Scenario

Last year, EasyJet announced record profits for a fourth successive year as the company continued to bolster its position as Europe's second-largest budget airline. It reported a rise in profits of 22% to 581m for the year ending 30 September, as revenues climbed by 6% to 4.5bn. Passenger numbers were up 6% to 64.8 million, with planes flying more than 90% full.

Shareholders, including its founder, Sir Stelios Haji-loannou, shared a 180m windfall, after the airline raised its ordinary dividend by more than a third to 45.4p per share. Despite the record profits, growth has slowed since last year and the airline's share price dropped 1% to 15.30 in early trading. The airline faces more competition from a rejuvenated Ryanair, Europe's biggest no-frills carrier, which has benefited from a policy of better customer service and imitating EasyJet with allocated seating and a push to attract business customers.

Carolyn McCall, EasyJet's Chief Executive, said the airline would be rolling out further incentives for the most frequent flyers after the successful trial of a loyalty scheme with 15,000 passengers in France, the UK and Switzerland. The free, invitation-only reward scheme for passengers flying several times a month includes greater flexibility on bookings, price guarantees if a competitor should undercut EasyJet's fare and a dedicated phone number.

McCall has been in charge for five years and dismissed rumours that she was planning to leave. "I love working here. We have a really fantastic team and there is lots more we can do," she said. The airline expects customer numbers to continue to grow and reported that advance bookings for the first

half of next year were already slightly ahead of the same period in the previous year.

It also said it faced increasing costs per seat, reflecting higher staff costs from opening new airport bases and

maintaining its ageing fleet, although it will gain from its continuing use of bookings technology and from

falling oil prices. It expects its fuel bill for the first half of the financial year to be between 12 and 22m less

than last year.

Task 1:

EasyJet is one example of an enterprise that has grown and continues to survive and thrive in the competitive budget airline market. It has clearly managed its resources well, makes use of IT in its marketing and bookings processes, complies with employment regulations and has awareness of its operations in relation to the product life cycle model.

Take the example of EasyJet or select another current enterprise then plan and carry out research examining the factors that affect its continued survival.

Using this research, prepare a written report that explains analyses and evaluates the impact of product life cycle on an enterprise's resource requirements.

You will need to consider the management of physical and human resources and any relevant legal implications for employment. You will also need to take into account the impact of technology, competition and market trends for the sector within which it operates.

The report will be comprehensive, professionally presented, with a logical structure and will be well written making use of the correct business and financial terminology.

Task 2:

From the scenario above it is evident that, as an enterprise, EasyJet has not only survived but has grown as well. This is reflected in some of the figures quoted and the comments made.

Looking at the example of EasyJet or another enterprise that you have researched, you need to carry out some further investigation in order to prepare a report that explores and explains the range of indicators that an enterprise would use as measures of growth. Your report should include an evaluation of the relative performance of enterprises using a range of growth indicators.

You will need to consider some financial and non-financial measures of growth, the relative importance of the measures used and you need to make some comparisons with other enterprises that operate in the same market.

The report will be comprehensive, professionally presented, with a logical structure and will be well written making use of the correct business and financial terminology.