Before sales of its ipad 1 reached its peak, apple launched the ipad 2, which took sales from the ipad 1 but also beat competitors' product offerings to the market. this move apple maintain its standing as a leading-edge company in tablet pcs and demonstrates the importance of as a competitive advantage.

Steele bicycle manufacturing company currently produces the handlebars used in manufacturing its bicycles, which are high-quality racing bikes with limited sales. steele produces and sells only 10,000 bikes each year. due to the low volume of activity, steele is unable to obtain the economies of scale that larger producers achieve. for example, steele could buy the handlebars for $31 each: they cost $34 each to make. the following is a detailed breakdown of current production costs: after seeing these figures, steele's president remarked that it would be foolish for the company to continue to produce the handlebars at $34 each when it can buy them for $31 each. calculate the total relevant cost. do you agree with the president's conclusion?

You are the manager of the packaging department in a cookie factory. (obviously, the packaging employees cannot eat the cookies that are transferred in during the period.) after your employees insert cookies into colorful packages (step 1) for display on store shelves, the packages of cookies are then boxed using cardboard cartons (step 2) for shipment to stores. each unit of product is represented by a carton of packaged cookies. the packaging department began the period with 1,000 units of cookies. during the period, 5,000 units of cookies were transferred in from the baking department and 5,500 units of cookies were transferred out to the finished goods department. the number of units of cookies in the ending inventory of the packaging department equals:

It is estimated that over 100,000 students will apply to the top 30 m.b.a. programs in the united states this year. a. using the concept of net present value and opportunity cost, when is it rational for an individual to pursue an m.b.a. degree. b. what would you expect to happen to the number of applicants if the starting salaries of managers with m.b.a. degrees remained constant but salaries of managers without such degrees decreased by 20 percent