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BMAN21040

INTERMEDIATE MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTING

2020

SECTION A WITHHELD

Multiple Choice Questions - not included with paper.

SECTION B

Answer two questions from section B (30 marks per question)

QUESTION 6

ChipCo designs architectures and processors, licensing them to device manufacturers including Dell, Apple, HP and LG for use in various devices such as smart phones, tablet devices and personal computers.

Because it is a very large company with a dominant market share (approximately 70%), it expands primarily through seeking ways to increase the total size of the world market for such devices.   This involves investing selectively in an ecosystem” of innovative downstream companies focusing on developing the next generation of mobile infrastructures.  It is these kinds of complementary products that may result in an expanding market for ChipCo’s devices.

ChipCo envisages a total cash investment in these downstream software firms of $400 million as of January 1st  2021.  This would be in return for minority shareholdings in them. ChipCo’s general policy is to seek to sell the investments to private equity firms or other buyers after a period of 5 years.

From extensive analysis of the prospects of the individual software firms, ChipCo conservatively estimates its investments in the software firms will be valued at about $450  million as of December 31st   2025.   In addition, ChipCo expects to receive dividends on its investments totaling $2 million annually, received at the end of each year from 2021 to 2025 inclusive.

If the software firms are successful, then a most-likely estimate is that total sales of devices will increase, yielding the following results for ChipCo and its competitors:

Forecast Incremental Volumes & Profitability for all device Sales:

2021

2022

2023

2024

2025

Volume increase (units)

385,000

500,000

636,000

591,000

568,000

Average selling price/unit

260

240

220

220

220

Total revenues

100,100,000

120,000,000

139,920,000

130,020,000

124,960,000

Variable production costs

40,000,000

50,000,000

62,000,000

57,000,000

55,000,000

Contribution

60,100,000

70,000,000

77,920,000

73,020,000

69,960,000

As % of total revenues

60%

58%

56%

56%

56%

Fixed production + sales costs

38,000,000

46,000,000

50,000,000

50,000,000

48,000,000

Operating income

22,100,000

24,000,000

27,920,000

23,020,000

21,960,000

As % of total revenues:

22%

20%

20%

18%

18%

The fixed production and sales costs in the table (above) are allocations based on the costing system of ChipCo.   It is not expected that ChipCo will need to increase its production or distribution capacity to meet incremental demand between 2021 and 2025. The data for selling prices and variable production costs are expected averages for ChipCo and its competitors in the region.

Since ChipCo currently holds 70% of the logic device market globally, it is expected that this percentage will decline by roughly one percentage point per year for each year from 2021 to 2025.  By investing in software developers, ChipCo unavoidably helps its competitors insofar as they too may gain in sales of logic devices.

The cost of capital rate used by ChipCo is 10% per annum and the relevant discount factors are as follows:

Table: Discount Factor at 10% per annum

Years 10%

Start 2021 1

End 2021 0.9091

2022 0.8264

2023 0.7513

2024 0.6830

2025 0.6209

REQUIRED:

a.  Compute the Net Present Value of the estimated direct returns from the minority

equity

investments

(10 marks)

And:


b.  Compute the Net Present Value of the combined direct returns from the minority equity  investments and the indirect returns of  making  the  investments  in software firms                                                                                       (5 marks)

And:

c.  Where individual firms are highly specialized, a need may arise to coordinate the investment decisions of any one firm with those of others in a network or “ecosystem” .  Examine how accounting might facilitate the coordination of such investment decisions at ecosystem” level.                                        (15 marks)

QUESTION 7

A power operator comprises three divisions.  The firm uses economic-value-added (EVA)  measures to  evaluate  performance  internally,  and  return-on-capital  (ROC) measures to report divisional performance to the capital markets externally.   The following financial statements have been prepared for each of the divisions:

Income Statements & Balance Sheets, Last Financial Year (US$ thousands)

Amounts in US$ thousands

Generation

Distribution

New

Energy

Income statements:

Sales:

76,800

63,120

57,600

Operating costs:

41,804

47,104

54,234

Depreciation of fixed assets:

4,400

1,800

1,500

Once-off write-down in value of investments:

1,500

----

----

Exceptional cost of fire in new energy division:

----

----

800

Interest on debt:

90

60

40

Operating income (loss):

29,006

14,156

1,026