Khái quát kiến thức Tổng quan thương mai (Understanding Business Business Introduction)

CHAPTER 1:
- Business: any activity that seeks to provide goods and services to others
while operating at a profit.
- Goods: Tangible products.
- Services: Intangible products.
- Entrepreneur: a person who risks time and money to start and manage a
business.
- Risk: the chance an entrepreneur takes of losing time and money on
business that may not prove profitable.
*Then why do people still want to take the risk?
>< reduced competition makes substantial profit possible.
- Revenue: the total amount of money a business takes during a given
period by selling goods and services.
- Profit: the amount of money a business earns above and beyond what it
spend for salaries and other expenses

To increase profitability, companies need to:
- Use their resources more productively to reduce operating costs
- Develop new & improved products to meet customers’ wants and needs
=> attract more customers
- Loss: When a business’s expenses are more than its revenues.
- Standard of living: the amount of goods and services people can buy
with the money they have.
- Quality of life: the general well-being of a society in terms of its political
freedom, natural environment, education, healthcare, safety, amount of
leisure and rewards that add to satisfaction and joy that other goods and
services provide.

STANDARD

QUALITY

- more objective
- Factors: employment opportunities,
poverty rate and environmental
quality…
- Can all be measured & defined
with numbers.

- more subjective
- Factors: equal legal protection,
freedom from discrimination,
freedom of religion…
- Difficult to measure & particularly
qualitative.

- Stakeholders: all the people who stand to gain or lose by policies and
activities of a business and who concerns the business needs to address.
- Outsourcing: a method of dispersing certain work functions to an
outside vendor/party instead of having it performed by an in-house
employee or department.
- Nonprofit organization: An organization whose goals don’t include
making personal profit for its owners and organizers.
- Entrepreneurship is:
+ The process of recognizing an opportunity
+ Marketplace testing
+ Gathering the resources necessary to go into business.
- Categories of entrepreneurs:
+ Classic entrepreneur – Pursues business opportunities and allocates
resources.

+ Serial entrepreneur – Starts one’s business, runs it, and then runs
additional businesses in succession.
+ Social entrepreneur – Focuses on solving society’s challenges through
their business.
- Factors of production: the resources used to create wealth: land, labor,
capital, entrepreneurship and knowledge.
+ Land: land and the natural resources are used to make homes, cars and other
products.
+ Labor: people have always been an important resource in producing goods and
services, but people are now being replaced by technology. (most important)
+ Capital: includes machines, tools, buildings and other means of manufacturing.
+ Entrepreneurship: all the resources in the world have little value unless
entrepreneurs are willing to take the risk of starting a business to use those
resources.
+ Knowledge: Information technology has revolutionized business, making it
possible to quickly determine wants and needs and to respond with desired goods
and services.
- Technology: Everything from phones and copiers to computers, medical
imaging devices, personal digital assistants and the various software
programs that make business processes more effective, efficient and
productive.


- Business environment: the surrounding factors that either help or hinder
the development of businesses.

- Database: Electronic storage file for information
- E-commerce: Buying and selling of goods over the internet
- Productivity: The amount of output you generate given the amount of
input, such as the number of hours you work.

- Efficiency: producing goods and services using the least amount of
resources.
- Effectiveness: producing the desired result.
- Demography: the statistical study of the human population with regards to
its size, density and other characteristics such as age, race, gender and
incomes.
CHAPTER 2:
- Economics: The study of how society chooses to employ resources to
produce goods and services & distribute them for consumption among
various competing groups and individuals.

- Resource development the study of how to : increase resources + create


conditions that will make better use of those resources.
- Invisible hand: A phrase coined by Adam Smith to describe the process
that turns self-directed gain into social and economic benefits for all.
- How the free market works: A free market is one in which decisions
about what and how much to produce are made by the market - by sellers
and buyers negotiating prices for goods and services.
* Benefits:
+ Open competition among companies
→ Encourages businesses to be more efficient so they can
successfully compete on price and quality.
→ Businesses must provide high-quality products at fair
prices with good services to keep/attract customers.
→ a major factor in creating the wealth that industrialized
countries now enjoy.
* Problems:

+ Limited Product Ranges.
+ Dangers of profit motive.
+ Market failures.
- How prices are determined in free a market: prices are not determined
by only sellers; they
- Market price: the price determined by supply and demand.
- Supply: the quantity of products the manufacturers or owners are willing
to sell at different prices at a specific time.
- Demand: The quantity of products people are willing to buy at different
prices at a specific time.

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

Factors causing demand to shift include
Price of the good.
Taste or level of desire for the product by the buyer
Income of the buyer.
Price of related product:
+ Substitute products (directly competes with the goods).
+ Complementary products (used with the goods).
Future expectations:
+ Expected income of buyers.
+ Expected price of the goods.
For the total market demand, the number of buyers in the market is
a determinant of the amount.

** Some specific language to clarify which of these is going on:
• A CHANGE IN QUANTITY SUPPLIED means that only the price has
changed and a new quantity is supplied along a constant supply curve.
• A CHANGE (DECREASE OR INCREASE) IN SUPPLY or a SHIFT IN
SUPPLY means that a change in amount supplied occurs because of a
change (shift) in the position of the supply curve.
• This SHIFT IN SUPPLY means that one of the other determinants of supply
(technology, resource prices, taxes or subsidies, expectations, and the price of
other goods produced) has changed.
- Four styles of competition:
Perfect competition:
+ Characteristics
●Sellers: many; none is large enough to control the price.
●Entry: Easy entry and exit; easily obtainable information.
●Products: appear to be identical.
→ Agricultural products (apples, corn, potatoes…)
(ví dụ như là chợ truyền thống)
+ Notes
●There are no true examples of perfect competition.
●The US: government’s price supports and drastic
reductions in the number of farms → probably no
perfect competition even in farming.
Monopolistic competition:
+Characteristics
● Sellers: many (some controls over price)
● Entry: relatively easy
● Products: very similar >< Buyers perceive them as different
→ hotdogs, hamburger, sodas,...

(Ví dụ như khu ẩm thực)
+How to compete:
→ Product differentiation (advertising, branding and packaging) to convince
the buyers that your product are different from competitor


An Oligopoly:
+ Characteristics
● Sellers: just a few; dominate a market.
● Entry: barrier to entry (reason: tremendous initial investment
required to enter the business.) (vốn lớn q ít ai vơ được)
● Products: ví dụ như thuốc lá, linh kiện máy bay,...
+ How to compete:
Product differentiation (e.g advertising) (rather than price) [reason:
intense price competition → lower profits for everyone (a
price cut by one producer would often be matched by the
others)]
→ Products from different companies tend to be priced
about the same.
(Giá không phải là yếu tố tiên quyết trong loại cạnh tranh này)
A monopoly (Độc quyền)
+ Characteristics
● Sellers: one seller controls the total supply of a product/ service,
and sets the price.
● Entry: no entry
● Products: no substitute
+ Notes:
● In the US, laws prohibit monopolies.
→ Giảm consumer choice, Giảm competition, Cao prices.
EXCEPT: in the markets for public utilities (natural gas, water, electric

power…) (prices and profits are controlled by public service
commissions to protect the interest of buyers).
- Types of economic systems:
+ Free market economies (nền kinh tế thị trường): economic
systems in which the market largely determines what goods and
services get produced, who gets them and how the economy grows.
+ Command economies: economic systems in which the
government largely decides what goods and services will be
produced, who will get them and how the economy grows.
+ Mixed economics: economic systems in which some allocation of
resources is made by the market market and some by the
government.
- Key economic indicators: three major indicators of economic conditions
are (1) GDP (gross domestic product); (2) the unemployment rate; (3)
price indexes.
- GDP (Gross domestic product): The total value of final goods and
services produced in a country in a given year (1 year).


* Doanh nghiệp có nguồn gốc tại đâu thì nguồn thu được tính vào GNP của
nước đó.
* Doanh nghiệp kinh doanh và bn bán tại đâu thì nguồn thu được tính vào
GDP của nước đó.
- Unemployment rate: the number of civilians at least 16 years old who are
unemployed and tried to find a job within the prior 4 weeks.


- Types of unemployment:
Frictional

Structural

Cyclical

Seasonal

- Causes:
+ Difficulties in
finding a suitable job.
E.g: pp looking for
their first job/
voluntarily changing
jobs, temporary
layoffs.
- Note:
+ FU is almost
impossible to avoid.
→ Job-seeker &
employers can’t
have perfect
information or act
instantaneously

- Causes:
+ Changes in an
economy
(technology/ the
structure of demand
for labor/ geographic
distribution of

jobs…)
→ one with
obsolete skills
can’t get a job.
- Notes:
Can be a serious
problem.
→ longer periods of
unemployment (need
for retraining)

- Causes:
+ Recession phrase of
the business cycle.
+ Inadequate demand.
→ Firms produce
less
→ demand for labor
nhỏ & wages nhỏ
→ Thất nghiệp
nhiều.
⇒ The most
serious type of
unemployment.
* Booming economy
(kinh tế phồn thịnh):
+Lots of demand for
labor.
+Firms employ
more workers →

thất nghiệp nhỏ.

- Causes:
+ Demand for labor
varies over the year.
+ Certain industries
shut/slow down for a
season or make
seasonal shifts in
their production
schedules.
Các ngành nghề có
lao động thời vụ như:
Hotel, tourism, fruit
picking, agriculture.

- Inflation: a general rise in price of goods and services over time. (giá tăng
nhanh)
>> Too much money chasing few goods ⇢ demand is growing
faster than supply. ➜ Demand-pull inflation.
>> Companies’ costs go up ⇢ they need to increase price to
maintain profit margins ➜ Cost-push inflation.
Disinflation: a situation in which price increases are slowing (the inflation rate is


declining). (giá có tăng nhưng tăng chậm lại)
- Deflation: a situation in which prices are declining. (giá giảm xuống)
- Stagflation: a situation when the economy is slowing but the prices are going
up anyhow. (Nền kinh tế thì thụt lùi mà giá vẫn tăng)
- Cách để tính mức độ lạm phát:

+ Consumer Price Index (CPI): monthly statistics that measure the pace
of inflation and deflation. (số liệu thống kê hàng tháng đo lường tốc độ
lạm phát và giảm phát.)
+ Producer Price Index (PPI): an index that measures price at the
wholesale level.
- Business cycle: the periodic rises and falls that occur in economies over time.
● 4 cycles:
Cycles

Characteristic

Prosperity
(Economic
boom)

Results from:
- Low unemployment.
- High productivity
- The opening of new
businesses.

- Higher wages
- Greater demand and more
consumption.

Recession

- When economic activity
slows down
- A recession can affect only 1

industry, related industries,
or spread to the entire
economy → The ripple effect
.

- Prices fall, businesses produce less,
unemployment increases,...

Depression

- A deep recession.
- A depression can be limited
to one country but usually
spreads to related countries.

- High unemployment.
- Low production.
- Can last for several years.
- High number of unused
manufacturing facilities.
- Very rare (hiếm xảy ra, thậm chí
là bỏ qua giai đoạn này).

Recovery

- A rise in business activity
after a recession or
depression.

- Everything is better.

- This eventually leads to an
economic boom, starting the cycle
all over again.

- Capitalism (Chủ nghĩa tư bản): an economic system in which all or most
of the factors of production and distribution are privately owned and
operated for profit.
●Under free-market capitalism people have four basic rights:
1. The right to own private property.
2. The right to own a business and keep all that business’s profits.
3. The right to freedom of competition.
4. The right to freedom of choice.
- Socialism (Chủ nghĩa xã hội): an economic system based on the premise


some, if not most, basic business should be owned by government so that
profits can be more evenly distribute among the people.
- Communism (Chủ nghĩa cộng sản): an economic and political system in
which the government makes almost all economics decisions and owns
almost all the major factors of production.
- Brain drain: The loss of the best and brightest people to other countries
(chảy máu chất xám).
- Fiscal policy: the federal government’s efforts to keep the economy stable
by increasing or decreasing taxes or government spending. (Chính sách
tài khóa)
- Monetary policy: The management of the money supply and interest rates
by the federal reserve. (Chính sách tiền tệ).
- Budget deficit (Thâm hụt ngân sách): when the government spends more
on programs than it collects in taxes.
- Budget surplus (Thặng dư ngân sách): Thu nhập (thuế) của nhà nước lớn

hơn chi phí tiêu hao.
- National debt (nợ quốc gia/ Nợ công): the sum of government deficits
over time.
CHAPTER 3:
- Why trade with other nations?
+ No nation, not even a technologically advanced one, can
produce all the products its people want and need.
+ Even if a country did become self-sufficient, other nations would
seek to trade with it to meet the needs of their own people.
- Global trade: enables a nation to produce what it is most capable of
producing and buy what it needs from others in a mutually beneficial
exchange relationship.
This happens through the process called free trade.
- Free trade: the movement of goods and services among nations without
political or economic barriers.
Pros (thuận lợi)
- Global market (khách hàng toàn cầu)
- High productivity (Do sự cạnh tranh
giữa chính quốc và các nước khác)
-(Cạnh tranh và giá nhập khẩu rẻ làm giá
trong nước giảm) → inflation doesn’t
curtail economic growth.
- Free trade inspires innovation for new
products and keeps firms
competitively challenged.
- Access to foreign investments → help
keep interest rates low.

Cons (khó khăn)
- Domestic workers can lose their jobs or

may be cut the paid (nhiều công nhân
adidas mất việc do họ chuyển nhà máy
sang Việt Nam)
- Moving operations overseas because of
intense competitive pressure often
means the loss of service jobs.
- Domestic companies can lose their
comparative advantage when
competitors build advanced production
operations in low-wage countries.

- Exports (xuất khẩu): Domestically produced goods and services sold in


markets in other countries.
- Imports (nhập khẩu): Foreign-made products and services purchased by
domestic consumers.
- Balance of trade (BOT) (trade balance) (cán cân thương mại): The
difference between the monetary value of a country’s imports and exports
over a certain period.
→ A trade surplus (export > import) (Xuất siêu). (favorable
BOT)
→ A trade deficit (import > export) (Nhập siêu).
⇒ Help understand the strength of a country's economy in
relation to other countries.
- Balance of Payments (BOP) (cán cân thanh toán): The difference
between money coming into a country (from exports) and money
leaving the country (from imports) plus other money flows
→ A favorable BOP: more money flowing into a country than out
(positive).

→ An unfavorable BOP: more money flows out of a country
(negative).
The balance of trade determines the balance of payments.
- Dumping (bán phá giá):
+ selling products in a foreign country at lower prices than those
charged in the producing country (bán rẻ hơn nước sản xuất)
+ sometimes used to reduce surplus products in foreign markets and
gain a foothold in a new market. ( E.g.: China, Brazil, & Russia have
been penalized for dumping steel in the US)
- Strategies for reaching global markets: (Viết theo chiều tăng dần số
lượng cam kết, kiểm soát, rủi ro và lợi nhuận tiềm năng) (Gồm 7 loại)
Licensing (cấp phép) (tiềm năng 1)
A global strategy in which a firm (the licensor) allows a foreign company
(the licensee) to produce its product or use its trademark in exchange
for a fee (a royalty). (công ty A cấp phép cho công ty B sản xuất sản phẩm hoặc sử
dụng thương hiệu của A nhằm mục đích lấy tiền bản quyền). (theo đúng quy chuẩn
của bên cấp phép).

Exporting (xuất khẩu) (tiềm năng 2)
Marketing and sale of domestically produced goods in another country. (simplest
and most common strategy)
- Direct export: producer directly sells to the importer. This mode gives the
company a greater degree of control over its distribution channels.
- Indirect export: is the process of exporting through domestically based export
intermediaries.


Franchising (Nhượng quyền) (Tiềm năng 3)
- A contractual agreement whereby someone with a good idea for a business sells
others the rights to use the business name and sell a product/ service in a given

territory in a specified manner (có quyền thay đổi chu trình kinh doanh).
- Popular domestically and globally.

Contract manufacturing (Hợp tác sản xuất) (tiềm năng 4)
A foreign company produces private-label goods to which a domestic company then
attaches its own brand name or trademark.

A joint venture (Liên doanh) (tiềm năng 5)
- A partnership in which 2 or more companies (often from different countries) join to
undertake a major project.

Strategic alliances (Các liên minh chiến lược) (tiềm năng 6)
- A long-term partnership between 2 or more companies established to help each
company build competitive market advantages.
- No share costs, risks, management, or even profits (unlike joint ventures)
- Provide broad access to markets, capital, and technical expertise

Foreign Direct Investment (tiềm năng 7)
- Foreign direct investment (FDI)
+ The buying of permanent property and businesses in foreign nations.
+ The most common form of FDI is a foreign subsidiary
- A foreign subsidiary: owned in a foreign country by the parent company
- A multinational corporation: a corporation that manufactures and
markets products in many different countries and has multinational stock
ownership and management.
CHAPTER 5: