Tiếng anh chuyên ngành kế toán part 58

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EXHIBIT 16.8 Example of output from a decision suppor
t system.
Information Technology and the Firm
559
what categories of items sold better than others. After finding an underper-
forming category, she may check how different groups or districts of stores
performed for that category. Knowing how each store performed, she might ex-
plode down, looking at individual items, and compare their performance to
that of a prior week or year. This process is like taking the Rubic’s cube and
continually rotating the levels, looking at each of the cube’s faces. Each face of
each small cube represents data for a piece of merchandise for a store for a pe-
riod of time. That is why this process is referred to as “slice and dice.” You can
slice and turn the data any which way you desire. The data can also be viewed
and sorted in a tabular or graphical mode. The same theory applies whether
the database contains retailing data, stock market data, or accounting data. Ex-
hibits 16.7 and 16.8 show examples of a decision support system’s output. The
output was created by Pilot Software’s executive information system.
ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY
Many new technologies are on the horizon, two of which are database mining
and intelligent agents. Both address the issue of information overload. In the
1970s, the average database was perhaps 100 megabytes (millions of bytes) in
size. In the 1980s, databases were typically 20 gigabytes (billions of bytes).
Now, databases are in the terabytes (trillions of bytes). Wal-Mart has a data
warehouse that exceeds 100 terabytes. With all that data, it is difficult for a
user to know where to look. It is not the question that the user knows to ask
that is necessarily important, but, rather, the question that the user does not
know to ask that will come back to haunt him.
These new technologies examine entire databases, scanning them for any
data that does not fit the business’s model and identifying any data that the
user needs to examine further. These data mining techniques can be used suc-

cessfully in many industries. For example, auditors might use them to scan
client transaction detail to look for transactions that do not conform to com-
pany policies, and stock analysts can use them to scan data on stock prices and
company earnings over a period of time in order to look for opportunities.
CONCLUSION
The world of business has changed dramatically in the past 10 years. What was
unimaginable then is ordinary today. Product life-cycle times have decreased
from years to months. New technology is being introduced every day. An Inter-
net year is equal to three or four calendar months. The manager who is com-
fortable with and understands the practical implications of technology will be
one of the first to succeed. Imagination and creativity are vital. Don’t be afraid
of change. Understand it, and embrace it.
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Making Key Strategic Decisions
FOR FURTHER READING
Amor, Daniel, The E-business (R)Evolution (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall,
2000).
Frenzel, Carroll, Management of Information Technology, 3rd ed. (Danvers, MA:
Boyd & Fraser, 1999).
Fried, Louis, Managing Information Technology in Turbulent Times (New York: John
Wiley, 1995).
Kanter, Jerry, Information Literacy (Wellesley, MA: Babson Press, 1996).
Kanter, Jerry, Information Technology for Business Managers (New York: McGraw-
Hill, 1998).
Kalakota, R., and M. Robinson, E-Business 2.0 (Boston: Addison-Wesley, 2000).
Nickerson, Robert, Business and Information Systems, 2nd ed. (Upper Saddle River,
NJ: Prentice-Hall, 2001).
Pearlson, Keri, Managing and Using Information Systems (New York: John Wiley,
2001).
Reynolds, George, Information Systems for Managers (St. Paul, MN: West, 1995).

Turban, E., E. McLean, and J. Wetherbe, Information Technology for Management,
2nd ed. (New York: John Wiley, 2001).
Turban, E., J. Lee, D. King, and H. M. Chung, Electronic Commerce—A Managerial
Perspective (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 2001).
INTERESTING WEB SITES
www.ariba.com ARIBA
www.baan.com BAAN
www.commerceone.com Commerce One
www.esri.com ESRI
www.greatplains.com Great Plains Software
www.intel.com Intel
www.intuit.com INTUIT
www.macola.com Macola Software
www.microsoft.com Microsoft
www.microstrategy.com Microstrategy
www.oracle.com ORACLE
www.retailexchange.com Retail Exchange
www.sap.com SAP
www.staples.com Staples
www.sun.com Sun Microsystems
www.verticalnet.com VerticalNet
www.wwgrainger.com W. W. Grainger
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17
PROFITABLE
GROWTH BY
ACQUISITION
Richard T. Bliss
The subject of this chapter is growth by acquisition; few other business transac-
tions receive more scrutiny in both the popular and academic presses. There are

several reasons for this attention. One is the sweeping nature of the deals, which
typically result in major upheaval and job losses up to the highest levels of the
organizations. A second is the sheer magnitude of the deals—the recently an-
nounced merger between Time-Warner and AOL, worth more than $150 bil-
lion, exceeds the annual GDP of 85% of the world’s nations! Thirdly, the
products involved are known to billions around the globe. Daimler-Benz, Coca
Cola, and Louis Vuitton are just a few of the world-renowned brand names re-
cently involved in merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions. Finally, the per-
sonalities and plots in M&A deals are worthy of any novelist or Hollywood
scriptwriter. The 1988 acquisition of Nabisco Foods by RJR Tobacco—at that
time the largest deal ever, at $25 billion—was the subject of a New York Times
best-seller and a popular film, both called Barbarians at the Gate. Since then,
there have been numerous other best-selling books and movies based on real
and fictional M&A deals.
In spite of this publicity and the huge amounts of money involved, it is im-
portant to remember that M&A transactions are similar to any other corporate
investment, that is, they involve uncertainty and the fundamental tradeoff be-
tween risk and return. To lose sight of this simple fact or to succumb to the
emotion and frenetic pace of M&A deal-making activities is a sure path to an
unsuccessful result. Our goal in this chapter is to identify the potential pitfalls
you may face and to create a road map for a successful corporate M&A strat
egy.
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Making Key Strategic Decisions
We review the historical evidence and discuss some of the characteristics of
both unsuccessful and successful deals. The importance of value creation is
highlighted, and we present simple analytical tools that can be used to evaluate
the potential of any merger or acquisition. Practical aspects of initiating and
structuring M&A transactions are presented and the issues critical to the suc-
cessful implementation of a new acquisition are briefly described. It is impor-

tant to understand that there are many legal and financial intricacies involved
in most M&A transactions. Our objective here is not to explain each of these in
detail, since there are professional accountants, lawyers, and consultants avail-
able for that. Instead, we hope to provide valuable and concise information for
busy financial managers so that they can design and implement an effective
M&A strategy.
DEFINITIONS AND BACKGROUND
Before examining the historical evidence on acquisitions, we need to define
some terminology. An acquisition is one form of a takeover, which is loosely de-
fined as the transfer of control of a firm from one group of shareholders to an-
other. In this context, control comes with the ability to elect a majority of the
board of directors. The firm seeking control is called the bidder and the one
that surrenders control the target. Other forms of takeovers include proxy con-
tests and going private, but the focus of this chapter is takeover via acquisition.
As we can see, acquisitions may occur in several ways. In a merger, the
target is absorbed by the bidder and the target’s original shareholders receive
shares of the bidder. In a consolidation, the firms involved become parts of an
entirely new firm, with the bidder usually retaining control of the new entity.
All original shareholders hold shares in the new firm after the deal. The two
transactions have different implications for shareholders, as the following ex-
amples make clear.
Example 1 There has recently been a wave of takeover activity in the
stuffed animal industry. Griffin’s Giraffes Inc. (GGI) has agreed to merge
Takeover
Acquisition
Proxy contest
Going private
Merger or consolidation
Stock acquisition
Asset acquisition