CASE BENJAMIN COHEN
Benjamin Cohen is a teenager who started his own internet site when he was still at school. He attracted a lot of attention, and in 2000/2001 the BBC filmed him and his new company for a couple of months. The resulting documentary was shown on television sometime in the early spring of 2001; it forms part of a series of documentaries called Trouble at the Top. This particular instalment is called Searching for Sex.
The library has a copy of this documentary (tape 1659). Watch this documentary, and then do the following assignment: you have a choice of two possible ways in which to do it.
1. You are the investment consultant of a group of private investors. They have some money to invest, and have asked you to gather some information about this young man and his company. You will write a report for these investors, in which you will advise them about a possible investment in this company. You can either give positive or negative advice.
2. You are the – external – advisor of the competition. The competition is thinking about trying to take over the company, or to enter into a joint venture with Benjamin Cohen. Write a report in which you give useful advice.
In both cases the assignment should have a length of about 1½ pages. Make sure that your report has the appropriate format:
a) For option one: ‘covering letter’ to the investors, in which you refer to their request for information and advice.
b) The report proper: what you consider to be the positive and/or negative sides of the company.
c) Advice; so this means that, based on the information you have gathered, you either advise them to invest, or you advise them not to invest.
d) For option two: ‘covering letter’ to the investors, in which you refer to their request for information and advice.
e) The report proper: an overview of the company (past, present).
f) Advice: take-over or joint venture (or possibly neither, if you think that neither...