Also Create Graphs Showing Management Information

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Also Create Graphs Showing Management Information

Part 1:

How do you know what information systems are really needed by a business and which are the most important?How should a company’s structure or culture affect the building and use of information systems?

Dirt Bikes’s management has asked you to prepare a management analysis of the company to help it assess the firm’s current situation and future plans. Review Dirt Bikes’s company history, organization chart, products and services, and sales and marketing in the Introduction to Dirt Bikes.

Throughout the course, you will be applying concepts and strateges learned to prepare a report that addresses an overall MIS strategy for Dirt Bikes.

The first part of your report should address these questions:

What are the company’s goals and culture?

  • What products and services does Dirt Bikes U.S.A. provide? How many types of products and services are available to customers? How does Dirt Bikes sell its products?
  • How many employees are managers, production workers, or knowledge or information workers? Are there levels of management?
  • What kinds of information systems and technologies would be the most important for a company such as Dirt Bikes?

Part 2:

As part of your analysis of the company for management, you have been asked to analyze data on Dirt Bikes’s financial performance. Review Dirt Bikes’s selected financial and sales data in the Introduction to Dirt Bikes, which can be found at the Laudon Web site. There you will find Dirt Bikes’s income statement and summary balance sheet data from 2012 to 2014, annual sales of Dirt Bikes models between 2010 and 2014 (measured in units sold), and total domestic versus international sales between 2010 and 2014 (measured in units sold).

Use spreadsheet software to create graphs of Dirt Bikes’s sales history from 2015 to 2019 and its domestic versus international sales from 2015 to 2019. Select the type of graph that is most appropriate for presenting the data you are analyzing.

Use the instructions at the Laudon Web site and your spreadsheet software to calculate the gross and net margins in Dirt Bikes’s income statements from 2012 to 2014. You can also create graphs showing trends in selected pieces of Dirt Bikes’s income statement and balance sheet data if you wish. (You may want to rearrange the historical ordering of the data if you decide to do this.)

Prepare an addition to your management report that answers these questions:

  • What are Dirt Bikes’s best- and worst-performing products? What is the proportion of domestic to international sales? Have international sales grown relative to domestic sales?
  • Are sales (revenues) growing steadily, and, if so, at what rate? What is the cost of goods sold compared to revenues? Is it increasing or decreasing? Are the firm’s gross and net margins increasing or decreasing? Are the firm’s operating expenses increasing or decreasing? Is the firm heavily in debt? Does it have assets to pay for expenses and to finance the development of new products and information systems?

Part 3:

You’ll use the Web to identify Dirt Bikes’s competitors and the competitive forces in its industry.You’ll use value chain analysis to determine what kinds of information systems will provide the company with a competitive advantage.

Dirt Bikes’s management wants to be sure it is pursuing the right competitive strategy.

You have been asked to perform a competitive analysis of the company using the Web to find the information you need.

Add to your report for management and address the following issues: analyze Dirt Bikes using the value chain and competitive forces models.

You report should include the following:

  • Which activities at Dirt Bikes create the most value?
  • How does Dirt Bikes provide value to its customers?
  • What other companies are Dirt Bikes’s major competitors? How do their products compare in price to those of Dirt Bikes? What are some of the product features they emphasize?
  • What are the competitive forces that can affect the industry?
  • What competitive strategy should Dirt Bikes pursue?
  • What information systems best support that strategy?

Guidelines:

Use a minimum of 3 scholarly references from peer-reviewed journals, and include supporting materials and references from your web-based research.All references should be in APA format.The Purdue OWL website is an excellent resource for APA formatting and reference examples:

https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/05/

You should include the following sections in your paper.

Prepare a presentation should be of 3-5 slides in length.