Business Case

According to Boone and Kurtz (2003) business consists of all profit-seeking activities and enterprises that provide goods and services necessary to an economic system, of course at a profit. The profit is made on behalf of the owner (Symons and Adams 1993). Business provides people with food, clothing, housing, medical care and transport and almost everything else that makes life easier and better.

A business is a legally recognized organization designed to provide goods and/or services to consumers. Businesses are predominant in capitalist economies, most being privately owned and formed to earn profit that will increase the wealth of its owners and grow the business itself. The owners and operators of a business have as one of their main objectives the receipt or generation of financial returns in exchange for work and acceptance of risk. Notable exceptions include cooperative enterprises and state-owned enterprises. Socialist systems involve government agencies, public ownership, state-ownership or direct worker ownership of enterprises and assets that would be run as

9

businesses in a capitalist economy. The distinction between these institutions and a business is that socialist institutions often have alternative or additional goals aside from

The term "business" has at least three usages, depending on the scope -- the singular usage (above) to mean a particular company or corporation, the generalized usage to refer to a particular market sector, such as "the music business" and compound forms such as agribusiness, or the broadest meaning to include all activity by the community of suppliers of goods and services.