Branson, Dyson, Gates, Roddick – Virgin Dyson vacuum cleaners, Microsoft, Body Shop: dynamic and rich people with successful firms. All these entrepreneurs have in their time followed some of the many principles laid down by a typical Business Studies course. You will study these principles and learn from the examples of these entrepreneurs as well as, importantly, from the failed ventures which have littered the business world too. Business Studies covers the life-cycle of a business – from start-up to multinational company. Case-studies of a wide variety of businesses are used, ranging from the smallest business start-up (as may be seen on BBC2’s Dragon’s Den) to the largest PLCs, such as Tesco and Microsoft. It involves studying in some detail how today’s businesses carry out their various functions, including marketing, finance, operations management (production) and people (human resources).