Hugo, a sales representative at chillout inc., a company that supplies frozen foods to supermarkets, is required to travel to the stores to meet their managers and view their inventory. after a recent road accident, hugo's left hand became severely impaired and only his right hand is functional. hugo requests that the company install an one-hand driving system, costing $35,000 to $45,000, in one of its minivans so that he can drive it. based on the size and financial position of the company, this cost is more than it can afford. chillout should convey to hugo that:

Daniel owns 100 shares of abc corporation's common stock. abc uses the fair value option, and recent declines in the firm's credit rating have caused the value of the firm's outstanding bonds payable to drop by 10%. daniel feels this is good news, but he wants to know what you think about the situation. which of the following represents your best response? a : "this situation may be positive for you in that the change in abc's credit standing indicates that the value of the firm's assets is likely increasing. however, the drop in bond value may negate any positive effects on your bottom line, because it means your claim on the firm's assets is simultaneously decreasing." b : "actually, this is bad news all around. the drop in the value of abc's bonds payable means shareholders' claims on the firm's assets have decreased. moreover, abc's declining credit rating means that the firm's assets are probably also dropping in value, thus magnifying your losses even more." c : "on the surface, this seems like good news because it means your claim on the firm's assets has increased. however, the drop in creditworthiness may also indicate that abc's assets are declining in value, thus offsetting any gains associated with the drop in bonds payable." d : "you're right! this is good news because it means that abc's debtholders have a decreased claim on the firm's assets. as a result, the firm's existing shareholders"like you"have seen their claim on the firm's assets increase."

Onsider the following subscription behavior information from genie, a web site that provides tools for constructing a family tree (ancestor search). subscriptions cost $9.99 per month, but you are charged for the entire year at the time of purchase. there is a one-year minimum term when you sign up for the service. once purchased, subscriptions are set to renew automatically unless the subscriber cancels them. when a membership renews, it renews for a one-year term and again you are charged for the entire year. there are no variable costs associated with providing this service to an individual customer, but genie does engage in customer relationship activities that they believe will increase customer retention. these customer relationship activities cost genie about $10 per year per customer. based on a sample of 1000 customers that joined genie five years ago, near the time when the company was founded, they were able to determine how many of those customers remained subscribers in the second year, third year etc. based on this information, genie calculated the average annual retention rate to be 20%. genie uses an annual discount rate of 8%. a. last year, genie spent $10,000 placing advertisements on google. genie management believes that these advertisements were responsible for about 300 new subscribers. would you recommend to genie management that they purchase more google ads? b. suppose a newly-introduced loyalty program increases the number of customers that remained to 30%. does this new data change your answer to 9.a? c. do you have any hesitations or concerns about making recommendations to management based on your above estimate of customer lifetime value?

Sunset foods relies on a highly centralized functional structure to ensure consistency in the quality and taste of its products and to drive down costs via process innovations. however, as a consequence of its highly compartmentalized structure, the firm has found it difficult to transfer information and ideas from one department to the next. with the launch of its new line of breakfast foods coming up, how can sunset improve its ability to collaborate without sacrificing the benefits of its current structure