Trento: Semester 1

For the academic year 2007/2009 the exams were as follow:

• International Management;
• International Accounting;
• Information System and ICT;
  
• European and International Commercial Law;
• Human Resources;
• Consultancy Project;

International Management

The lenght of the exam was one hour and 45 minutes.
It was composed of 3 questions (we could choose the 3rd or the 4th) which were in fact the title of some chapters that we have to write down.

1. The change in the environment of international business.(notes;Hill,ch.1)
2. The internationalisation process of the firm and the reasons for becoming an international company.(Rugman,ch.2)
3. Organisational problems in a transnational organisation.(Rugman,ch.9)
4. Product strategies for international markets.(Rugman, ch. 11)

International Accounting

This was an individual test of two hours composed of 5 questions:

1) Describe the main classifications of accounting systems.What is the purpose of classifying accounting systems?What are the main factors that can explain international differences in accounting systems?

2) Why did the EU decide to adopt International Financial Reporting Stanndards (IFRS)?What are the main provisions of the EU legislative acts in the field of accounting harmonization?

3) Why has accounting for goodwill become such a significant problem internationally?What is the accounting treatment of goodwill under IFRS?

4) How do price changes and inflation affect the financial position and performance of a corporation? Explain and critically comment on the philosophy underlying the different inflation accounting methods?

5) What are the consequences on financial and risk disclosure of the introduction of fair value accounting for financial instruments? Describe the classification of financial instruments under IAS 39 and the evaluation methods required by the standard for each category of financial instruments.

Information System and ICT

The examination of ICT had a duration of one hour and thirty minutes here are the questions which were asked:

Question 1) Present the main characteristics of Datawarehouse,OLAP and Datamining, and explain the relationships among them

Question 2) Describe the TCO and its main components

Question 3) Present mobile computing,its value-added attributes and the crucial technologies in this field that have a deep impact on information systems

Question 4) Explain the role of outsourcing in modern Information systems, with major benefits and related problems/risks

European and International Commercial Law

For the Law examination we had to answer to specific case studies. I unfortunately did not keep the case studies but can give you the questions. It can at least help you to see the type of questions you can expect:

• Can the German company sue the Italian company in Germany?
• If a German court was competent would CISG be applicable to this controversy?
• Assume that the buyer,instead of being based in Italy, is Lovely Cottage, a company based in Cork (Ireland). The seller is still the German company (based in Germany). Would CISG be appliable?
• Of the communications exchanged between the parties,which can be considered an "offer" under CISG and why?
• Which can be considered an "acceptance" and why?
• If instead of answering as in Communication No.4, the German company answered: "WE CONFIRM YOUR ORDER.ANY CONTROVERSY SHOULD BE BROUGHT IN FRONT OF THE TRIBUNALS OF VERONA", What would be the effect of this communication?
• Assume that communication No.4 is made over the telephone.When the goods are delivered,they are accompanied by an invoice which,on the back side,contains the following text:WE CONFIRM OUR AGREEMENT.THE APPLICABLE LAW IS GRMAN LAW.What would be the effect of this writing?
• Can you give a definition of HARDSHIP?What could be the effects of applying the rules on HARDSHIP to a given situation?

Human Resources

50% of the examination was dealing with an individual exam that we had to do in classe. In unfortunately could not keep the questions.
50% of the rest of the exam was dealing with groupworks and handling a personal and concrete report about a specific aspect of the course.

Consultancy project