Thursday, October 3, 2013
Business Ethics
A consortium of Japanese companies used code names and secret meetings to rig bids for dozens of types of auto parts imported to the United
States in a decade-long conspiracy that may have cost US consumers hundreds of millions of dollars, US officials have revealed.
Unveiling what the Justice Department said is its largest-ever criminal anti-trust investigation, US Attorney General Eric Holder Jr said nine
companies had agreed to plead guilty in the case and pay roughly US$740 million (NZ$893m) in fines.
The companies included Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Hitachi Automotive Systems and Mitsubishi Electric. Two executives also pleaded guilty, and
one will face a one-year prison term.
Holder described a massive and complex conspiracy as executives conferred in the United States and Japan, sometimes retreating to “remote
locations,” to manipulate prices for windshield wipers, radiators, power-window motors and other parts that were sent from overseas to be included
in new cars assembled in the United States.
The parts entered the supply chains of almost every major US-based automaker, including Detroit’s Big Three and the US subsidiaries of
Japanese firms including Honda, Mazda, Mitsubishi, Nissan, Subaru and Toyota.
US Justice Department officials said they could not estimate how much the conspiracy cost consumers. But they said that over as many as 13
years, it affected prices on more than US$5 billion worth of auto parts used in more than 25 million vehicles — or about US$200 per car.
Combined, the companies had enough pricing power to divvy up sales, co-ordinate bids, and “stabilise and maintain” prices.
Holder described the companies as divided into several “cartels” that “targeted US manufacturing, US businesses and US consumers.”
“Americans paid more for their cars. And American companies … were victims,” Holder said of the investigation, which is still ongoing after several
years. “As we have uncovered each auto part conspiracy, we have continued to find more and more parts that are involved.”
Including the fines announced today (NZ time), US officials over the past two years have levied US$1.6 billion (NZ$1.93b) in penalties against a
total of 20 auto-parts firms and sent 16 executives to jail.
Trade and industry firms and company executives largely declined to comment on the case.
Honda North America released a brief statement saying it expected all of its suppliers “to observe the law.”
The US auto-parts sector has been hit hard in recent years by the spread of auto-supply manufacturing around the world, the ability of auto
companies to source parts from an expanding number of countries, and trade restrictions in places such as China that have limited US companies’
ability to export. Once done in house by automakers such as GM and Ford, auto-parts manufacturing was steadily outsourced beginning in the
1990s.
Over the past few years, and particularly since a trade agreement with Canada and Mexico was signed, US auto-parts imports have grown rapidly,
topping US$125 billion last year for engines, tyres and other components.
Japan has been a major supplier, sending about US$17 billion in parts to the United States last year.
The case comes at a sensitive time in US-Japanese economic relations, as US officials try to further open a Japanese market that is at once rich
— the country has the third-largest economy in the world — and considered difficult for important US industries to crack.
Japan recently joined free-trade talks with the United States, but some labor and manufacturing companies worry that those discussions will
produce only limited access to a market that has struggled for decades to fully open.
Scott Hammond, deputy assistant attorney general for the antitrust division, said the case “should resonate in boardrooms around the world” and
discourage future efforts to manipulate prices.
-Washington Post/Bloomberg
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Venezuela country risk analysis
A Ltd is a US-based multinational corporation (MNC) oil company. A Ltd is considering acquisition
of a smaller oil company which is based in Venezuela.
2. Task
Write an essay analysing country risk for Venezuela. Finally, write your
conclusion/advice about acquiring a Venezuela-based oil company.
3. Important
You are NOT supposed to write any theoretical
information/definitions from the text book chapter/s (for example: what is country risk and why it is important to manage it). You are
required to apply the theoretical knowledge to the real world situation ofVenezuela and write a report using the relevant data and
information.
required to apply the theoretical knowledge to the real world situation ofVenezuela and write a report using the relevant data and
information.
3. Word limit Minimum 700 words – maximum 800 words. DO NOT MORE THAN 800 WORDS!!
4. Assessment criteria:
i. Information
gathering: maximum 4 marks
ii. Analysing and applying the information to real world :
Pro-poor Tourism;
Creating Economic Growth for Disadvantaged People It is a paper from Hospitality class. Answer those questions and there is no limited pages because the Professor said she is focus on the quality. She said we can choose some country like in Africa or Hayti something like that.
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water imagery
topic: Analyze the water imagery throughout The Waste Land. What is the significance of water throughout the poem?
12 point type. times new roman, with one inch margins.
well-developed thesis in the introduction and to support that thesis in body paragraphs.
USE QUOTES from the text to support points. Don’t forget to use in-test citations after each quote
well-developed thesis in the introduction and to support that thesis in body paragraphs.
USE QUOTES from the text to support points. Don’t forget to use in-test citations after each quote
institutional factors influence
What institutional factors influence undergraduate student engagement in the online environment, and how do those factors compare to results from traditional classroom instruction
Objectives – A 2,000 word research proposal comprising of:
• State its relevance to higher education and specifically to online higher education organizations using references.
• A discussion of possible data collection and analysis methods that could be used to address the question and your reasons for choosing these methods.
• State its relevance to higher education and specifically to online higher education organizations using references.
• A discussion of possible data collection and analysis methods that could be used to address the question and your reasons for choosing these methods.
My research question is: What institutional factors statistically influence undergraduate student engagement in the online environment, and how do those factors compare to results from traditional classroom instruction?
I plan to use two data type (quantitative and qualitative). First, and quantitatively, I hope to use National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) data to identify specific factors that influence student engagement using factor analysis, principal component method. This will cluster similar questions with similar responses into categorical groups, thus revealing distinct ‘factors’ (see ‘Empirical Results’ section in Jordanian article for similar analysis).
Next, I will compare the factors from online student responses to responses from traditional classroom students (using ANOVA); this will identify the similarities and differences in engagement factors between online student responses and traditional classroom student responses (See Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education article for similar quantitative analysis methodology) . Example:
Online Traditional Online Traditional
Question# Mean Mean P Factor Mean Mean P
1 2.76 2.82 0.63
1 2.45 2.79 0.63
2 4.13 3.83 0.001* 2 4.30 3.58 0.001*
3 4.1 3.99 0.15 3 4.12 3.75 0.15
4 2.94 3.14 0.06 4 2.46 2.86 0.06
5 2.23 2.39 0.2
I plan to use two data type (quantitative and qualitative). First, and quantitatively, I hope to use National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) data to identify specific factors that influence student engagement using factor analysis, principal component method. This will cluster similar questions with similar responses into categorical groups, thus revealing distinct ‘factors’ (see ‘Empirical Results’ section in Jordanian article for similar analysis).
Next, I will compare the factors from online student responses to responses from traditional classroom students (using ANOVA); this will identify the similarities and differences in engagement factors between online student responses and traditional classroom student responses (See Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education article for similar quantitative analysis methodology) . Example:
Online Traditional Online Traditional
Question# Mean Mean P Factor Mean Mean P
1 2.76 2.82 0.63
1 2.45 2.79 0.63
2 4.13 3.83 0.001* 2 4.30 3.58 0.001*
3 4.1 3.99 0.15 3 4.12 3.75 0.15
4 2.94 3.14 0.06 4 2.46 2.86 0.06
5 2.23 2.39 0.2
Cola Wars
Special instructions:
Paper, 12-15 pages, due in week 7, must include the following elements:
• Review of the strategic issues presented in the case.
• Application of the Pearce and Robinson Strategic Management Model (p. 2) with its 11 steps as described in the text. (Robinson_Chapter_1). You must apply all 11 steps of the Strategic Management Model to both Coca-Cola and PepsiCo.
• Analysis of the case from the theoretical framework of at least two of the articles discussed in the course. [Select primary sources; do NOT choose wikipedia and similar secondary sources for this part of the assignment.]
• Discussion of implications of the case for middle managers.
• Review of the strategic issues presented in the case.
• Application of the Pearce and Robinson Strategic Management Model (p. 2) with its 11 steps as described in the text. (Robinson_Chapter_1). You must apply all 11 steps of the Strategic Management Model to both Coca-Cola and PepsiCo.
• Analysis of the case from the theoretical framework of at least two of the articles discussed in the course. [Select primary sources; do NOT choose wikipedia and similar secondary sources for this part of the assignment.]
• Discussion of implications of the case for middle managers.
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