Acc. pay. /
Sales4%23%24%20%20%23%23%23%Preferred
stock$0$0Accruals / Sales7%6%6%6%6%6%6%5%Market value
of equity = (Price x # shares)$0$0Tax rate40%-
25%49%9%12%13%13%13%Total$36,945,000$39,281,0002.
Capital StructureActual Market WeightsTarget Market
Weights% Long-term
debt22%48%49%50%50%44%55%57%See the box to the right
for calculations of the actual capital structures, based on market
83. values, for the past two years.Percent long-term debt49%54%%
Short-term debt3%11%8%8%8%6%7%9%Percent short-term
debt8%8%% Preferred stock0%0%0%0%0%0%2%3%Percent
preferred stock0%0%% Common
stock75%100%100%80%80%80%5%5%Percent market value of
equity0%0%3. Costs of CapitalForecastTotal57%62%Rate on
LT debt9.0%9%9%9%9%Rate on ST
debt10.0%10%10%10%10%Rate on preferred stock (ignoring
flotation costs)8.0%8%8%8%8%Cost of
equity13.58%14%14%14%14%4. Target Dividend
PolicyActualGrowth rate of
dividends0%0.0%0%0%0%0%0%Figure 3Pepsi's Forecast of
Operations for the Selected Scenario (Thousands of Dollars,
Except for Per Share Data)INCOME
STATEMENTSKOPepsiPepsiPanel A:
InputsActualActualForecastA1. Operating
Ratios20172016201720182019202020212022Sales growth
rate5%-7%7%8%6%7%5%5%COGS (excl. depr.) /
Sales76%211%182%200%178%178%178%178%Depreciation /
Net PP&E9%33%41%35%35%35%35%35%Other op. exp. /
Sales10%22%15%18%18%18%19%19%Cash /
Sales1%8%8%6%6%7%7%7%Acc. rec. /
Sales8%3%12%10%8%8%8%8%Inventory /
Sales15%4%3%20%5%4%4%4%Net PP&E /
Sales33%63%56%40%55%60%60%60%Acc. pay. /
Sales4%23%21%20%20%23%23%23%Accruals /
Sales7%6%6%6%6%6%6%6%Tax
rate40%8%15%9%12%13%13%13%Panel B:
ResultsActualForecastB1. Sales
Revenues201720182019202020210Net
sales$63,525,000$68,607,000$72,723,420$77,814,059$81,704,7
62$81,704,762B2. Operating Assets and Operating
LiabilitiesCash$10,610,000$4,116,420$4,363,405$5,446,984$5,
719,333$0Accounts
receivable$7,024,000$7,726,400$8,344,512$9,012,073$9,733,03
9$0Inventories$2,947,00013721400363617131125623268190$0
84. Net
PP&E$17,240,000$27,442,800$39,997,881$46,688,436$49,022,
857$0Accounts
payable$15,017,000$13,721,400$14,544,684$17,897,234$18,79
2,095$0Accruals$2,319,863$2,282,244$2,339,425$2,474,740$2,
647,971$0B3. Operating IncomeCOGS (excl.
depr.)$18,969,000$137,214,000$129,447,688$138,509,026$145,
434,477$0Depreciation$7,848,000$24,012,450$25,453,197$27,2
34,921$28,596,667$0Other operating
expenses$5,349,000$12,349,260$13,090,216$14,006,531$15,52
3,905$0EBIT$2,366,000$2,507,960$2,658,438$2,844,528$3,043
,645$81,704,762Net operating profit after
taxes−$12,896,100$2,282,244$2,339,425$2,474,740$2,647,971$
81,704,762B4. Free Cash FlowsNet operating working
capital$3,244,137$9,560,576−$540,021−$2,800,354−$2,719,504
$0Total operating
capital$20,484,137$37,003,376$39,457,860$43,888,082$46,303
,353$0FCF = NOPAT – Δ op
capital−$33,380,236−$14,236,996−$115,059−$1,955,482$232,7
00$128,008,116B5. Estimated Intrinsic ValueTarget
WACC15.7%15.7%15.7%15.7%0.0%Return on invested capital-
63.0%11.7%11.7%11.7%11.7%ERROR:#DIV/0!Growth in FCF-
99%1599.6%-111.9%54910.0%Horizon Value:Value of
operations 101745634.55$101,745,635+ ST
investments8900000.00$0=−$128,241,239Estimated total
intrinsic value110645634.55$101,745,635− All
debt45079000.00$0Value of Operations:− Preferred
stock0.00$0Present value of HV$53,495,882Estimated intrinsic
value of equity65566634.55$101,745,635+ Present value of
FCF$48,249,753÷ Number of shares4000000.00$0Value of
operations =$101,745,635Estimated intrinsic stock price
=16.39ERROR:#DIV/0!
All four projects are due by 1:50pm on Mar 18 th,2019
(Monday)FIN 430 — Finance Theory and PracticeStock
Valuation project
85. You have been assigned a company to research (please check
the excel list for the firm you are assigned to). statements are
available on the internet through at the http://finance.yahoo.com
website. At this website you will put the ticker symbol for your
company in the symbol box and press “go”. At this point you
will see a page that has financial information about your
company. On the left-hand side of the screen there will be a
series of options that you can choose to get more information
about your company. Under the heading “financial statements”
you will see an option for “income statement” and “balance
sheet.” You want annual statements. The financial statements
for the past 3 years should be available. (Depending on the
fiscal year for your company, these might be 2015, 2016, and
2017 or 2016, 2017 and 2018.).
The purpose of the project is to estimate and justify: (1) an
intrinsic (fundamental) value for the company of your choice
and (2) the fundamental price/share of equity in the firm. You
should attempt to justify that you have calculated your best
estimate of the firm’s stock price. You may compare your
values (ratios/prices/calculations, etc.) to those you find on the
internet, but your work should be your own and your job is to
calculate these figures. All calculations/ratios/values are
assumed to have been calculated by you own. You should not
substitute those figures for yours and using such figures from
other sources is plagiarism. All of your reports (including table,
graph, figures, reference, etc) should not be longer than 25
pages.
You may use up to three different methods to calculate firm
stock value (the FCF method is most important and you have to
include this analysis in your project). The three methods that
we study for valuing corporations include:
1. Free Cash Flow Method (or discounted cash flow
method). This method requires you to produce pro forma
financial statements as based upon the additional funds needed,
percentage of sales and constant ratio methods (see “Financial
86. forecasting” in the index). The pro forma statements are then
used to calculate the free cash flow as based upon the
formulas/examples in the: "Financial Statements, Cash Flow
and Taxes," "Financial Planning and Forecasting Financial
Statements," and the "Corporate Valuation," chapters in the
text. The FCF is discounted back to the present by the WACC,
which leads to the firm value as follows. Note that the present
value of the FCFs = the Value of Operations (see the CH 7 and
the formula runs as followings).
Value of Operations (Enterprise Value )
+ Value of non-operating assets (one example would be
marketable securities)
= Total Firm value
- Value of Debt [we use the book value of ST and LT debt;
though theory suggests that the market value
- Value of Preferred Shares [if any]
= Value of Equity
÷ Number of Shares of Common Stock outstanding
Price per share
This price per share is your estimate of the fundamental value
of the firm stock, which you would then use to argue that the
firm is either currently over/under/fairly valued according to the
market, i.e., by comparing your price/share to
the current market price/share. Warren Buffet calls this
estimate the "intrinsic value" of the firm. Remember that you
may consider the efficient market hypothesis in relation to your
price estimate.
2. Dividend Growth Model (Multi-stage growth model)
3. Comparables (Stock Price Multiples Model): This method is
relatively easy and provides some useful valuations that often
set the ranges for the stock price. The course packet lecture
entitled “Using Stock Price Multiples to Estimate Stock Price”
describes this method. You may use either a direct competitor
87. or industry averages. For example, if you are analyzing Ford
Motor Corp. it would be appropriate to use GM as a comparable
firm (and/or the auto industry). Note that sector/industry ratios
can be obtained on Yahoo.finance [look under profiles, then on
the left hand side under Financial Links you should
see competitors]. Many different financial ratios can be used,
although the P/E and Price/CF ratios are common. Another
alternative is to create your own "industry" averages from a
diverse group of firms within the industry. You are limited
only by your creativity; and a great deal of information is
available on the Internet. The goal should be to calculate
fundamental values by yourself.
General Guidelines (Mandatory)
The major focus of the project is to calculate and justify your
estimate of the price/share of equity using the FCF
Method. Many other elements of the project are necessary in
order to complete a satisfactory project. Minimally, these
include:
An example is given on CH12 (page 489- 495).
Completing 5-year pro-formas for your firm. The pro formas
serve as the central element of your project. Many steps lead up
to the pro formas, and many important steps follow from the pro
forma. All of your estimates should include
appropriate justification/ support/ explanation. Many of the
estimates of growth rates and ratios needed below should be
calculated using regression analysis.
Growth. You will need to calculate the historical growth
in dividends or in revenue for your firm (in order to obtain an
estimate of future growth). The method for estimating growth
is illustrated by an example of dividend growth for Firm XXX.
– the related file is provided on Blackboard (BB) by the name
of “Growth estimate sheet”.
88. Data Needed to Construct the Pro Formas
* Dividend data: You can attain the historical data from
https://www.dividata.com/
* An Excel spreadsheet that you use to construct your pro
formas. An excel file is provided on BB and here under the
name: CH12 (Figure 1-3) . This file “automatically” completes
the 5 years of pro formas for you; given that you have input the
data and assumptions correctly.
* 2 years of the firm’s historical financial statements,
including annual balance sheets, income and cash flow
statements (these form the basis of your pro formas). You may
also want to download 5-10 year historical data to do a better
estimate. This data may be downloaded at Mergent-
Online (available through the university library) or through the
SEC official site:
http://www.sec.gov/edgar/searchedgar/companysearch.html
NOTE: While you may want to read or skim the 10Ks for your
company, you need not construct the 10 years of financial data
from the 10Ks. Rather, using either SEC site or MergentOnline,
you are able to download the 5-10 years of financial statements
directly as a file which can be read by Excel. Should you have
difficulty, please contact me.
* Estimates of the company’s current and future (long-term
normal – gn ) sales growth (this should be completed in the
same manner that you calculate dividend growth for a company)
– you may use the Growth estimate sheet available on
Blackboard as a guide. Use the 10 years of financial
statements for the historical sales figures.
* A justification of your choice of constant or non-constant
ratios when completing the pro-formas (the base case should
usually be the constant ratio approach as discussed in the text).
* An estimate of the firm’s target capital structure (see the
89. guideline below about Calculating a Firm’s WACC) – note that
you need these weights both for the WACC.
* An estimate of the firm’s dividend payout policy.
* The firm’s tax rate.
Steps to Take after Completing the Pro Formas
* As mentioned above, the goal is to calculate the firm’s
value (in the end, your estimate of the stock price/share). This
requires that you calculate the firm’s FCFs (free cash flows) as
discussed in the relevant chapters in your text (CH2 and
CH12). This should be a relatively easy procedure, and should
be done on the same Excel spreadsheet as your pro-formas (see
CH12 (Figure 1-3)).
* You also need to calculate the Continuing Value (or
terminal or horizon values) as discussed in CH6 - see the related
equation (it is analogous to the constant growth part of the
supernormal growth model)! This is a crucial part of the
project, because the continuing value of the firm will typically
be the largest proportion of any firm’s current value.
* To discount the FCFs back to the “present” (to the date
of your last historical financial statements) you need to have
an estimate of the firm’s WACC(note that this includes the
weights of debt and equity, the costs of debt and equity, the
latter of which is calculated by using the CAPM, with your
estimate of the firm’s beta). Again, see the guidelines of
WACC Calculation about Calculating a Firm’s WACC, and also
review the “Four Mistakes to Avoid” (see the index to your
text).
* Once you have completed these steps, you are then ready
to follow the general steps described above to calculate your
estimate of the stock price/share.
Improving the Quality of your Project (Optional)
Other elements are left up to you, in terms of how complete
and/or creative you want your project to be. Some of these
90. elements must be completed in order to earn a higher than
average or satisfactory evaluation for the project. You
may/should include these other elements if you believe that they
will improve your “case” for your estimate of the price/share
for your firm. For example, a SWOT analysis is often used in
business. For this project, it may be useful, but only if you can
connect the main conclusions of the SWOT analysis to your
evaluation of the firm.
The most important extensions include:
* Using ratios that are not a constant percentage of sales
when constructing the pro formas (the basic percent of sales
method is described in the Financial Planning and Forecasting
Financial Statements chapter of the text). The relevant
procedures are either discussed in the text or are available on
spreadsheets that come with the text and/or are on the text's
homepage (listed in the syllabus). The firm’s profit margin has
a very important impact on firm value. If you use the most
recent profit margin in the pro formas, you may not be
providing an accurate longer-term picture of the firm’s
operations. As a result, it may be useful or even crucial to
analyze this ratio and/or others when constructing the pro
formas.
* Sensitivity analysis. How does your estimate of the
price/share change with changes in the firm’s WACC, the firm’s
short or long-term growth rates, changes in the firm’s profit
margin(s) and so on. The amount of work that could be done
here is almost limitless, so good projects would demonstrate
good judgment in which sensitivity analyses they conduct.
* Scenario analysis. This is similar to sensitivity analysis,
but discrete scenarios (e.g., a recession or a boom) are analyzed
instead.
* Ratio analysis. Ratios can be used as diagnostic tools in
91. evaluating the “health” of a firm. Note that such analysis would
typically include comparisons of your firm’s financial ratios to
the industry standards (or averages). These averages are
available on the Yahoo.finance site
under: Profile/Competitors (Sector or Industry). Ratio analysis
by itself is not very useful in terms of valuation. It provides a
diagnostic view of the company which may be helpful in terms
of analyzing the better and poorer practices of a company. In
order to make ratio analysis relevant for this project, it must be
tied directly to the firm's valuation. For example, if a
company's current Inventory Turnover is very poor, the group
can suggest that it should get better into the future, and then
make the necessary adjustments (which may require changes in
the formulas) in the pro forma sheets, to see how improving the
inventory turnover would increase the firm's value.
Advanced Elements of the Firm Valuation Project If you
attempt any of the following, you should connect the additional
analysis directly to the base case for your firm valuation
project.
* Managerial/Strategy Analysis. You may view your job of
this project as the managers of the firm. In completing the
project, you may recognize that the company is either
performing some function very well or very poorly. It is
perfectly appropriate to make suggestions for improving or
maintaining the operation of the firm.
* Marketing Analysis. Future sales typically depend upon
marketing. Projects which focus on companies for which this
may be particularly important may consider analyzing the
marketing policies of the company in order to determine how
those policies affect firm value.