ABSTRACT
The selection of new business opportunities is the basis for future corporate performance. Good evaluation weeds out the poorer opportunities, highlights the better opportunities, and improves the overall odds of successfully developing future profiTable businesses. The technique of evaluation has evolved into a sophisticated operation. Business opportunities, like people, come in many shapes and sizes. Experience has shown the advantage of systematically organizing these forces as an aid in ensuring that none are overlooked during evaluation. Forces largely outside the control of any single company can be grouped into four classes: economic, social, political, and technical. In each class there are the normal or logical alternatives to be considered as well as a “suprise situation,” the latter unpredic Table but many times of great significance. Business cycles with their booms and recessions typify economic forces. In the United States, for example, the federal government allows extractive industries a reduction in federal income taxes for depletion of their reserves.
