Analysis of the attractiveness of the UK venture capital industry Essay

Analysis of the attractiveness of the UK venture capital industry - Essay Example Private Equity and Venture Capital Report on Investment Activity 2008’ in its survey has determined that worldwide the investment has seen a steady rate of growth with a few undulations in the last three decades (Coups, 2009). There was a steady spurt in investment from year 2003 onwards until it peaked at 31,634 Â £m in 2007. In 2008 it fell by 11,609 Â £m probably due to the effects of worldwide recession but still maintained a healthy figure (Fig.1). In the UK, the investment figure was 10,227 Â £m in 2006, rose to 11, 972 Â £m in 2007 but fell sharply to 8556 Â £m in 2008 (Coups, 2009). All asset classes have now suffered due to the impact of worldwide recession and Private Equity is no exception. However such funds which were raised during previous such downtrends in the years 1991-94 and 2001-03 did produce outstanding results for the investors (BVCA, 2009). Over long term, UK private equity has outperformed other asset classes in a comprehensive manner. The annual IRR in 2008 for all funds was -9.8% which compares favourably with public equity market performance (BVCA, 2009). In fact over a span of the last ten years private equity returns per annum were approximately ten times higher than that of the FTSE All-Share Index and four times more than the pension average (BVCA, 2009). When considered region wise, investment in the years 2007 and 2008 has been steady enough throughout the United Kingdom, but there was a major fall in the financial capital of the country, London where it fell from 5730 Â £m in 2007 to 3590 Â £m. Almost similar decline was observed in the South East, East Midlands and the North West. In the East of England, Yorks and Humb and West Midlands investment figures did not change much in these two years. Surprisingly, investment rose remarkably to 1052 Â £m in 2008 from 393 Â £m in 2007 in Scotland (Coups, 2009). The major investment was in UK Technology Companies where 596 Â £m was invested in 2008 as compared to 835 Â £m in 2007. Particularly

Contemporary Perspectives Of Family In Society Sociology Essay

Contemporary Perspectives Of Family In Society Sociology Essay DEFINING THE FAMILY: A family is a social unit made up of father, mother brothers and sisters. All these members play a very important role while living together, sharing problems with one another at the time of help. Love is the most important element in a family among these members without love and happiness these pillars of family has not the ability to stay longer and be with one another for a longer period of time. THE CENTRAL POSITION OF THE FAMILY IN SOCIETY: In order for the family to meet a childs psychological needs, its members must be nurturing, convey mutual respect, provide for intimacy, and engage in bonding and attachment. The family also socializes the child, guiding the child to be members of the society beyond the family. The family conveys religious and cultural beliefs and traditions to the next generation. The family is the childs source of economic resources, which meet the childs various physical needs for food, shelter, and clothing. Then, too, the family sees to it that the child receives health and dental care. The family also teaches morals and values to a child. WHY THE FAMILY IS THEORETICALLY SIGNIFICANT: Family is the most important unit of society and plays an essential role in fulfilling the emotional and physical needs of individuals, which is required for achieving economic and social development. But for a family to succeed it doesnt necessarily need to be a nuclear family, it needs support in caring for its family. If a society is at war, is suffering severe weather such as droughts, is made up of people living primarily in poverty, is a society with a high illiteracy rate, or is experiencing overwhelming negative health conditions such as AIDS, of course any family will be negatively affected. MEDIA ARTICLE 1: Work, Family, and Religion in Contemporary Society. By: Nason-Clark, Nancy Publication: Sociology of Religion Date: Sunday, September 22 1996 In the opening essay to Work, family, and religion in contemporary society, authors Ammerman and Roof claim that the days when business could ignore families and churches could take them for granted are over. Each of the contributors to this volume grapple with some facet of the dilemma facing Religion and religious organizations as they attempt to minister effectively to diversified and changing family forms. The book is organized into two sections: assessing the links among religion, family, and work, and exploring emerging patterns for responding to the contemporary needs of individuals and family units. Essays by Penny Long Marler, and Wade Clark Roof and Lyn Gesch, examine the link between traditional family forms and religious institutions. Marler demonstrates how mainline churches have been able to keep their market share of both husband-wife-plus-children families and the elderly, but have lost ground with younger singles and those in nontraditional households. Interestingly, she examines the process by which church programs for children and the youth are staffed and supported by older church members who remember with fondness their own participation in the life of the church as a family unit. Roof and Gesch note that attitudes in support of families participating in religion together occur most strongly amongst those who have the traditional family structure to match. Several essays examine the relationships among religion, gender, and paid employment: both Lyn Gesch and Charles Hall explore the inter- and intra-personal dynamics impacting upon womens employment status. Each of these chapters draws attention to the importance of gender images and gender expectation as women determine their role in the modern world. Using NORC data from 1972-1990, Bradley Hertel offers a detailed examination of religiosity and labor force participation among men and women. He concludes that by far the most significant challenge to organized religion lies in the work-related declines in membership and attendance attributable to the full-time employment of married women. Part Il of this collection invites the reader to consider some of the implications of changing family constellations for religious groups. Chapters by Don Browning and Joseph Reiff consider the more particular religious or ethical ramifications of the trends documented in the earlier data-based chapters. In an especially insightful essay by Cheryl Townsend Gilkes, the relationship between church and family is examined within the African-American experience. Claiming that it is possible to interpret the history of the African-American experience as a succession of dislocations affecting the relationship between work and family, she argues that it is in the construction of alternatives for survival and growth that the current mission of black churches is best understood. Choosing innovation at the personal level can involve substantial cost, but it also offers opportunities for immense rewards. Mary Johnson details the difficult choices some defense workers face as they struggle to reconcile their work experiences with their faith perspectives, and eventually decide role-exit is their option of choice. On the other hand, William and Sylvia Johnson Everett explore patterns of work and family among couples who decide to merge their familial and employment lives and work together. Small groups, or the home cell ministry, are an innovation that Stuart Wright believes has the potential to bring vitality and renewal to both mainstream and conservative churches alike. Bill DAntonio traces the growth and development of Intentional Eucharistic Communities (IECs) that have emerged within and kept rather close links with the Roman Catholic tradition while Mary Jo Neitz looks at the construction of womens rituals within Limina, a group loosely linked with Roman Catholic women, but clearly outside the boundaries of mainstream Catholicism. This collection of essays has something to offer just about any scholar interested in the issues raised by work, family, and religion in modern society. For the empirically sophisticated, there are chapters that tease apart the nuances of religious participation, employment status, gender, and parenthood. For those preferring narratives of the linkages between work and family, or case studies documenting the choices ordinary men and women make, there are several rich accounts of the process by which ones religious ideology intertwines with ones familial and work settings. Moreover, other chapters offer a more passioned plea for a return to the strong bond between family and faith. Without a religious institutions have been called upon to respond to the changes impacting families across the nation. The editors have pulled together a wide array of scholars to document the dilemmas facing churches and families of faith as we move towards the 21st century. For the most part, the chapters are clear and concise and though there is some unevenness in quality and scope, readers will not be disappointed. There is much in this volume to satisfy both the seasoned scholar and the undergraduate student. CRITICAL ANALYSIS: The concept of work family and religion is linked with one another in a sense that a person work for his/her life to live, move in society to improve his/her life style in life only because of work, a person can earn can live a better life of his/her own choice in society. In case of family it also plays a very important role in society because a person in this world wishes to succeed his/her family in society to get fame in society. Means that both work and family have very close relationship with one another. In case of religion, it has a much broader view from each person or family point of perspective because every one wants to give importance to God to prayers or to church to get through the line of success in life. Letà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚ ¢s take the example of a Muslim point of view about their religion Islam. They have a strong belief that asking from God by fulfilling the needs of prayers in order to get success in life because they believed that God come first then the idea of work and family all these things are based on God, if God will be happy we can easily achieve all these things in life. Same is the case with Christianity and Christianà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚ ¢s point of view about Jesus that by going to the church regularly saying their prayers share the good and bad things such as ideas/sins with a priest in order to change their bad deeds into good ones they have to ask from Jesus in order to get success. I am not referring towards the idea that hard working is not important and justly saying prayers either in the mosques or in the church for earning or success in life for all there things it is necessary to have some ability to be educated and work hard in life not just by wasting their time in rubbish things. So here in the idea to be educated a baby is not born with idea of education from his/her childhood he/she learn a lot from society people in their surroundings from parents so his/ her foundation is based on family and that family is then linked up with society. The media raised the above specified issue in article 1, because they actually want to show a comparison of the importance of work, religion and family in the past and in the present. In the past people used to gave a lot of importance to work, daily business in their lives, religion i.e. the role played by religion in the lives of people but in all this process they ignored the importance of family that why family is important , or why it is important to give more importance to family in life. But now according to the present time churches want to gave more importance to family as well as work and religion because according to their point of views family is also very important because the preaching of religion and churches are only for society, and what constitutes a society the people who are living in that society , the role played by families in a society and in families the role played by elders, so according to some churches that it is important to give more importance to the r ole played by elders in a society because they fulfill all the criteriaà ¢Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¡Ã‚ ¬Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â‚¬Å¾Ã‚ ¢s of family in life, but this view is contradicted by some churches that it is important that elders play a very important role in a family but along with elders the younger ones i.e. the siblings in a family means that the young minds in a family are also of great importance because the whole generation depends on the young minds in a family so if the young minds will not be fresh and have the complete opportunities in life for the exploration of new ideas and concepts then in that case such type of family will not be considered as the good family in society. MEDIA ARTICLE 2: Address (URL): http://www.lib.mq.edu.au/e-access/document.php?save=1HYPERLINK http://www.lib.mq.edu.au/e-access/document.php?save=1eid=52052HYPERLINK http://www.lib.mq.edu.au/e-access/document.php?save=1eid=52052eid=52052 CRITICAL ANALYSIS: In the past aboriginal family life style was very simple. They gave more importance to family. In their families they have father, mother brother and sister. They were all linked with one another because of love. They have great sympathy and heart full of emotions for one another. They were badly discriminated by the white people, because of their dark skin they were not respected in a society among the white people. The white people were used to rape their woman their woman was not respected like the white people woman. When the children were born they were brutally snatched from their parents. Children were also not comfortable in the field of education. They were not provided as much educational facilities like the white people. They were not provided of basic things in life like the white people. When ever a baby was born in their families not of dark skin so they were snatched by the white people so before they were carried away by them their families used to hide them from their cruel hands. This is true that the dark skin people have strong family views. They have their own family values, rules and regulation for spending their lives, but their ideas were not fully developed about the idea of success in life. They were not completely aware about the true meaning of life that to work hard in order to improve their standard of living in life. They used to live in caves and like to prefer the forests for their places of living. When the white people came at that time they have not strong and clear views about the idea of family, they were completely unaware of this thing the used to live together without getting married having children without any sort of strong relationship. They were more concerned with the idea of drugs and alcohol as compared to dark people, who in the beginning were completely unaware of using drugs in their lives. The white people induce this habit in them. This article is written to highlight the positive aspects of aboriginal families, that the concept of family is very strong among them in a sense that they give more importance to the members in their families such as more respect to their elders, respect their decisions, great love for their younger ones. According to this article the writer trying to convince that it is true that there are some negative aspects among the family lives of aboriginal people but along with some negative aspects they have some positive aspects too. For fulfilling the needs of negative aspects of aboriginal families government has to play a very important role such that the school curriculum must be designed in a way that children from aboriginal families must also take some advantage in the field of education because the community must be best identified through the importance of education in that particular community that either the ratio of people regarding education is raising in that particular community or not and if raised then get to know that up to which extent it has been raised. Through this process aboriginal families can be considered as the respectable families in society as compared to other communities. REFRENCES: Clark, Nason. Nancy. (1996). Work, Family, and Religion in Contemporary Society. Sociology of Religion Walker, Y. (1993). Aboriginal family issues. Family Matters, 35, 51-53. Skolnick, Arlene S., Skolnick, Jerome H. (2009). Family in Transition. New York: Pearson Education

Magnesium Essay -- essays research papers

Magnesium is the twelfth element on the periodic table. It is located in the second group called the alkaline earth metals. Natural magnesium contains three different isotopes, and there are twelve others that are recognized. Seawater is a rich source of magnesium in the form of salt. Magnesium is the eighth most abundant element in the earth's crust. Magnesium readily ignites upon heating in air and burns with a dazzling white flame. To extinguish the flame water should not be used. Alkaline earth metal salts in general, are less soluble in water than the corresponding alkali metal salts. Some are even so insoluble that they resist weathering and leaching action in rainwater. Alkaline earth metals are extracted from the mineral ores like they have been for many decades. This second group of metals is also less reactive than the alkali metals. They do not need to have a specific storage procedure like that of the corresponding elements. These alkaline metals react with acids, and in certain temperatures of water. They are also harder than their alkali friends. In general, they have a gray-white luster that tarnishes quickly in the air to form a tough, thin oxide coating. The coating protects the metal, particularly magnesium, from further oxidation. This allows alloys of these metals to be used as low-density structural materials. Magnesium is one of the two most important alkaline earth metals. It is found in seawater. Today, though it is chiefly produced by electrolysis of fused magnesium chloride. It has many uses. Magnesium is an important material that is a chief component in a number of high-tensile-strength, low-density alloys. These properties allow the alloy to be very valuable in air and spacecraft construction. Also, the alloyed metal is used to make a large variety of other products, such as, artificial limbs, vacuum cleaners, optical instruments, recreational skis, wheelbarrows, lawn mowers, and outdoor furniture. Magnesium is also found in asbestos. Asbestos was used in insulating materials up until it was found to cause cancer and other types of lung diseases. The unalloyed metal of magnesium is used in photographic flashlight powders, incendiary bombs, and signal flares. This special element also has many important roles in the body. The most vital need for it is on the cellular level. It is as important as calcium, and is found in bone... ... nuts, pecans, and cashews contain some of the highest amounts of the element from edible nuts. Many types of fish contain the element too, specifically salmon. Also fruits such as dried apricots or avocados hold the element well. Eating these foods proves to be beneficial to the body in the ways already stated and many more in the long run. As you can see, magnesium is a special element that is extremely useful in our lives. We come across every day, completely unaware that it is there or even what it is. Most elements are like that though, never thanked or recognized for the important roles they play in our world today. Life without elements wouldn't be life at all. Without elements, such as magnesium, we would find ourselves without many of the conveniences and advancements in civilization that are currently available to us. Society, as a whole, (not just chemistry students) should learn more about these elements and appreciate all that they have given them for without them, life wouldn't be the same. With new advances in space exploration and more experimental research, we are sure to find many more elements which will make the life to come almost an effortless exsistance.

Pest Analysis Essay

Political factors include the following types of instrument: – Legislation such as the minimum wage or anti discrimination laws. – Voluntary codes and practices – Market regulations – Trade agreements, tariffs or restrictions – Tax levies and tax breaks – Type of government regime eg communist, democratic, dictatorship Non conformance with legislative obligations can lead to sanctions such as fines, adverse publicity and imprisonment. Ineffective voluntary codes and practices will often lead to governments introducing legislation to regulate the activities covered by the codes and practices. Economical The second element of a PEST analysis involves a study of economic factors. All businesses are affected by national and global economic factors. National and global interest rate and fiscal policy will be set around economic conditions. The climate of the economy dictates how consumers, suppliers and other organisational stakeholders such as suppliers and creditors behave within society. An economy undergoing recession will have high unemployment, low spending power and low stakeholder confidence. Conversely a â€Å"booming† or growing economy will have low unemployment, high spending power and high stakeholder confidence. A successful organisation will respond to economic conditions and stakeholder behaviour. Furthermore organisations will need to review the impact economic conditions are having on their competitors and respond accordingly. In this global business world organisations are affected by economies throughout the world and not just the countries in which they are based or operate from. For example: a global credit crunch originating in the USA contributed towards the credit crunch in the UK in 2007/08. Cheaper labour in developing countries affects the competitiveness of products from developed countries. An increase in interest rates in the USA will affect the share price of UK stocks or adverse weather conditions in India may affect the price of tea bought in an English cafe. A truly global player has to be aware of economic conditions across all borders and needs to ensure that it employs strategies that protect and promote its business through economic conditions throughout the world. Social The third aspect of PEST focuses its attention on forces within society such as family, friends, colleagues, neighbours and the media. Social forces affect our attitudes, interest s and opinions. These forces shape who we are as people, the way we behave and ultimately what we purchase. For example within the UK peoples attitudes are changing towards their diet and health. As a result the UK is seeing an increase in the number of people joining fitness clubs and a massive growth for the demand of organic food. Products such as Wii Fit attempt to deal with society’s concern, about children’s lack of exercise. Population changes also have a direct impact on organisations. Changes in the structure of a population will affect the supply and demand of goods and services within an economy. Falling birth rates will result in decreased demand and greater competition as the number of consumers fall. Conversely an increase in the global population and world food shortage predictions are currently leading to calls for greater investment in food production. Due to food shortages African countries such as Uganda are now reconsidering their rejection of genetically modified foods. In summary organisations must be able to offer products and services that aim to complement and benefit people’s lifestyle and behaviour. If organisations do not respond to changes in society they will lose market share and demand for their product or service. Technological Unsurprisingly the fourth element of PEST is technology, as you are probably aware technological advances have greatly changed the manner in which businesses operate.

First Day of Classes

A9927139 English Writing March 13, 2013 First Day of Classes (draft 1) Throughout the first twenty years in most of our life, we have attended the first day of classes several times. This time, why not abandon the ancient way and be only one of its kinds. Early in the morning, students come to school half an hour before the bell rings. Step in to the school gate with a little part of our shirt out, so the prefect can catch us for not tucking the shirts in. The school petrol will definitely have a tremendous impression on us on the first day.Then, once students enter their classrooms, look around the existing mammal in the class, gaze at new classmates appearance and judge a book by its cover to decide whom we want to become friend with. Obviously we do not want to have a new amiga who is pretty but dumb, but at least it is better than without covering and being stupid. During the class, remember not to show off your talent and ability too early, and wait until the last minute. If no one else in the class can answer the question, then go for it.This is how our image of intelligent is formed; hopefully the rest of the class will praise you as Athena. Comes the break time, this is the perfect timing for us to acquaint new friends. We can see herds of pupils gather around and start giggling and gossiping. Try to start a conversation with peers we desire to be friends with and stick to them for the first few days. Friend’s accompany gives a sense of safety. After repeating the last two steps, there comes the end of the day. Farewell to our new friends and wish us a bright tomorrow.